Firstly, you need to check with your bank whether certain debit card can be used for online purchases. If you have a credit card, then you are good to go.
For booking a flight always check several websites. You never know which website would at which point offer the best booking option, or which website has the best deal with a certain aircraft carrier. Sometimes travel websites have exclusive deals with an aircraft carrier or purchase certain number of tickets for a lower price, and later sell them after this tariff has been sold out on the aircraft carrier's website, hence at the given moment they could offer the best possible price. Sometimes you can find the best possible price through the website of the flight company. All this depends on the policy of an airline, whether or whether not an airline is advertised on a certain travel website, business policy of a certain travel websites, etc.
When there is a demand for a certain flight, the price for it rises, regardless of whether the tickets are selling fast or not. So, merely by entering your destination and preferred travel dates on the travel websites, you affect the price for that flight. What you can do about this is: turn off cookies on your Internet browser. If you are using Google Chrome, use Chrome Incognito mode.
If the dates of your trip are not fixed, you can search which date combination is the cheapest by using this website:
When entering the dates in your search, you have the option to pick "Whole month" or "Whole Year" for departure and return, and Skyscanner gives you monthly, or yearly view of all the flights for a certain destination by dates, and you can see which dates combination is the cheapest.
This is an example who you can find the best combination for a flight Belgrade - Tokyo. The return ticket, all taxes included is about 408 EUR.
The following local websites give you the chart view if you use option Pretraga letova ( + / - 3 dana):
Local website www.jeftineaviokarte.rs is good for options when you do not have credit or debit card that can be used for online purchases. The agency that owns this website allows ticket purchases within 24h of making flight reservation in local currency. There are ways to wire money to this agency even if you are not from Serbia.
When you choose your dates, now check several other websites to see what prices they offer. Some of the websites that you could check are:
www.expedia.com (flights and hotels search)
www.hipmunk.com (flights and hotels search)
www.jeftineaviokarte.rs (flights and hotels search)
www.whichbudget.com (flights search)
www.edreams.com (flights and hotels search) NOTE: Edreams first gives you prices taxes excluded, so in most cases it just appears that it is the cheapest, whereas it is not!
When you check all the prices and flight details offered through travel websites or directly on flights companies websites (sometimes one offers better flight time combination that the other for the same amount of money), search coupons.
Often times it is cheaper to pay a bit more for shorter layovers than to choose flights with long layovers. Keep in mind that food and drinks at airports are very pricey, so it is cheaper to save time even though you pay more for the ticket.
IF you are spending several days at a certain place, and then you continue your journey, try to enter ALL flights for that journey, or, pick an option multiple destinations. You will be surprisedhow the prices fall when you connect several different flights, regardless of the time you are spending at a certain location. There is no cap on the time spending in a certain location and buying "connected tickets" other than how far in advance certain flight company allows ticket purchases.
Check the tickets prices in several different currencies. Asian websites tend to have better rates for USD than other currencies, but this does not apply to all Asian websites. Also, the exchange rate can change between the moment of online purchase and the moment that amount of money is actually taken from your bank account, so you can be (un)pleasantly surprised when you realize the price is by a few EUR higher or lower when you see your bank statement. Such oscillations occur when you purchase tickets in currencies that change exchange rate more than the others: in USD or Swiss franks, for instance, compared to EUR or local currencies because credit card debts in Europe are paid either in EUR or local currency.
If you do not have frequent flyer number for a company that you are flying with, apply for their frequent flyer program online and you can immediately start using it. It can never hurt collecting miles.
Low-cost kompanije are often not included in travel websites searches, so you have to go to those website directly. The list of low-cost flight companies can be found here:
Some flight companies offer the best price for purchases through PayPal, so, it doesn't hurt to have account opened there, too.
