Last week, we wrote about our friend who is traveling to a few cities in Europe and how a multi-city itinerary was more expensive than booking an open jaw and using low cost carriers to construct a multi-city itinerary .

Today, we were helping a friend travel to South Africa and Namibia. The travel hack we detailed above would have been $400 more expensive than a simple multi-city itinerary.  Since our friend was traveling with 3 other people, that would have cost $1,600 more for the group. Now the group will have more money for more tasty South African wine.

Here’s how to construct a multi-city itinerary to compare and contrast (we will use Orbitz.com for demonstration purposes):

Multi-City Search

Once you have entered all your cities, select “Find” to search for the fare. It should give you this:

Multi-City Flight Selection

Select your flights and it will reprice the itinerary for you.

The takeaway from this is to always search all possible scenarios. The search engines will not always give you the best price; and sometimes some manual intervention is necessary when your itinerary is more than just an origin and destination.

Background Information:

• South Africa – US Citizens do not require a visa. Passport must be valid for another six month and have 2 empty pages
• Namibia – US Citizens do not require a visa. Passport must be valid for another six month and have 2 empty pages