Are there websites that will purchase airline tickets automatically?

May 27, 2005 9:42 AM

I'm looking for a travel website that will purchase airline tickets for a specific date automatically once the price goes below a specified amount. I'm pretty sure this service is available for purchasing stocks. But is it for airfare?
posted by sublivious to Travel & Transportation (7 answers total)

I tried something called TripStalker after the developer and mefi member plugged it in this thread. I put in my info and email address, setting it up to notify me when prices went below a certain point, but never got it to do anything. Maybe JpMaxMan will stop by and let us know if the bugs are worked out?
posted by jacobsee at 10:50 AM on May 27, 2005

(You're referring to stop and limit orders on stocks)

Orbitz DealDetector will send you an email if/when a price drops below your specified amount. I've used it before for personal trips - it works fine.
posted by milkrate at 12:47 PM on May 27, 2005

Response by poster: Yeah, I have the same thing set up in Travelocity, milkrate. Unfortunately I've found that sometimes a deal will break and by the time I try to buy, it the deal's over. This makes me very sad.

Jacobsee's advice seems perfect. I've emailed the developer to find out if it's still 'online' so to speak.

Thanks!
posted by sublivious at 12:59 PM on May 27, 2005

Just an update on this - we have just come out with a Public Beta 2 which has numerous bug fixes. Thank you to everybody who gave us extremely valuable feedback! And, sorry to be so long without an update... we have been working tirelessly to get this version out!

Stop by and check it out, we are giving away free "I AM A STALKER." t-shirts to the first 500 people who book a ticket using the TripStalker. (and one person will find a Sony PSP wrapped in the shirt!)

Our future features list has grown insanely long - and we have a lot of exciting improvements that can be made down the road. For now, we are focusing on core functionality and making sure it works as designed - bug free.

Your feedback is valued and I hope to get a section up on the tripstalker.com to fromally track feature requests and bugs. For now, please fill out the feedback form and let us know what you think!

Thanks!!
posted by JpMaxMan at 6:35 AM on June 21, 2005

jp, thanks for the update. do you still have forums on your web page? i'd be interested to hear how other people are dong with TS
posted by jacobsee at 7:39 PM on June 21, 2005

Working on getting the forums back up - we had the login system for the forums integrated with the TripStalker. In the changes in getting public beta 2 out, that hook was broken. Instead of delaying any longer we've put out the public beta 2 and taken the forums down. I'll be sure to put a post here when they're back up :)

In the feedback we received people are finding the TripStalker extremely useful - which makes us very happy!! The main use, and probably what we will foucs around in trying to promote this, seems to be 'event travel'. By event, I mean anything with a fixed date that is known sometime out. Like SpringBreak got great results in our first launch. One person even wrote in that they were stalking their flight to go home to Beijing for the Chinese new year!

Thanks!
posted by JpMaxMan at 5:51 AM on June 23, 2005

jacobsee: Just remembered this thread and thought I'd let you know we did put forums up: TripStalker Community
posted by JpMaxMan at 2:31 PM on April 4, 2006