Online travel agents’ deals may be tempting – but be careful who you book through

The Man Who Pays His Way: Cut-price deals can make the difference between travelling or not

Read the small print when booking cheap flights through an OTA (Getty/iStockphoto)

Simon Calder, also known as The Man Who Pays His Way, has been writing about travel for The Independent since 1994. In his weekly opinion column, he explores a key travel issue – and what it means for you.

In aviation, if it looks too good to be true – it may still happen. I am flying out to Marrakech for the annual convention of Abta, the travel association, on Monday morning. My return fare for 2,800 miles of air travel aboard the world’s safest airline, Ryanair, is £57.

A reader named Malcolm is also off to Africa – but to Johannesburg, in the far south of the continent. He writes: “I am looking to fly to Johannesburg from London later this month. I found a deal on Skyscanner which was very reasonable. But it is on an airline called Air Odisha. Never having heard of them before, I am very cautious.”

He kindly attaches a screenshot from an online travel agent showing an 11-hour nonstop flight on a Boeing 747 from Heathrow to South Africa’s main hub on Air Odisha for, indeed, a very reasonable £305.

When I tried to replicate the search, I could find nothing of the sort – which suggests Skyscanner is doing its job and removing obvious rubbish from the flow of data from online travel agents.

Air Odisha was a short-lived regional airline in India that had just one aircraft (a small propellor plane, not a jumbo jet). It certainly never flew anywhere near the UK or South Africa, and I have no idea why any company would pretend that it would be doing so in a couple of weeks’ time.

Skyscanner provides an extraordinarily useful service in allowing travellers to survey the available options for any route on any day. I am a budget traveller and always seeking a good deal. The Air Odisha ghost flight was an aberration. But even looking at genuine offers I am wary of choosing the very cheapest option.

Right now I am looking at a proposed itinerary on Malcolm’s date for £325 one way. It involves flying from Ryanair from London Gatwick to Dublin – with just one hour 40 minutes to go through passport control, collect luggage and check in for an Egyptair flight to Cairo and an onward connection to Johannesburg.

The Egyptair segments are linked, which means that the airline will need to look after you if the Dublin-Cairo hop misses the connection. But if the first leg is late, the rest of your itinerary (and your money) will be lost.

Much more tempting is an Egyptair-only trip from London Heathrow for a mere £332. It offers good timings and a comfortable connection in Cairo: depart Heathrow at 2pm, with a two-hour wait in the Egyptian capital before the eight-hour overnight long-haul to South Africa’s biggest city.

That cheapest fare is with mytrip.com, an online travel agent that is part of the Etraveli Group based in Sweden – along with the better-known GoToGate.

I have not heard good things about either agency, but I would be prepared to book the flight subject to two conditions: first, if it is at least £50 cheaper than an agency I know and trust; second, if I am booking very close to departure.

The less time there is between buying and travelling, the lower the chance of things changing and having to seek help from the online agent’s customer service team. If there is a significant re-timing that means the flight no longer works for you, the help you need may not be forthcoming – or might be charged for.

Much better to choose a human agent, who will usually have access to a similar range of deals and is on your side. Or, if online really is the way to go, consider the “book through Skyscanner” option – it costs £23 more in the case of those Johannesburg flights, but I know that if anything goes awry I will be able to deal with a decent organisation.

Airlines work with online travel agents because they help to fill empty seats: Egyptair makes serious money from passengers flying the London-Cairo or Cairo-Johannesburg sectors alone, but when it is clear some seats would inevitably go empty the airline will offload them through online agents.

With pounds so puny, online agents’ deals are tempting. They can make the difference between travelling or not.

Just be circumspect about who, exactly, you book through.