pryzk is right.

This forum is full of posts about Ultimate fares tricks.

You can get a decent ticket price with reputable Agents, I won't name them, but Airlines own systems usually win out.

Unfortunately, the old saying ' you get what you pay for' and 'if it seems to good to be true...' are valid most of the times! I agree with others here in that your best bet is booking directly with the airlines and checking some of the consolidators for comparison.. I find the airline sites do usually offer the best, if not the same fares.. not so much as it was a while back where some of the airlines would toss over their unsold allotments over to one of the 'big boy's to unload but find that happening less and less! Enjoy!

I just had the same thing happen to me! I booked a flight for $474.20 from England to USA and got the same confirmation email. I then called US Airways who didn't know anything about my confirmation. I then phoned Ultimate Fares and waited a LONG time before someone finally answered. Then they told me the airline rejected their price, and had come back with a higher price, over $300 more expensive!! I told her they would issue me the ticket, and any shortcomings would be at their expense. They never returned my call. I have reported them to the BBB in Nevada, and plan to file a complaint with the Attorney General of both Nevada and Washington. This is disgusting to bait and switch like that. If they had not sent the confirmation email confirming the flights, I would not be so upset. If there's this many unhappy customers, and that many BBB complaints, then why oh why hasn't someone shut them down???

I know many people also swear by Expedia or Travelocity, but I see no advantage in using even the big, well known sites. As for the unknowns, be careful.

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Indeed, the unknowns are the dangerous ones. I've read some horror stories about airlines that offer business and first class fares for far below retail.

What they don't tell you is they purchase fares from Canada (or some other cheaper origin point) and then route it through your airport and onwards. People would be issued paper tickets WITH COUPONS MISSING and they'd arrive at their airport and would find their itineraries were either cancelled because they missed the first leg or they were forced to pay enormous penalties for repricing of the fares.

I do find that some of the big online TAs can beat the airlines. Expedia often have web specials that the airlines themselves can't match. London to New York on AA in First Class for 410GBP? London to Abu Dhabi and back on BA in First Class for 900GBP?

They are certainly good for finding the cheapest airline on a given route and you can often save a few dollars just going back to the airline's own website.

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I searched Kayak, Orbitz, Travelocity and also airline websites in the hopes of, but not expecting to, find a semi decent fare to Paris tomorrow. The lowest fare I found on these sites was for a US Airways flight for $1950 (incl. taxes). Ultimate Fares, which I'd never heard of and somehow stumbled across, is charging $1247 (incl. taxes) for this same US Airways flight. The French Open beckons and I can be somewhat impulsive, so I feel lucky that the huge price difference and Ultimate Fares' incredibly ambiguous fare rules and that I checked Trip Advisor. I have a feeling that this and the other threads saved me a lot of money as well as my marriage. Sorry to hear about people's bad experience and thank you all for sharing them.

For those of you victims who want to pursue prosecution I think Ultimate Fairs is located in Florida....Boca if I remember correctly.

I cannot say this often enough. Third party internet booking agents can advertise whatever price they decide to advertise. When it comes to actually producing a ticket at that price....it never happens. I have never ultimately found working directly with the airline to be more expensive than those third party agents. The very worst thing is that when something goes wrong you cannot just go to the nearest gate agent or ticket counter. You have to get on your cell phone to Expedia or Orbitz or whoever and have long and protracted explanations and conversations while your plane takes off.

People should just book online with their airline of choice directly!

can only agree busy retired. i have dealt directly with airlines for my trips almost exclusively except when rtw tickets are involved.

was sucked into an rtw offer by a well known local travel agent a few weeks ago. a really good price, validity may08-feb09. but wouldn't u know, there were no seats available at that fare for 6 weeks either side of our departure date (in august!) but there were heaps available at double the price!

it's a joke and people need to have their wits about them.

What was the outcome of your complaints?