Many vacationers must book their holiday dates well in advance in order to ensure their employer will give them the time off. These people have the advantage of being able to book their holidays long prior to their departure date in order to receive favorable pricing. However, if you are able to travel on a more flexible schedule, with an equally flexible sightseeing agenda, searching for global late deals may be the best way to get more vacationing value for your investment.

What are global late deals?

Prices in the travel industry resemble a bell curve. If you book well in advance, you can often take advantage of an early reservation discount, depending on the travel vendor you’re working with. As the departure date approaches, prices climb steadily, and reach a high point several weeks before the reservation date.

If the accommodation, hotel, flight, cruise, or resort sells all of its available tickets, and few travelers cancel their reservations, prices never really fall back down again. On the other hand, if the travel provider does not sell all of its available tickets, or if the particular offering experiences a high traveler cancellation rate, the vendor ends up with excess capacity.

Knowing that no revenue is earned on empty accommodations, but that relatively few travelers are willing to pay full price for last-minute reservations, travel providers are forced to deeply discount their last-minute accommodations in order to make some revenue on the available capacity. This is called a “global late deal,” because the travel industry market sector providing booking services for this niche of traveler must usually collect last-minute worldwide bargains to ensure profitability.

What does all of this mean for you, the traveler? If your travel schedule is flexible, you can leave on holiday on very short notice, and your list of desired vacation destinations equally easygoing, you can enjoy fantastic trips for a fraction of the normal cost.