Flying locally can set you back a fair bit, especially if you’re booking a ticket close to your departure date.

Luckily we have the internet, which makes it easier to compare prices, but it’s still a good idea to keep tabs on what’s happening.

With that in mind, MyBroadband decided to do your homework for you. To see who is the cheapest at the moment, they looked for local flights on major airlines and compared the website and pricing for each.

First up is the black sheep of the SA airline family. Once we’ve run through each site, we’ll compare the prices.

South African Airways

Despite being a financial disaster, the airline still somehow manages to maintain a well run and efficient website.

Booking a round trip is pretty easy and you can see which class you’re paying for along with any extra charges.

Mango

Mango only operates in South Africa, so it’s easier to search through airports for flight bookings.

The website is quick and easy to navigate and you can sort by ‘price’, which takes the work out of finding the cheapest option.

Kulula

Kulula’s website is quick and the flight booking interface displays the lowest prices available.

As long as you don’t end up on this now notorious flight, everything should run relatively smoothly.

You can also book BA flights through their portal.

Safair

Safair’s website has a simple interface and is easy to navigate.

Selecting flights can get tricky, though. The cheapest fare on the site does not include checked baggage, which means paying extra to check a bag in.

This extra charge is usually more than the ‘Lite’ and ‘Standard’ fare.

British Airways

British Airways is operated by Comair. The website is easy to navigate but takes some time to load.

It’s also the only website where you can view car rental and hotel packages as well as airfares.

Return Flight Prices

Now for the real test – ticket prices.

For each airline’s online booking platform, we selected the cheapest departure flights available on 25 January 2019 and return flights for 30 January 2019.

We selected the cheapest airfare available for each airline, not including any flights which were operated by partner airlines.

The lowest class of travel which included checked luggage was selected for each airline ticket.

You can see the results here:

When it comes to the JHB – DUR flight, Mango takes the lead with the cheapest flight, Kulula follows and British Airways edges into third place.

Mango also comes out tops in the JHB – CPT flight, with Safair in second and Kulula taking third.

What should you take from this? Just shop around a little before booking your flights, or make use of comparison sites, because there’s money to be saved.

[source:mybroadband]