Tommy has over 15 years experience within the insurance industry, and his primary focus is helping travellers find the right cover for their medical conditions.
If you’ve booked a holiday, are looking to book a holiday or are even just in the planning stages, sometimes the excitement of heading away to far-flung destinations can become overwhelming, and other important topics can be overlooked.
Whether you’re looking to holiday on a budget, or you’re looking to splash out on a luxury holiday, it is still important to be careful with your money and save for emergencies whilst you’re there, if you’re planning to travel for a prolonged period, then trying to save money here and there to help you when you come home.
In this guide, we look at some of the simple ways you can try and save money whilst travelling and still ensure you have a great time.
Tips for saving money whilst travelling:
- Track your spending
- Create a travel budget
- Travel off-peak
- Be flexible
- Book in advance
- Make sure you have travel insurance
Track Your Spending
One of the simplest ways to make sure you aren’t overspending when on holiday is to track your spending. There are several options when it comes to tracking your spending, you could simply do this by keeping an eye on your spending daily with your online banking app, or you could download an app like Emma that allows you to track spending as you go, sending you alerts as you go if you are nearing your budget limit.
By creating an account with a bank like Monzo, firstly, you won’t be charged for transactions abroad, but you’ll also be able to transfer a set amount to the account, so you know you’re never going to be overspending. All these apps can be downloaded to your phone, so you can easily check and keep an eye on your funds.
Create a Travel Budget
One of the best ways to make sure you are saving where you can when you’re abroad is to set yourself a travel budget. Preferably, this would be completed before you start travelling to allow you to manage it whilst you’re on the move.
Set yourself a budget for the whole trip and then split this up into bitesize chunks, whether that is based on destinations or even broken down into daily budgets, this will make it easier to monitor and will also allow you to move money around accordingly if you overspend or underspend on certain days.
Travel Off-Peak
Whether you’re travelling locally or looking to travel abroad, one easy way to save money when you’re travelling is to try and travel at off-peak times. Off-peak tickets tend to be cheaper due to fewer people travelling and the need for seats to be filled, so taking advantage of this is a great way to travel.
If you’re flying, earlier and later flights will often be cheaper due to fewer people wanting to fly at those times, similarly, trains will usually run under the same format, so if you’re looking to travel by train, then early and late times are a good option.
Be Flexible
Flexibility will be your best friend when travelling. Allowing yourself to be flexible will mean that you can save money travelling at cheaper times and on less popular days. Take a look at the months you want to travel prior to booking and work out what is cheaper or works best for you and book accordingly.
The blog Adventures of Alice comments about allowing yourself to be flexible when travelling: “One of my top tips for saving money to travel is to be flexible. That can mean a lot of things, but what it aims to do is focus your budgeting mindset on how you can work around the money you DO have and adapt what you want from it.”
Book in Advance
Booking in advance is a simple way to save a few pennies, travel agents and companies will often offer deals if you book way in advance, similar, to booking last-minute. Booking in advance also allows you to amend and change your booking should you need to; this is a great option for those who may have pre-existing medical conditions as health can change and fluctuate quickly and the need to be flexible is a great advantage.
Make Sure You Have Travel Insurance
Losing luggage, dealing with cancelled flights, missing your flights or having to deal with a medical emergency can ruin a holiday, so making sure you have medical travel insurance is crucial to stop you from losing money. If you have a medical condition, then looking for specialist insurance like travel insurance for over 60s with pre-existing medical conditions or travel insurance for pre-existing heart conditions, is a wise idea and should be considered before travelling.
If you’re planning to travel abroad, or even just in the UK, and you’re looking to save a few pennies whilst you’re abroad, then hopefully these saving money when travelling tips have given you a few ideas on how to budget and keep costs down. For more articles and guides like this, make sure you check out our blog.