Travel Planning to Kona, Hawaii- A Tutorial

My wife and I were planning on accompanying my brother and soon to be sister-in-law to the Big Island of Hawaii in June, and as a result I did quite a bit of planning for the trip. Being cost efficient is important to all of us, but making sure we end up with decent accommodations at a good value is possibly even more important.

I thought I would document my search methodology in case it helped others to find and book their travel online. Please note that I am very meticulous when it comes to travel planning. I’m picky about where I stay, how I get there, and want to know what I’m going to do while I’m there. I even make printouts and carry a small binder with me. Anal, I know… but it works for me.
[Read more...]

How to Reach a Human When Calling Any Company

Get HumanEveryone has been driven crazy by a poorly staffed call center, sitting behind a horrible Interactive Voice Response Unit (IVRU) while calling a service provider like the phone company, cable company, government office or technical support. Well, help has now arrived.

Paul English, the CTO of Kayak.com, decided to build a site to help people get through to a real human after one such frustrating call. The result is GetHuman.com.
[Read more...]

Kayak’s Buzz – the Best Flight Deal Finder

Kayak BuzzAs previously mentioned, I’ve been using Kayak for travel planning for some time now, but I actually just discovered a new feature that is one of, if not the, best tools I’ve yet seen for helping to plan vacations that involve air travel.

The Kayak Buzz section offers a very cool, Google Map enabled shopping comparison tool which overlays destinations onto a regional or world map. The site lists the top deals for any given period of time and generally helps you decide where to go on vacation.
[Read more...]

Saving Money is as Good as Making It!

CashIt’s true. There is nothing like making a few $Hundred grand a year. But almost as good is buying stuff for half what it’s worth!

So, being the excellent consumer I am, The Man has compiled a list of 8 great tips for saving loads of cash. I’m not being paid a dime to make these recommendations, I’m just sharing a bunch of services which have saved me a cumulative ton of money in the past.
[Read more...]