My D is going to Japan for study abroad. She arrives in early January. The program ends in April.
What’s the best time to think about getting plane tickets? Is it a good idea to buy a one way ticket initially? Is it very common for students to travel afterwards? I know that when I did study abroad, my parents got one way tickets.
How have other parents worked out flights?
I bought a one-way ticket for D last year when she studied in London. We didn’t know when she would be coming back. She ended up staying an extra week to travel. (She had done plenty of other travel during the semester.) I think I started looking for tickets around this time. She also started in early January.
I think you have to play around with it. I have several times only needed a one way to or from Japan and ended up buying a round trip because it was cheaper. Also, the day of the week sometimes matters a lot. Midweek can be a lot cheaper.
April/May are peak tourist season due to the cherry blossoms around early April and the really good weather that time of the year. So it would be good to have travel reservations booked in advance.
I am a Chinese student. And parents often buy me round-trip tickets. Because round-trip tickets are much cheaper than one-way tickets in China!! For example, my parents spent 10000 YUAN for my one-way ticket this semester but my classmate only spent 6000yuan on their round-trip ticket!! What’s more, I suggest you book the ticket earlier and focus on ticket prices frequently because there are always large fluctuations on plane tickets prices. 
Depends on circumstances. Personally, I find the best deals generally about 8 weeks from travel however, that can go out the window if it’s a major holiday or a particularly busy tourist season. My eldest went to England and we did a one way ticket because she was going to be there for 6 full months.
My son studied abroad in Japan a few years ago. He was on the quarter system so he didn’t go until March. I believe that the ticket was originally booked in January, about 8 weeks before the scheduled date. It was a round-trip ticket with the return flight in June. At the time, he was hoping to get an internship to stay on in Japan for the summer, but wasn’t going to find out about it until he was already there. When he did get the internship, we were able to change his return flight to late August. We paid the additional cost of the ticket (about $300) plus the incredibly reasonable change fee of only $50. This was on Singapore Airlines out of LAX. Since the original round-trip ticket was such a good price, this option was probably cheaper than getting two one-way tickets. If you decide to do it this way, I would recommend choosing an airline with a reasonable change fee.
We bought a round trip to London. She went one week early. Honestly, she didn’t have any money left to travel at the end. Neither did her friends, and they all came home on the same flight, but D was the only one who could check in online as she had a round trip ticket and her friends had two one way tickets.
To change the return would have been about $150-200, plus the difference in fare.
The difference in fare is a key thing. I called United last week to try to push forward a flight I had scheduled to Tokyo in two weeks. The change fee was about $200, but the fare difference I would also have to pay was at minimum $2000. It doesn’t matter if the fare on those days would have been the same as my original flight when I purchased the tickets three months ago, United uses the fare as it is right now.
If you have enough airline miles then that can be a good option, since those tickets don’t cost more for two singles than one return flight (and to avoid change fees you could leave booking the return flight until dates are more certain, assuming your airline has decent availability). However make sure that any visa rules don’t require you to show a return ticket when entering the country.
" However make sure that any visa rules don’t require you to show a return ticket when entering the country."
^^ This is what I was going to mention. It is fairly common to need a round trip ticket when entering another country, visa or no visa.
Fares seem to be less time sensitive than in the past. It used to mean booking way ahead of time was cheaper. Now it seems the 1-2 month window can be optimum. I often use the Kayak search engine. They have some handy features. One is a Price Forecast tool which will show up in the upper left corner of the screen and will give you and idea if fares have been cheaper or more expensive than what you’re currently seeing. They also have a feature that lets you sign up for alerts if fares drop. You could go on now and monitor over the coming weeks. I wouldn’t wait too long.
And sometimes you just have to make a plan and stick with it if the change fee or new return fare is too high. My daughter had a great time in London for 13 weeks. Sure, she would have loved to traveled around for a few weeks after the semester abroad, and if she had had the money to do that, plus to change the ticket, she could have done that. She didn’t.
When we booked the airfare, it was cheaper for her to get the round trip. Even in Jan when booking, it was more expensive to return in May than on the day her program ended, in April. As I said, the other kids ended up coming home too and had to pay more for their tickets booked when overseas and on shorter notice.
We’ve starting using Goggle Flight Alerts for our travel and have been pleased with it.
My son had a round trip ticket with an extra week at the end. If I remember correctly, he traveled around Japan using the train. One of his favorite places was Nikko National Park, and the extra week gave him time to go back to a couple of places he wanted to spend more time at or had missed. The extra week was planned with a friend, so he had somebody to explore the sites with.
Edit: I forgot to say he had a fantastic time! I think your daughter will love it!
We bought two one-ways when my D when to Japan for study abroad. Many US kids study near Osaka and the flights for that usually go through Korea. Because it was a spring SA, she thought she might like to spend extra time in Japan after the semester ended in June. She did travel around a bit and it was easier to find a flight home from Tokyo. Getting a flight out of Osaka in June was much harder and she would have needed to head backwards and change in China. Bottom line: I began watching fares in late November even though we didn’t have a confirmation of her start-date in Japan and purchased in late December. She flew Nippon Air. The flight home was much harder to secure and in the end I only found a Singapore Air that connected with a Virgin flight in LA. The first leg of the flight spoiled her.
If you child finishes in early April you might find the returns hard to come by or expensive. That’s peak cherry-blossom season and there will be lots of competition for flights
Tip: Yamato is a luggage forwarding service that everyone in Japan uses. Your child can ship their luggage to or from the airport (even one in another city) and it will be there on the departures floor when they check in. Even a large suitcase costs about $25. Most trains don’t have space to stash anything larger than an carry-on.
We bought one-way for our son’s junior year in London. We visited him at Christmas/New Year break, and went to Paris and Rome with him and his sister. He made his own return flight arrangements as well as trains for other trips in Britain and continental Europe. We wanted him to have flexibility, so didn’t tie him into a specific return date.
My D has studied abroad twice. Once (maybe both times) she had to have the return ticket to enter the country per visa requirements as others have mentioned. Start watching ticket prices now using Google flights. We had to wait to buy tickets until we had specific information on when she needed to arrive for her program. She had to arrive in a specific window of time on a specific day or it would have made things more complicated for her, and that limited flight options. From watching flights, in one case it wouldn’t have mattered when we bought the tickets—the price stayed the same until about two weeks before departure, and then it went up a little. The other trip, there was more variation in ticket prices but sometimes saving money requires making the travel very difficult on the kid.
When my son used the alerts, he was notified of a price drop by United. I just looked up his ticket cost, and it was $649 round trip to Tokyo (layover in San Fran outbound, Denver inbound). The price drop only lasted a few hours, but those kids who booked immediately got that price (considered great from our part of the country). The ones that waited ended up paying double the amount.
We bought this bag https://www.ebags.com/product/ebags/mother-lode-tls-weekender-convertible/143101 which he traveled around with (the heathered-graphite gray is a nice color). It was much easier to use on public transport than a wheeled carry-on. There is a smaller version which may fit your daughter better https://www.ebags.com/product/ebags/tls-mother-lode-weekender-convertible-junior/241465
They should be discounted around Black Friday. Just an idea if she plans on weekend or overnight excursions, but pack light - the bag will get heavy if she stuffs it full.
@Lindagaf Just wanted to bug in here and say, how exciting! I remember all your posts when she was deciding on a school (the WL and all…) and our D’s had alot of similarities in their experience. My D spent a semester in Budapest and absolutely loved her time there. Good luck to your D and I know she’ll also have the time of her life
Thanks everyone! Kayak is telling me to buy now, for a roundtrip ticket. Ack! She actually recieves the official info packet today, so I’m going to have her look at their rules for RT versus OW tickets in terms of entering the country.
Thanks, @NEPatsGirl ! Yes, can’t believe she’s a junior in college. When I first came to CC, she had just finished sophomore year.
LOVE Budapest!!! Congrats to your D too. She’s nearly done!
@Lindagraf, best to get a round trip ticket. My daughter was almost prevented from leaving Boston to fly to Japan two years ago at Christmastime. Her ticket was actually the return leg of a round trip that originated in Asia, but she didn’t have proof that she return travel because we hadn’t purchased the ticket to return to the US yet. This was not a problem the year before. Rules keep changing.
Also play around with departure airports if you have a choice. The prices can vary a lot.
You can rest assured that your daughter will love Japan and be very safe.