Comparing the temporal changes of airfares on online travel agency websites and metasearch engines

Recent trends in transport and communication infrastructures have had a profound impact on the tourism industry. Despite the growing number and importance of online travel agencies and travel metasearch sites tourism literature addressing this issue is very scarce. This paper aims to examine the temporal changes of return airfares on online travel agency (OTA) and travel metasearch websites from Budapest to three short-haul destinations for fixed departure dates in high and shoulder season. The study was based on quantitative research methods using automated internet data collection and statistical analysis (ANOVA tests). During the study, we created a database containing more than 31 thousand ticket prices over a 182-day period for the three selected destinations. Empirical findings showed that no single website offered lowest airfares consistently and metasearch sites outperformed OTAs in almost any cases by offering lower airfares. Results also indicated the best time to book flights on the selected sites, airfares for shoulder season were significantly cheaper than for high season and ticket prices tend to be more expensive on Mondays and Sundays