Skip Header
Home Achieve your Financial Wellness Financial wellness insights

Travel smart and save more

20 Jul 2023

Everyone has different goals in different life stages but many Hongkongers set travelling as their prime goal believing there is “no point of working hard if you cannot enjoy their life”.

With the reopening of the economy after the pandemic, there is a heightened desire among Hongkongers to travel. A recent survey1 conducted by an online travel platform reveals that nearly 90% of survey respondents plan to travel within one year, 33% of them anticipate travelling 2 to 4 trips and 50% decide to increase their travel expenditure.

Amidst the persistently rising inflation, travel expenditures are unavoidably increasing. How can you reduce the cost of travel?

1. Travel during the off-season

School holidays such as summer vacation, spring break, Christmas holiday, and Chinese New Year are typically peak seasons for travel. As a result, the costs of travelling and flight tickets are comparatively high. If you want to save on travel expenses, it is recommended to consider travelling during the off-season.

One option is to commence your trip on Friday, as flight tickets are usually cheaper on that day, offering potential savings of up to 25%. If you fly on Thursday, you can even potentially save up to 51%.

2. Using credit cards abroad can be expensive

It’s common to use credit cards for shopping when travelling overseas. However, the exchange rate and transaction fees charged by different credit card issuers vary, so it’s worth doing your research.

Some cards offer the Dynamic Currency Conversion that allows the cardholder to settle the bill in Hong Kong dollars, but the exchange rate varies significantly. The exchange rate varies can be as much as 1.5% to 4% and reaching even 5% in certain locations. In addition, banks charge a transaction fee while card issuers may impose a cross-border transaction fee. As the costs add up, it is probably better to settle in the local currency or even pay in cash.

Apart from finding different ways to save money, you may also use online tools for managing the travel budget.

1 Source: 近9成港人計劃2023年出遊 Klook調查指海外活動預訂量激增28倍, am730, 2023

None

Understand Financial Wellness

Understand the definition and importance of being financial well

None

Determine your Financial Wellness

Assess your personal financial wellness with our easy-to-use tool

None

Retirement Savings Guidelines

Rules of thumb that make retirement planning simple