10.16.26 Clark Answers His Critics on Clark Stinks / Winter Travel Strategies

Friday - Clark Stinks day! Christa shares Clark Stinks posts with Clark. Submit yours at Clark.com/ClarkStinks. Also, even if oil and jet fuel prices drop, major U. S. airlines warn that fluctuating costs mean high airfares are here to stay for the foreseeable future. With flight delays and unpredictable pricing making winter travel tricky, flexibility and preparation are key. Clark breaks down his top strategies for beating high airfares and making your travel budget go further. All this and more on the October 16, 2026, episode of The Clark Howard Show. Submit your opinions or questions: Ask Clark. Clark Stinks: Segments 1 & 2 Winter Travel: Segment 3 Ask Clark: Segment 4 Mentioned on the show: Why Clark Says You Should ‘Ignore’ Paze as Trendy New Payment Option TSA PreCheck® vs. Global Entry vs. CLEAR+: Which Is Best for You? Is There a Safe Way to Use Your Debit Card? - Clark Howard Follow Clark Howard's #1 Rule To Travel Cheap Booked a Flight? This New Tool Will Tell You When the Price Drops Today's Top Travel Deals -ClarkDeals / Travel Archives - Clark Howard Points Path Review: This Free Tool Makes Using Travel Points Much Easier Clark Howard’s Secrets to Beating Sky-High Airfares and New Hidden Fees Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card Review: What To Know About the Travel Card Clark.com resources: Episode transcripts Community. Clark.com / Ask Clark Clark.com daily money newsletter Consumer Action Center Free Helpline: 636-492-5275 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Indeed. You're ready to level up your business, but the pressure to find the right person to make that happen is intense. Indeed sponsored jobs can help carry the load. It boosts your job post to help it reach quality talent fast. Cut through the chaos with Indeed sponsored jobs. Get a $75 sponsored job credit at indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring now? Then this is a job for Indeed sponsored jobs.

• 0:30Speaker 01

  Visible puts the ultimate wireless hack in the palm of your hand. With unlimited 5G wireless data and hotspot designed to keep you connected. Powered by Verizon's 5G network. And no contract holding you back. Plans start at $25 a month or get the premium Visible Plus Pro plan and save $10 on your first month when you use promo code hack. Make the switch at visible.com. Terms apply. See visible.com for details.

• 1:05Speaker 02

  It's so great that you're with us here on the Clark Howard Show. You know, our mission is to serve you with advice and information that empowers you if you make better financial decisions in your life. And it's about to be the weekend. And you know, that always puts me in a great mood. What could be better? Mid-October, fall, football, all in combination. Oh, how great. Anyway.

• 1:37Speaker 03

  Close to Halloween.

• 1:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, your birthday.

• 1:40Speaker 03

  But Halloween more importantly.

• 1:42Speaker 02

  No, your birthday is more important to you than Halloween, isn't it?

• 1:46Speaker 03

  No, not really. Uh-uh. I love Halloween.

• 1:49Speaker 02

  Are you going to a costume party?

• 1:50Speaker 03

  No, I love to hand out candy and see all the little kids in their costumes.

• 1:55Speaker 02

  And so you followed my advice last year and after Halloween, you bought discounted Halloween candy.

• 2:02Speaker 03

  Sure, that's stale now.

• 2:03Speaker 02

  That's what you're giving out now?

• 2:04Speaker 03

  No.

• 2:05Speaker 02

  No, you're not doing that.

• 2:06Speaker 03

  I get mine at Costco.

• 2:07Speaker 02

  Okay. That may not be the cheapest on Halloween candy, actually.

• 2:11Speaker 03

  Wah, wah, wah.

• 2:12Speaker 02

  But it's convenient because you got those huge bags.

• 2:15Speaker 03

  Huge bags.

• 2:16Speaker 02

  Yeah. The key is to buy candy you don't enjoy yourself.

• 2:19Speaker 03

  Oh, definitely. Can't be any Kit Kats or Twix in there or they're gone.

• 2:24Speaker 02

  Oh, is that what actually got you for your birthday?

• 2:26Speaker 03

  No, no, thanks.

• 2:28Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 2:29Speaker 03

  Anyway.

• 2:30Speaker 02

  But anyway, we digress way far because it's time for our weekly Clark Stink segment coming straight ahead. And also in this episode, you know that I live in airports and I sure haven't been happy with the airfares I'm seeing. So I've had to employ a bunch of strategies to save and I want to share some of those with you if you're suffering sticker shock at what airline tickets are costing now. But right now, you get to be shocked by what people are unhappy with me about how I may have messed up.

• 3:12Speaker 04

  I should have never encouraged you to speak.

• 3:14Speaker 05

  You must think I'm pretty stupid. You should be ashamed of yourself. Well, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe you're right, pal.

• 3:25Speaker 03

  Okay, I apologize in advance for the pronunciation of this name. Lajos in Washington says, Clark smells worse than a drive-through hog farm on a North Carolina avenue. You advise consumers to ignore PAYS, a payment option that lets banks bypass the Apple, Google monopoly when doing online checkouts. I like my credit card company and I want the micro fee that they end up paying Apple to go directly to them.

• 3:52Speaker 02

  Thank you for that. Have I really bashed PAYS?

• 3:55Speaker 03

  Not that I remember.

• 3:57Speaker 02

  You know, if I did that, I don't remember. I think I explained why PAYS exists because the banks have fought back against the attempt to have an efficient payment system like other countries have and the Federal Reserve tried to do it and the banks freaked out and they came up with PAYS. We can have a lower cost, more trustworthy, more efficient payment system in the U.S. We just don't have it yet.

• 4:26Speaker 03

  George in Florida says, the idea of a dedicated Chromebook for finances was wonderful from a security idea. I've gotten my in-laws, my parents and others all on board with it. Now, after a few short years, they're all obsolete. They're all talking about security warnings and Google's refresh policy is way too short, even with their half-hearted extensions, essentially causing piles of waste to the environment and our pocketbooks. None of us are sharp enough to go to updated to the Linux OS or whatever options that are possible to make it run. Your Clark.com content on Chromebooks is all about to be out of service from Google's perspective, so it might be time to update that as well. You know, every five to 10 years, you got to refresh everything, putting it in the landfill.

• 5:11Speaker 03

  This is not saving us money and that's why the advice stinks. And perhaps more why Alphabet stinks. They seem to do this with all hardware. Alphabet has done this to their exercise trackers, thermostats, TV boxes. Perhaps advice should gear toward companies that aren't unnecessarily obsolete with their products costing us money. Yeah, I know the irony. I'm using their email. Time to go to Proton Mail.

• 5:34Speaker 02

  Okay, so George, this is fantastic that you wrote in about this because it's something I wanted to talk about on the podcast and YouTube show that Google basically has lost the love for Chromebooks. And I think the final blow was when Apple came up with the new, is it called the Neo? MacBook?

• 5:59Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 6:00Speaker 02

  That they've already had to raise the price on because of the chip shortages, but it really hemmed in Chromebook. And now Google, doing one of the things Google does is they're coming up with yet a new operating system that apparently is going to be introduced really soon. And Chromebook's like, what are they? We did something called Chromebooks? They're about to start all over with a new thing, which I don't even know if there's an official name for it yet.

• 6:29Speaker 03

  I don't know.

• 6:30Speaker 02

  So yeah, my Chromebook advice is going stale. So those of us who have Chromebook pluses, we're still going to get the updates on those for a number of years to come. But regular Chromebooks, I'm going to have to rethink how I do advice on that. And thank you for bringing it up. I just wasn't ready to talk about it yet because it's still not completely clear what Google's new strategy is. And you're completely right about Google saying, oh, we're doing fitness trackers. Oh, no, now we're not. Oh, we're doing this. Oh, now we're not.

• 7:07Speaker 03

  The home security, I had that whole thing.

• 7:09Speaker 02

  Yeah. I mean, they just, there's like, oh, well, we thought that would be a good idea. Nope, we're done.

• 7:15Speaker 03

  So this might sound like Google bashing, but I'm going to read this one from Daniel.

• 7:18Speaker 02

  You have another Google?

• 7:19Speaker 03

  Daniel in New York.

• 7:20Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 7:21Speaker 03

  If you're really concerned about companies accumulating and abusing data about people as you were with the baby monitors and many other past situations, then you should take a hard look in the mirror and seriously reevaluate the way that you present Google. So often you give Google a free pass treating it like an open source Goldilocks that gives a great deal. It's free compared to other companies that overcharge for products and services. As I'm sure you know, that isn't really how it works. Google is the original author of the shady data practices that you pin on others. And Google is not the white knight, open source defender of the digital commons while everyone else is building walled gardens. Yes, Android is open source, but many of the layers built on top, such as the Play Store, Gmail and Google Maps are not.

• 8:06Speaker 03

  The reason why Android phones are generally cheaper and more attractive among the less affluent is because Google gives software away in order to package you up and sell you onwards. I happen to personally use both Google and non-Google products and I have accepted the pluses and minuses of both, as I'm sure you have too. However, if you truly value the free market, you should stop giving Google free advertising and discuss more about the ways they damaged the free market using price manipulation to grow market share and become a monopoly. The same way that drug dealers give free samples or Microsoft made it financially impossible in the early years for other companies to offer any operating system other than Windows.

• 8:47Speaker 02

  That's a very thoughtful post about Google and Google's original founders. Do you remember what their thing was they would tell every employee when they started?

• 8:58Speaker 03

  No.

• 8:59Speaker 02

  Do no evil.

• 9:00Speaker 03

  Oh yeah, that's right.

• 9:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, that was their thing. But you know, there are many generations into leadership now and it all seems to be about the data, the value of data that they have from us that use all the various free products. So the post is very harsh.

• 9:22Speaker 02

  Sounds more like a Google stinks than Clark's.

• 9:25Speaker 03

  Right.

• 9:25Speaker 02

  It's just, you said that I give Google a free pass. Google is not who they used to be. But they make some very good products. And I understand using them that I'm giving up a lot for the freedom. But that's why I use different browsers. That's why I use Proton Mail. Somebody else mentioned Proton.

• 9:52Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 9:52Speaker 02

  Yeah. I use Proton Mail. So, yeah. You want to be not beholden to any one company. And when they get too intrusive, go somewhere else.

• 10:05Speaker 03

  All right. Parabo Tech in Georgia says, Clark, I wouldn't touch you with a 25 and a half foot pole. Stink, stank, stunk. Today, someone asked when you thought you'd be able to just get in his car and tell it to drive from South Carolina to Wisconsin and allow him to sleep, read a book, et cetera. As usual, you went on about Tesla cars and how they could do that now. You neglected to tell the listener the raw truth. You could have told him about the autonomous vehicle levels one through five. You could have also said that there is no level five AVs sold to the public yet, and that includes Tesla. You never told the listener the hard truths directly that there currently there are no level five AVs to buy and he cannot sleep, read a book, or anything else in any Tesla

• 10:47Speaker 03

  other than sit in the driver's seat and pay attention the entire trip. Anything else would be illegal and dangerous to everyone. Please get off your Tesla platform.

• 10:57Speaker 02

  So my Android phone on my Tesla.

• 11:00Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:00Speaker 02

  Like, okay. So the Tesla software now is phenomenal. It really is. It's really great. But at the same time, Tesla has had trouble with their new, their Cyber Taxi? Is that what the, that?

• 11:18Speaker 03

  I don't know.

• 11:19Speaker 02

  The autonomous, fully autonomous vehicle like the Waymos. Tesla has had a tough birth of that. No doubt, one of the problems with the Tesla technology is those of us who use it get to where we trust it too much. And at just the wrong moment, we won't be paying attention and it could cost us our health or our life. No doubt. We are in, you were talking about levels one to five. The Tesla technology, I guess, is level two, I think is what it is. But, you know, the new Tesla Cyber Cab, Cyber Cab, is that what they, whatever they call

• 12:01Speaker 02

  it, has no steering wheel, no brakes, nothing like that. I mean, you just get in it and it's a robot driving you. Again, they have not been able to get that to work yet. The Waymos have been far more successful, even though there have been problems from time to time. But I'd say the big thing about this is my belief that these semi-autonomous driving systems, let's call them that, reduce the chances of you being in an accident a significant amount. I believe that, I'm in a Model Y with the latest FSD, Full Self-Drive.

• 12:42Speaker 02

  It drives so much safer than I can as a human being. Is it foolproof? No. Is it something that makes me much safer on the road, especially on a road trip? I think without doubt. I drove here, well, I didn't drive. The car drove to the studio today. I just put in the destination, hit a blue button, and it drove me here. And I didn't do anything till I got to where I had to park the car in a space.

• 13:18Speaker 03

  Larry.

• 13:18Speaker 02

  That's going to create.

• 13:19Speaker 03

  Well.

• 13:20Speaker 02

  Additional stinks, right?

• 13:21Speaker 03

  Larry in Ohio says, you don't really stink. I'm a 27-year-old listener and I've seen you speak live twice and I couldn't count the number of good advice from your show I've used in that time. I just dropped my Clear Plus membership after many years as I don't get it free from a credit card. However, Delta and American both offer TSA Touchless ID at certain airports and I find it at least as fast as Clear. In fact, at the Las Vegas airport, the touchless passengers were whizzing by while we were waiting in the clear lane. Thanks to you and your amazing staff for all you do.

• 13:54Speaker 02

  Okay, so, true story. You know, I do travel a ridiculous amount. And so I'll walk up to security in an airport and I've got Pre-Check, I've got Global Entry, I have Clear, I've got Touchless ID. And I look and I see which of the lines are the shortest, which would be the Clear with the digital gates in airports that have that, and the Touchless ID and the regular Pre-Check. And I just go in whichever one is quickest. If you're not flying all the time, or you don't have something that picks up your membership for Clear, if you're willing to give, this goes back to the Google thing.

• 14:38Speaker 02

  If you're willing to give up a layer of privacy and allow Touchless ID, and this is Google again, on an Android, you can have it set up Touchless ID with various airlines. The Touchless ID is quicker almost always than regular TSA Pre-Check and is often quicker than Clear.

• 15:04Speaker 03

  Kenneth in California says, excuse me, regarding debit card use, Clark stated debit cards do not have the same consumer protections offered by credit cards. And choosing credit when processing a debit card transaction won't change that. Are you aware that Dave Ramsey has a completely different take on this? Per Ramsey, the Visa website indicates that the card issuing bank must afford the debit card the exact same protections in cases of theft or fraud. More specifically, per Visa, Visa's zero liability policy covers all Visa credit and debit card transactions processed over the Visa network. Visa extends the same protections and benefits to its debit cards as it does to credit cards, including the ability for credit card issuers to resolve merchant disputes on the cardholder's

• 15:48Speaker 03

  behalf if goods were defective or weren't received, you were overcharged, or for other reasons. This holds as long as you run the debit card as a credit card and do not use your PIN.

• 15:59Speaker 02

  This is very interesting. And if you remember when we had the Visa spokesperson on the air, they said that it did, and then later it didn't.

• 16:11Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 16:12Speaker 02

  So if I need to take another look at this, I will. But I have never seen anything from Visa or MasterCard that extends the protections of the law that they don't have to provide to debit cards for failure to deliver goods and services, disputes about merchandise, that are rights you have with a credit card. I have never seen anything in writing that they voluntarily are extending those to debit cards. And if you're right, you know, I'm going to go on the podcast and say I've got new information for you that I wasn't aware of.

• 16:56Speaker 03

  I mean, even if that were true, I wouldn't want to use a debit card because you think about it, fraud, any of these things, your money's out of your account while you're disputing it. And someone could keep, you know, sending through fraudulent charges and really you're racking up, you know, insufficient funds. I mean, all sorts of stuff can happen and it's just too, too much fire for me.

• 17:16Speaker 02

  And, and let me say this. Dave and I do different things in this space. Dave overwhelmingly is working with people who've gotten into trouble with debt. And as I've said, that's the situation where living with cash or even using the piece of trash, fake Visa or fake MasterCard, the debit card is preferable if you know in your heart of hearts using a credit card is going to get you in trouble. Our audience generally is not having those kinds of problems. The way I describe it to people is Dave is more a firefighter, that he's dealing with people whose financial life is on fire.

• 17:57Speaker 02

  We're dealing with people who may have a hiccup here or there, but they're just, they're trying to build more financial success in their lives. So. He is very much debit card, debit card, debit card, because the dangers of people putting themselves into debt with credit cards, that's not generally our audience. But on this issue, if there has been a change in policy and it's in writing from Visa, and I'll check MasterCard as well, then obviously I'll have to modify the advice I give. But as Krista said, I prefer

• 18:37Speaker 02

  the protections of a credit card where the money has not left your hands. I mean, think about even with the fraud part, your number's compromised. The money is gone to pay your bills, it's gone to pay your mortgage, or your rent, or your car payment, or whatever, until you're able to fight with your bank or credit union to get your money restored in your account, if they restore it. So, the protections are not going to be the same. And the Congress could have overcome the power of the lobbyists and put in equivalent consumer protections for debit cards. But a lot had changed from when the credit card

• 19:21Speaker 02

  era started in the late 60s to now. The power of lobbyists and the money spread around Washington was nothing like it is now. And so, when debit cards became prominent, Congress chose not to provide consumer protections equivalent to a credit card under law. And someday, I'll tell you a story about the political influence of big corporations in Washington that I discovered by accident because a pilot told me about it. Okay, Krista,

• 20:02Speaker 02

  maybe I should just, now that I said that, maybe I should just tell. Okay, a pilot told me something that I'd never thought about looking at. So, there are these apps that people use, a lot of pilots use Flight Radar 24, a lot of consumers use FlightAware, and you can track what's actually going on with the flight instead of relying on what an airline says. So, this pilot said, "You gotta see this, Clark. Look at how many flights from the private jet airports in New York, Teterboro and White Plains are going to Washington

• 20:41Speaker 02

  every day that Congress is in session." He said, "It'll blow your mind. The big corporations in New York are flying their executives and important officials down to work Capitol Hill like you can't imagine." So, I went on Flight Radar 24 on a weekday before the House went into adjournment to politic for the election, for the midterms. And at Teterboro, which is the airport most preferred by the big corporations to fly their executives down to DC to lobby, Teterboro, one plane after another, after another, after another,

• 21:24Speaker 02

  after another, were these huge corporate jets that were flying from New York to DC. I mean, it was unbelievable. And so, if you ever wanted a weird way to see how much the money and power of big corporations is affecting the way law is made in Washington, oh my goodness, oh my goodness. Wow. And speaking of travel, we're going to talk about a follow-up on travel and how I'm handling finding deals for winter travel that you need to know for yourself.

• 22:06Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Indeed. You're ready to level up your business, but the pressure to find the right person to make that happen is intense. Indeed Sponsored Jobs can help carry the load. It boosts your job post to help it reach quality talent fast. Cut through the chaos with Indeed Sponsored Jobs. Get a $75 sponsored job credit at indeed.com/podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring now? Then this is a job for Indeed Sponsored Jobs.

• 22:35Speaker 06

  Hey there. Don McDonald from the Talking Real Money Podcast. Looking for a source of honest, consumer-centric financial help? While obviously biased, I think you'll find that Talking Real Money is what you're looking for. My co-host Tom and I have spent most of our careers helping people like you manage their money on radio, TV, and podcasts. Joe from Stacking Benjamins and Paul Merriman from Sound Investing both love Talking Real Money, and I'm pretty sure you will too. Why? Because we tell the truth about saving and investing based on decades of academic research, not a bunch of dubious hunches or mysterious premonitions. Talking Real Money is both a valuable education and a

• 23:16Speaker 06

  lot of fun. Plus, we answer your questions on almost every episode. So, if you're looking for a better way to manage money and build wealth, look up Talking Real Money on your favorite podcast service like this one. Ask your smart speaker to play Talking Real Money, or go visit us online at TalkingRealMoney.com.

• 23:35Speaker 01

  Visible puts the ultimate wireless hack in the palm of your hand. With unlimited 5G wireless data and hotspot, designed to keep you connected, powered by Verizon's 5G network. And no contract holding you back. Plans start at $25 a month, or get the premium Visible Plus Pro Plan and save $10 on your first month when you use promo code HACK. Make the switch at visible.com. Terms apply. See visible.com for details.

• 24:06Speaker 05

  The secret society of semi-homeade? Listen up. Sam's Club has pre-made dishes for a Thanksgiving feast that's ready in two hours, all while tasting suspiciously homemade. Come join us. Sam's Club. Individual oven times may vary. Your sausage McMuffin with egg didn't change, your receipt did. The sausage McMuffin

• 24:24Speaker 02

  with egg extra value meal includes a hash brown and a small coffee for just $5. Only at McDonald's for a limited time. Pricing participation may vary. Promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing. If you're a regular listener to our show, or you're a YouTube viewer, you heard me recently, saw me recently, talk about strategies that I recommend in terms of using the calendar as your friend, as your booking travel because of how much airfares are up this year. And there were some things I didn't get around to, and some things I felt like I didn't

• 25:05Speaker 02

  emphasize that I should have. If you've been following me a long time, you know something I should have said last time that I didn't. I want to say it because there are a lot of people who might not have heard it. And then there's another strategy that I'm using I want to talk to you about. So, first things first, even now, there are still deals popping up in the midst of airfares being much higher. And so, that goes to a core strategy that I follow. And that is, that what I do is I let the deal drive where I go. Unless I

• 25:48Speaker 02

  have to be somewhere, going somewhere for work, or whatever, where I'm going to a specific place, or a wedding, or whatever, my travel is dictated by the deal. And then I figure out why I'm going to go there. And I know that just sounds so silly to a lot of people. But the point is, I've been all over the world, except Antarctica, because I won't do the Drake Passage, because I'm a wimp, I guess. But anyway, I've been all over, over the years, just by letting the deal drive my choice of destination. And that is more important now than it's ever been. As an example, there have been a bunch of deals

• 26:32Speaker 02

  recently from the US to Asia, from all around the US to Asia. There was a deal two weeks ago from much of the eastern part of the United States to New Zealand for 800 and something round trip. I mean, some of the fares there have been, even in the midst of much higher airfares, have been great. So, if instead of saying, "Well, I guess I'm not going anywhere," even if you have the travel bug like me, just be patient. And when a deal happens, a real deal, pounce on it. Now, second thing I did, the big airlines

• 27:14Speaker 02

  have generally adopted a relationship, a ratio, if you will, that connects the fare they're charging to the points charged. One airline hasn't done it yet of the bigs, and that's American. And so, I started looking at what redemptions cost on American and their variable, rather than based on what the ticket price is. And I'll give you an example of what I did recently. I had a ticket on Delta. It was one way, it was crazy expensive,

• 27:56Speaker 02

  because I was flying from a business market to a business market. And it was like, I wasn't trying to buy the airplane, I was just buying a seat on the plane. The day before I went...

• 28:11Speaker 02

  I went on American and they had seats available for 11,000 points, which for those of you who use points, that's like nothing. That's like the equivalent of like $130 one way. When I was staring down the barrel of a ticket, one way that was over $430. So what did I do? I canceled the Delta flight, held it as a credit that could be used for up to one year on other travel, which works for me because I travel so frequently. And

• 28:50Speaker 02

  then I redeemed 11,000 points and went on American and saved the equivalent of $300 one way. So I've become a complete free agent. I actually, early this year, when I realized that American was not yet tying point redemptions into dollars that you'd pay for a physical ticket, I got the American Airlines credit card. I've been earning points on American and I've been saving a ton using the points. And one of the things that's odd about American is if you look far out, the points required for redemption can be a ton. Close to travel,

• 29:32Speaker 02

  they can be two tons, or they can be like nothing. It's all based on some kind of internal yield analysis they do that makes the points so crazy variable where the other airlines, it's just a direct ratio. And so this is one of the strategies I use. The other thing I do, I am never loyal to a single airline. If you don't value money, be loyal to one airline. Go to that airline's website, shop for fares at that airline. And if you love

• 30:12Speaker 02

  helping out the shareholders of that airline, keep doing that. On the other hand, if you value your money, and it's your money, every flight, be a free agent. Use Hopper, use Skyscanner, use Google Flights, use these tools to see, oh, I didn't know they flew nonstop there, whoever they is. And whoever you get the deal on, take the deal. Because a coach seat is a coach seat is a coach seat unless you're on Frontier.

• 30:48Speaker 03

  Do you do basic economy?

• 30:51Speaker 02

  I will not do basic economy.

• 30:53Speaker 03

  Okay, good to know.

• 30:54Speaker 02

  And why don't I do basic economy? Because I'm a free agent. I need to have the ability, if a better deal pops up, to have that. And I do have a serious character flaw. Do you know what it is?

• 31:11Speaker 03

  No.

• 31:12Speaker 02

  It's called aisle seat.

• 31:14Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 31:15Speaker 02

  I don't know what my problem is, but I only like sitting on the aisle. You know, there are people who love having a window seat. There are people who don't care what the seat is, as long as they have one on the plane. And remember when Ryanair wanted to do the standing seats? I thought that was the greatest thing ever. I'd stand for two hours. I mean, I stand all day long working, right? I would do that to save money on a two-hour flight. Sure, I would. But it would have to be a standing seat on the aisle.

• 31:47Speaker 03

  Oh, wow.

• 31:48Speaker 02

  Did you know that about me?

• 31:50Speaker 03

  I didn't know that. I'm surprised. I've flown with you a ton, but did not know that.

• 31:55Speaker 02

  Just think back if you've ever seen me sit anywhere but on an aisle.

• 31:58Speaker 03

  Right. But if you could save 50 bucks on the flight, if you sat in a middle seat, would you do it?

• 32:03Speaker 02

  No.

• 32:04Speaker 03

  Wow. Okay. So you're saying, take the deal, but...

• 32:06Speaker 02

  I'm telling you, I have a factory defect.

• 32:09Speaker 03

  All right.

• 32:10Speaker 02

  It clearly is. I have a character defect, and it's called aisle.

• 32:14Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 32:15Speaker 02

  I'll tell you one other thing. Whenever I go to a live sports event, I always want to sit on the aisle and have to stand up and down over and over again with people going by me, going to the restroom, or going to get refreshments, or whatever. And I just, I don't know.

• 32:34Speaker 03

  I get it.

• 32:35Speaker 02

  No, I don't. I don't get it. Why am I like that?

• 32:38Speaker 03

  You like to be able to get up and get out? You want to be able to use the restroom easily? You know, all that stuff. If there's a problem, you can make a quick escape. I get it.

• 32:48Speaker 02

  I don't know. You want a quick escape, you sit window on the emergency exit. You're the first one out.

• 32:54Speaker 03

  All right. We'll go to some travel questions. Josephine in Texas said, hi Clark, my husband and I have two children, ages nine and 11, and we would like to start traveling internationally. How did you and Lane keep travel costs low when you were traveling with your kids when they were younger?

• 33:07Speaker 02

  So what we did was, we pretended they were under two till they were 18. No. I mean, it's repeat and repeat. It was all about the deal. We would not say, hey, it would be great if we took the kids to Jellystone Park. You have to know the...

• 33:27Speaker 03

  Yellowstone, yeah.

• 33:28Speaker 02

  You have to know Yogi Bear.

• 33:29Speaker 03

  Or Yogibera.

• 33:30Speaker 02

  Yogibera.

• 33:31Speaker 03

  Yogibera.

• 33:32Speaker 02

  Flintstones.

• 33:33Speaker 03

  Not Flintstones, I know. Sorry. Getting my cartoons mixed up.

• 33:36Speaker 02

  So we always, with our kids, and they all three get it, that wherever the bargain is, that's where we were going. Because you're multiplying, you're multiplying by four, we were multiplying by five. I mean, the math is so compelling that whatever the bargain is, that's what you do. You know, two of my kids, my oldest and my youngest, my middle one never had to do this. There'd be frequent flyer promotions where it was economical, if you went and took a bunch of flights, the points you got and the bonuses you got

• 34:16Speaker 02

  really paid off. And two of my three kids had to go on mileage runs with me.

• 34:23Speaker 03

  Hmm. That's fun. I bet they loved it.

• 34:26Speaker 02

  Well, one of Lane's favorite pictures of our son, Grant, is of him exhausted, passed out with, you know how they give little kids the wings? And he had like a whole, like, like an army general with all his medals. He had all the wings.

• 34:46Speaker 03

  And now he's going to be a pilot. I love it. He's a pilot.

• 34:49Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:49Speaker 03

  All right. Marcelino in New Mexico says, I recently had a negative experience with air travel, and I want to know what, if anything, I can do differently if this happens again. Long story short, my flight was canceled and the airline rebooked me for another flight two days after the original flight. This was not acceptable, since I absolutely needed to be at my destination the following day. I calmly explained this at the ticket counter, and the agent said she could reserve a spot for me on another airline for the following morning, and even offered to pay for a hotel for that night. However, she couldn't guarantee that she could transfer the money from the ticket I bought to the one she reserved before my flight took off. I asked, what would happen if the money didn't get transferred? The answer, I wouldn't get to fly. I ended up driving eight hours overnight to another

• 35:33Speaker 03

  city, buying another ticket out of pocket, and barely made it to my destination on time.

• 35:37Speaker 02

  Oh, boy.

• 35:38Speaker 03

  Thinking back, could I have asked to pay for the reserved ticket out of pocket and just waited for the refund of the original flight that got canceled? What would Clark do?

• 35:49Speaker 02

  Okay, Marcelino, the deal is, if the airline cancels your flight, they are required by law to give you the money back. Period. And airlines have trained all their personnel to never give you a refund, to only give you a credit. You're entitled to the refund. So if the replacement transportation is something that you went through all that hassle and drove eight hours and all that stuff, if it were me, I would just get my refund from the first airline. You went to all that extra expense and hassle. I would just buy the ticket on the other airline. Now, in the United States, we used to have a federal

• 36:32Speaker 02

  regulation, that the regulation was Rule 240. And when one airline failed to deliver the flight, they had to, by law, buy you a ticket on another airline. Period. The next flight out, they had to buy it for you. That no longer is in effect. Some airlines have some level of protection that they make available to you on another airline in their contract with you, called the Contract of Carriage, I think is the official name for it. But the only thing I would have done differently, I would have said, I'd love my money back and buy that ticket that you know would have gotten you to where you needed to be in time for what you had to go for.

• 37:14Speaker 03

  Okay, I'm going to try to squeeze two more in. Bonnie in Alabama says, my husband and I are traveling to Vermont in December for a week. We'll be renting a car. We would like to purchase loss of use insurance, so that if we wreck our rental car and it has to be in the shop for a number of days, then we won't be liable for the loss of the rental car company incurs for not being able to use that car. Is loss of use insurance really necessary? And if so, where can we purchase this? We want to rent a car from Turo, but they don't sell this type of insurance. Our vehicle insured also does not sell it.

• 37:45Speaker 02

  Yeah. So loss of use is a real sore spot with auto insurers. Even if they cover your temporary use of a rental car, they get really upset with the big three car rental agencies that own pretty much all the brands for this thing they've imagined called loss of use. And they come up with a crazy amount of money where their net profit per day, per vehicle in their fleet, is teensy tiny. They make it seem like it's as much as the car costs per day. I mean, it's ridiculous. So one thing I like for even an occasional traveler

• 38:25Speaker 02

  to do is look at getting the Chase Sapphire Preferred. Chase Sapphire Preferred card. It's 95 or $99 a year.

• 38:36Speaker 02

  And covers you for temporary use of a rental car and handles a lot of the dispute you have with the car rental agency. And they're very expert at negotiating down the loss of use. Now, let's look at some things here. The chances you're going to be in an accident on that trip in December, Vermont, you could have, you could lose control of the car in snow, whatever. But Vermont does a really good job of keeping the roads clear through the winter, except right after a huge blizzard kind of conditions, snowfall.

• 39:14Speaker 03

  Then you're not driving anyway, though.

• 39:15Speaker 02

  Hopefully not. But how often have you ever been in an accident, anyway? You know, the rare chance that you'll be in an accident and it'll lead to a loss of use claim is so small, you can't insure against everything in life. I wouldn't worry so much about this.

• 39:35Speaker 03

  Dan in Ohio says, hi, Clark and team. I love the shows and all your content. I was planning a last minute trip to Disney with my family, December 19 through 23. My 11 year old daughter and I have been going through a tough time and I'd like to

• 39:47Speaker 02

  I'm sorry.

• 39:48Speaker 03

  I know. I'd like to make it a great trip for her. Do you have any advice for saving on flights, how to spend less in the parks and not getting ripped off while we are there?

• 39:57Speaker 02

  Okay, so Disney uses variable pricing and the daily rates during the Christmas peak period, I can't even sugarcoat this, they're generally almost double what the regular rates are per day at the park. So the park thing, that you can't fix is going to be probably, I don't know, $175 to $200 a day for park admission. Where you can make a difference is airlines have been pouring flights into Orlando International, particularly

• 40:39Speaker 02

  into Sanford Field, which is the north end of the Orlando area. There are even flights into Lakeland, Florida, which is not that far from Disney that discounters are going into. There are a lot of discount flights going into, into the Tampa Bay area, but particularly into St. Pete Clearwater Airport on discounters like Allegiant, the previously mentioned frontier that I can't stand. Anyway, the flights, even during that, a peak, peak, peak week, you should be able to find more decent fares if you think wider and use those

• 41:20Speaker 02

  search tools like I talked about, using Skyscanner, Hopper, Google Flights, and look one way first, and then look round trip. You'll probably find cheaper deals buying two one-way tickets than buying a round trip. Hotels, if you're willing to stay off airport, there are really so many hotel rooms in the Orlando metro area. It's not a big convention period. A lot of the hotels during Christmas, New Year's, that normally live on convention business are selling to nightly guests like you. You should be able to find a really good, high

• 42:01Speaker 02

  quality hotel in Orlando, not on Disney property, for about $80 to $120 a night. So I can't fix the ticket prices, but I can help you with the other things. And I hope you and your 11 year old daughter have an absolutely wonderful time. And thank you so much for joining us on today's podcast. Weekend's here. Hope you just have a great time. And I look forward to serving you on Monday. And know that we're here for you 24 hours

• 42:40Speaker 02

  a day. Not a slogan, it's a fact, at Clark.com and Clarkdeals.com. And as we move closer and closer to Christmas, Clark Deals makes such a difference, they just did with the recent Amazon Prime Days, working literally around the clock to hit you with the deals, both from Amazon and from their competitors that were offered then. And we will be at your service with the best prices on things all the way through the Christmas shopping season at Clark Deals. Everything we do is about you, gaining knowledge you can use

• 43:19Speaker 02

  in your life, so you can save more, spend less, and avoid getting ripped off. And we'll be with you on Monday.

• 43:28Speaker 05

  The secret society of semi homemade, listen up. Sam's Club has pre-made dishes for a Thanksgiving feast that's ready in two hours, all while tasting suspiciously homemade. Come join us. Sam's Club.

• 43:45Speaker 00

  Individual oven times may vary.

• 43:47Speaker 07

  Your sausage McMuffin with egg didn't change, your receipt did. The sausage McMuffin with egg extra value meal includes a hash brown and a small coffee for just $5, only at McDonald's for a limited time.

• 43:59Speaker 04

  Price and participation may vary. Promotion pricing may be lower than meal pricing.