Air New Zealand Multistop Domestic Flight Hack

Finding the best fare and flight combination with Air New Zealand is not always the most straight forward. Air New Zealand flights are typically priced higher through online travel agencies, like Expedia, making it cheaper to book direct. Not all possible flight combinations show up when you search Air New Zealand’s website, and it is not uncommon to get different results with a google flights search. There is a trick using a multistop search that allows you access to more routes and potentially cheaper flights. The multistop domestic flight hack works with trips that involve a connection, not direct flights. I will use the example of flying from New Plymouth to Queenstown. There are no flights direct from New Plymouth to Queenstown.

Multistep Domestic Flight Hack Steps

• Determine what airports Air New Zealand flies to from your origin airport. In this case Auckland, Christchurch, and Wellington.
• Go to Air New Zealand’s booking page
• Click on the multistop trip search

• List flight 1 as your origin city and destination as one of the cities that is flown to direct. In this case New Plymouth to Auckland.

• List flight 2’s origin city as the same city as flight 1’s destination city and list the destination city as your final destination. In this example Auckland to Queenstown
• List the flight dates as the same for both flights
• You then can pick and mix your flights and have the opportunity to create more options than the default options

• If you want to bring a bag, you only need to select seat+bag for one leg, and it will allow you to bring a bag on all the flights on the same day.  You do not need to purchase it for both flights.

This creates a flight with one PNR which means the airline will route you to your final destination if one of your flights is delayed or canceled.  Our guide to New Zealand domestic flights goes over more information about flying domestically in New Zealand.