In recent years booking a last minute holiday has made a lot of sense - with ever more destinations available, a flexible tourist has almost been certain of being able to grab a last minute holiday at a bargain price.
But things are changing, and a new report suggests that for those who book next year's holiday well in advance they could be the ones who will be paying less, and with holiday companies cutting back on the number of holidays they sell due to recessionary times, last minute holiday bookings could be more expensive.
The report, by a leading consumer organisation, studied holiday prices for July and August this year, and compared the prices to the same holidays when they first went on sale last summer.
Those holidays were on average a thousand pounds (around US 1700 dollars) higher in cost for those who had waited to book last minute, compared to those who had booked a year in advance, changing the trend of the holidays market in Europe from the previous five years.
Last minute holidays, and the niche travel industry that has grown up around it as more people switched from brick and mortar travel agencies to booking holidays on the internet and becoming their own travel agent, has grown as internet usage has grown.
Before the internet was widely used the British market for example traditionally saw the highest number of bookings for a summer holiday in January and February, and while the first two months of the year are still high booking months, their importance has slowly declined in the last decade as a whole section of the population took advantage of tour operators slashing prices when their flights and accommodation weren't full.
With a recession tour operators will be cutting the number of flights and available hotel rooms to popular holiday islands like Malta for 2009, making a bargain last minute holiday even more difficult to find than in the summer of 2008.
But times change, and after the report the equivalent of an earthquake hit the British travel industry when the country's third largest tour operator, XL, went bust in September.
According to one Malta holidays travel site - and the majority of Malta's tourists originate from the UK - holidaymakers could well now not have cheap prices as their number one priority, but whether the travel company they book with is still going to be in existence by the time their holiday comes around - with a resulting swing back to holidays booked last minute, not because of the prices, but the chances of their holiday company still being in business is higher.
So in the fast moving travel industry, a trend away from last minute holidays as the savings weren't there to the same extent as in previous years could be back as quickly as it went as other considerations factor in - such as a travel company's ability to survive a recession, and medium size travel firms could be squeezed as holidaymakers place their faith in the biggest companies, hoping that the chances of them being able to fulfil a holiday are higher.
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