Delta Fares

How do you reserve a plane ticket and pay at a later time?

I am planning a trip to Georgia in the month of March of this year. I will not be able to pay for my ticket officially until February. I use the Delta airline for my travel. So far the fares are about $200+ and a friend of mine told me that I am able to reserve a seat but not pay for it until I arrive at the airport. I have never done that before, I would just pay for the ticket when I had the money. So my question is, to get a better price on a plane ticket what are the steps to reserving my seat before I pay is it even possible? Also what are the steps to efficiently complete this to where there would be no problem?

Public Comments

1. If airlines allow holds on tickets before purchase, it's usually for a short time (24 to 48 hours). There are no airlines I'm aware of, nor any mechanisms that I know of, that will allow for someone to reserve a ticket now and pay for it at the time of travel. Basically, your friend who told you that such a thing was possible gave you incorrect information.
2. It is possible to reserve a ticket and pay later. Basically you pay when the ticket is "ticketed" or printed (as they used to be in the old time). However a ticket comes with a set of rules, for example: if it's changeable, dates when it's valid and so on. One rule regulates when it must be "ticketed". This can be for example 30 days before departure. You must contact a travel agent to arrange for this as almost all tickets sold on the internet must be paid for when you make the reservation. The drawbacks are probably that you must pay the travel agent a service fee, and the tickets may be more expensive. Edit: Having now looked at a sample of DL fare rules, almost all tickets need to be paid 24h after reservation.