For those freshly returned from 2024’s year-end holidays, a way to counter the back-to-work drudgery is to begin planning all over again.
I admit that I have already planned for holidays until August, and it seems that I am not the only one.
Booking early is a travel hack everyone talks about when the topic of holiday planning comes up – how to stretch the budget most effectively while covering more ground.
It’s always a delicate balance between several factors, including the number of leave days to take, the travel period, the money spent and the enjoyment derived.
Ms Jacquelyn Tan, head of group personal financial services at UOB, has booked her flights for the year. “Book flights and travel packages as early as possible, preferably during periodic sales events organised by airlines and travel agencies, to maximise savings,” she said.
She also monitors the currencies of countries she intends to visit as early as possible, and buy them when the rates are favourable.
OCBC’s managing director of investment strategy Vasu Menon said he booked a trip to Phuket for June 2025 during the SQ sale from Oct 25, 2024, and saved almost 40 per cent on the cost of flights – the promotion offered flights for four people at only $678, including taxes.
“My family’s travel arrangements are usually made six months to a year in advance,” he added.
But even before making any bookings, setting a budget for the year is essential, experts said.
It is easy to get swept up in a wave of spontaneous trip planning, but that doesn’t bode well for the wallet.
Indeed, Instagram keeps feeding me content about visiting London as therapy when I am feeling depressed. While it makes for a good laugh to see such content, impulsively dropping money on air tickets without any proper budget planning will probably lead to financial issues later.
DBS head of financial planning literacy Lorna Tan said budgeting means being able to save at least 10 per cent a month, and having cash savings or liquid assets for at least three to six months of monthly expenditure.
And if you’re working in the gig economy, your emergency fund should cover at least 12 months of monthly expenses, she noted.
“It is prudent to have adequate protection and insurance too, including a suitable hospitalisation cover such as an Integrated Shield Plan, and critical illnesses insurance.”
She also advocated early planning, saying: “This can make the difference between booking a glass igloo in Finland with toilets and without. Imagine waking up and having to plod through the snow in minus 40 deg C to visit the toilet 15m away! All because you didn’t book the glass igloo with full facilities early.”
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Mr Menon noted that while there is no hard and fast rule on how much to spend on travel a year, 5 per cent to 10 per cent of one’s annual salary seems like a reasonable figure.
“Much also depends on how much you enjoy travelling and see it as a need to destress and how it competes with the other wants and needs you may have,” he said.
Besides booking cheaper flights early, another way to cut travel costs is to choose the right accommodation for your needs and preferences. Mr Menon tries to stay at serviced apartments with a kitchen as cooking also saves money, instead of dining out at restaurants all the time.
In a recent podcast with The Straits Times, millennial traveller Prisca Ang told me that choosing business hotels helped cut the cost of her trip to Japan. These hotels also have the benefit of being clean and located near transportation nodes like train stations.
Multi-currency e-wallet YouTrip’s chief operating officer Kelvin Lam said he chooses hotels near student hostels because these places offer cheaper amenities like coin-operated washing machines and beer.
Personally, I also pick Airbnb flats where possible, instead of hotels, primarily so that I can cook instant noodles for meals to save money. Revealing this fun fact made my podcast guests recoil in horror.
Mr Lam suggested a slight tweak to this common budget travel hack – cook food that is part of the country’s cuisine, instead of simply eating instant noodles. Doing this is good for the pocket and also gives you a taste of different flavours.
Another way to save money is to use multi-currency cards and accounts, instead of using credit cards that can have high conversion rates for each transaction in a foreign currency.
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Post-Covid-19, cashless payments have caught on; in fact, some places totally reject cash. As a result, cashless payment providers have pressed on with new innovations and initiatives to capture consumer demand.
For instance, Nets has established cross-border QR across Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and China, so those who travel within this region can just scan the codes to pay via various apps.
This complements the use of cards – which is handy as not all street vendors have card acceptance points.
In December, digital banking platform Revolut announced that it will offer e-SIM and global data plans to customers. Those who use the Revolut app can install the e-SIM digitally and top up in the app as well.
Some banks also offer multi-currency options. DBS customers with a DBS My Account or Multiplier account can access and exchange 11 foreign currencies, which will be held in the account, akin to a travel wallet.
UOB has the multi-currency card UOB FX+, which is a debit card that also allows consumers to convert 11 popular currencies. It has grown in popularity along with the pent-up travel demand post-Covid-19: Newly approved applications for the card grew more than 40 per cent in October and November 2024, against the previous year.
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Having said all this, I sometimes need a reminder that travel is a luxury, not a necessity. In July 2024, a study showed that more than half of those polled said a yearly trip to a South-east Asian destination was essential.
It sparked a discussion in my social circles over whether travel is truly essential, like air-conditioning and a smartphone with a data plan, which the survey showed were also counted among essentials.
Travel is talked about so often that there seems to be this prevalent fear of missing out, or the idea that you will be left behind if you do not have an answer to the question, “Where are you going next?”
But travel can also be exhausting. My podcast guest, Ms Ang, said she needed “a holiday from my holiday”, hence defeating the purpose of having some rest away from work.
At the end of a holiday – after all the travel laundry is done and luggage is stored away – travel is, ultimately, a personal journey.
It has to be for myself, not the Instagram feed, or to answer the questions of others. And sometimes, merely taking the time to soak in Singapore or lie in bed might be just the ticket I need, instead of an expensive trip elsewhere.
Sue-Ann Tan is a business correspondent at The Straits Times, covering capital markets and sustainable finance.
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