Blog - Cape Town Holiday Accommodation - Places to Stay in South Africa

There’s some confusion surrounding the ticket allocation and collection for the forthcoming 2010 World Cup in South Africa. There are two types of tickets. Individual match tickets for each of the 64 games and Team Specific Match Tickets (TSTs) which are a series of tickets to follow your national team and may include between 3 and 7 tickets. (Code TST5 = 5 games etc). If your team gets knocked out your TST ticket remains valid to follow the team that progresses into the next round of the competition.

You can only collect your tickets from the designated Ticket Collection Points in each of the 9 host cities in South Africa. You must be the person who applied for the tickets and must present the credit card used to pay for the tickets. You will also need another from of ID such as your passport. Tickets will not be delivered to your home address.

Tickets are still available for the tournament and yesterday Fifa announced another PMA (participating member association) phase of sales which will take place through the Fifa.com website from 9 Feb - 7 April, 2010. This will coincide with the 4th planned sales phase whereby match tickets will be available on Fifa.com and at branches of FNB Bank (in South Africa) on a first come first served basis.

Sales of World Cup tickets in the host country have so far been met with apathy. More tickets have been sold to watch England’s games than Bafana Bafana, the South African national team. This is no great surprise in a country where Man Utd and Liverpool are the two biggest supported teams. Having lived in South Africa for some time I wouldn’t be overly concerned by the lack of enthusiasm thus far. South Africans are notoriously laid back about committing to any event until the day before it’s due to take place. For more information about tickets for the World Cup visit Fifa.com.

Yes, but the prices vary wildly depending on when you travel. If you decide to stay until after the final on July 11th then you can fly home on the 13th for £2,698 or stay an extra couple of days in the Mother City and return on the 15th for only £472 with British Airways, a colossal saving of almost £2,200.

This pattern of volatile prices continues across the board and with most airlines. Emirates, however, are very consistent with return prices around the £2,800 mark … ouch! If money is not an issue and you’re looking for a direct flight then try either BA or Virgin. If money is an issue and you don’t mind traveling 15 - 20 hours then focus on SAA and other European airlines. From our research KLM is a good choice, lots of availability and fairly consistent prices of between £1,000 and £1,600 for a return flight during the World Cup. South African Airways is also a great option and with a travel time of only 15 hours (1 stop in Johannesburg) it’s possibly the best choice at the moment.

In general, aggregate sites are a great way to search. Try opodo.com or travelsupermarket.com. Once you’ve found an airline and roughly know your travel dates try searching cash back sites such as quidco.com. You can often shave up to 5% off the price of your flight by clicking through from one of these sites.

Our advice for travelers is to book early. Don’t hang around for a last minute bargain because chances are there won’t be any. As a regular traveler to South Africa myself, the closer to your departure you get the more expensive and less choice there is.

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BA have announced that they will be following the lead of many budget airlines and charging passenegers to pre-book their seats. The prices will range from £10 to £60 depending on which seats you require. Passengers will be charged £10 on short haul flights, £20 on long haul or business economy and £60 on long haul business flights. Seats in an emergency exit row will cost £50 and can be booked between 10 and four days prior to departure. The good news is that if you don’t reserve a seat when you make a booking you will be able to book your seat, free of charge, within 24 hours of departure. Read more