So your uncle booked a flight to Seattle four days before your auntie's wedding and got a round-trip ticket $50 cheaper than you did? Even though you booked months before?

That's part of the reality of online travel. While there are many ways to find travel deals on the Internet these days, the bargains aren't always predictable or guaranteed.

Ten years ago, booking travel on the Web offered new opportunities for cheap deals and struck fear in the industry that travel agents would go the way of manual typewriters — quaint anachronisms.

But that didn't happen. Industry professional Scott Ahlsmith, vice president of Global Network Solutions, has been in the travel business since 1972. He recently told a Hawai'i Tourism Authority conference that some not-very-good travel agents went out of business but others thrived.

Ahlsmith cited recent statistics showing half of travelers booking online and the other half working with another human being. "People are checking the Internet for information, but the amount of travel booked online has dipped," Ahlsmith said.

Those who prefer to call a travel agent want someone to offer personal advice, to be accountable and to iron out problems that emerge, he said. A good travel agent can tell you that a place near Times Square that sounds good online is actually a dump. Or a hotel in San Francisco has bigger, nicer rooms than the one a block away.

TAKING A RISK

Many Web sites work just like travel agents but you do the booking on the computer. It can be cheaper but works best when you know where you're going, what your choices are and can make informed decisions.

A Web site can show you pictures and even offer unedited entries of how others sized it up. Those entries — such as on tripadvisor.com — can be eye-opening but can't be relied on as unbiased.

Ahlsmith recalled checking into a New York City hotel that he picked just by its online profile. What he found at check-in was a lot worse than what he expected. He went up to the room and found a voice-mail message telling him that he could upgrade simply by going to the business center to type in an Internet hotel review.

So much for candid advice from a fellow traveler.

Still, good deals and sound information can be found. Some sites, such as Hotwire and Priceline, get access from travel partners to unsold inventory — empty seats on flights, empty hotel rooms, unrented cars — at huge savings.

The catch is that you don't know which company you are buying from — car rental, hotel, etc. — until after you book. Some people don't want the surprise, others take the risk for the savings.

LAST-MINUTE DEALS

A Consumer Reports analysis published early last year found those who shop around online save 40 percent or more. The magazine found best deals then at Priceline and Hotwire (see details in box). But that won't work some of the time if you can't be flexible on your schedule or if you need to be at a certain hotel.

And the conventional wisdom has changed since 20 years ago, when booking early was the best way to guarantee a good price. Now, many last-minute deals beat the early-buying and that's how you end up with the last-minute guy beating out the careful planner.

Kayak and SideStep are travel search companies that hunt for travel bargains, checking online agencies, consolidators and airline sites as well as hotels, vacation package providers and rental car companies.

At the Hawai'i office of the American Automobile Association, you can buy online or talk to a real person. Travel agency manager Lucia Royal said business has increased in recent years.

She said business travelers were the first to flock to the Internet but are now returning to agents. "They have that trust factor with the agent that they may not have online," she said.

She said people do buy some travel basics online: "Most of it is real simple, like air, car, hotel."

But others come to an agent after having trouble online or just being unfamiliar with it. One of the more common complaints is that errors are hard to fix and changes near-impossible.

"For every story of somebody that saved a couple bucks, there's a story of how people got ripped off on the Internet," Royal said.

Welcome to "Are You Buying This?" — a new weekly column designed to help consumers find better deals on living in the Islands, and navigate the modern marketplace. The column will tackle a wide range of issues — from finding healthier food at better prices, to tips about safer toys and other consumer warnings. We'll strive to find the broader themes that affect more people and avoid the "my-toaster-never-worked-right" or "I-hate-my-landlord" rants. Got an idea that goes with that approach? Let us know.

Reach Robbie Dingeman at rdingeman@honoluluadvertiser.com.