Cheap flights and take the kids to the theatre for free

Urgent! The cheapest day to book Easyjet, cheap holiday car hire, kids go free to the theatre, £22 Sanctuary Spa gift set and stop spam calls. These are our Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis’ Deals of the Week.

Remember, deals can change quickly, even while I’m on the programme. So always double-check the terms and conditions before spending. Plus, while I hope these deals will save you cash, don’t spend if you can’t afford it, don’t need it, or won’t use it.

Today is the cheapest time to book Easyjet seats for Feb 2017

Easyjet’s prices are fluid and move based on demand for any particular flight. So when they’re usually launched they’re priced cheaply and can quickly change depending on how many are being booked. So if you can pounce when they’re launched, you’re often getting the very cheapest deal.

It releases tickets five times a year and today (Thursday) tickets go on sale for travel between 6 February 2017 and 25 March 2017, so including Valentine’s weekend and the February half term. For full details of how to slash the cost and what is released when, see Martin’s ‘18 Easyjet tricks’ guide.

There is no exact release time – different seats are put on sale at different points throughout the day, so keep checking – and prices can and do change rapidly. So it’s a question of repeated trial and error to see if it looks good.

I can’t guarantee that today will have the cheapest tickets, as if there’s no demand prices might drop later. Though if this does happen (not due to a sale), Easyjet has a policy that you can call it up and it’ll give you the difference back in vouchers towards another Easyjet flight.

I told you the same last time it launched tickets, to huge feedback – including Mark who tweeted:“You’re not wrong! Booked four seats to Faro in Aug at 7.15am for £666, and within 15 mins they went up by £200, then £300 again by 11am!”

Save up to 75% by booking car hire now

If you’re going away this summer, book your holiday car hire ASAP. If left to the last minute you could pay massively over the odds – for example, walk in mid-summer, and if they’ve got spare cars, you could pay £40+/day. Yet book now for August and it can cost as little as £11/day for Malaga or £15/day for Tenerife.

To find your cheapest, use a comparison site such as Kayak (good for options), Skyscannerand TravelSupermarket(both good for breadth). I’ve heard huge successes of people getting great deals by booking in advance, like Dave, who emailed: "Booked four months ahead, got 10 days for £296 for a decent-sized car. Just before I went, checked and price had gone to £900."

Once there beware of added extras they try to sell, like unnecessary insurance. Usually it’s included in the price, yet often they’ll try to scare you and say “you need it; without it, have an accident, even a scratch, and you'll pay £1,000s extra”. This can be £20+/day, but you can buy standalone cover for as little as £2/day – use Moneymaxim's comparison to find the cheapest.

Plus be careful of some firms which try and make you pay for a full tank of fuel, then ask you to “return it empty”. But if you haven’t driven much the unused fuel can cost you more than the hire. To avoid this, sites includingSkyscanner, TravelSupermarket and Carrentals let you filter by fuel policy, while Enjoy Car Hire only shows 'pay for what you use' policies.

Martin’s Quickies:

Kids go free to the theatre: From 10am next Tuesday (14 June) you can get a free child’s ticket (ages 16 and under) to one of over 35 London theatre shows, when you buy a full-priced adult ticket on the Kids Week website. You’ll need to set a diary reminder for this, as last year tickets went super quick – 116,000 tickets sold in the first 24 hours – so if you want this, be ready. There are around 150,000 tickets available this time, including Wicked, The Lion King, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Stomp.

£22 Sanctuary Spa gift set: Go online to Boots or into a store until Wednesday 6 July, and you can get a ten-pieceSanctuary Keep Cool This Summer gift set for £22. In it you’ll get a cooling shower gel, body lotion, hand cream, heel balm, face wash, salt scrub, body wash, body scrub, body lotion, tanning lotion and a canvas bag – bought individually at normal price it’s around £45 (some discounts on now, though, so you could buy the constituents for £32ish).

Update. New free text number to stop spam calls: On last week’s Deals of the Week (read the article here) I ran through the various ways you can stop spam calls, texts, mail and door-knockers. Yet since then there’s been an important update: to register your mobile number with the Telephone Preference Service (TPS) you can now text it for free to 85095 with ‘TPS’ and your email address (needed to verify your identity). Previously you were charged to use the old number, so don’t use it. Remember though this only stops reputable EU companies from calling – firms from outside the EU and rogue firms may still contact you.