Travel Sites: 10 Things They Don

[Guest fountainhall]

Yes, another list – this time from Wall Street Journal’s Marketwatch. It really does not say things we do not already know, but sometimes it’s useful to have them reinforced.

 

1. “Don’t assume our prices are the lowest.”

 

Airfare comparison sites like expedia and Orbitz now have 37% of the market. But they’ don’t necessarily get you the best fare or the lowest hotel rate. This is partly because some carriers won’t work with them, and they are unable to handle hotels' own guarantees and promotions – like “lowest price guaranteed” with reductions if you can find a better rate within a set period of time, or two nights for the price of three. As the VP and GM of expedia says: “I can’t say 100% of people 100% of the time will always find the cheapest rate!”

 

2. “We’ll snag you with a great view – of the parking lot.”

 

The chances are you’re going to get the least desirable roooms. The American Hotel & Lodging Association says hotels consider customers using online agencies as infrequent travellers searching for the cheapest price. The perks and better rooms go to those paying higher rates and loyalty club members.

 

3. “Freebies are for our preferred customers.”

 

Again, loyalty card customers will always win out with free internet, free bottled water and other small perks at the more top of the market hotels.

 

4. “We're making big bucks – at your expense.”

 

When you book an airline ticket on a travel site, the commission paid to the site finds its way into the cost of the ticket in the form of overall higher prices. With hotel stays, the travel sites frequently tie up bookings with a number of restrictions, including advance payment which may or may not be refundable depending on the rate. Travel sites often receive the merchant rate from the hotel (never disclosed on the hotels own sites) and then mark it up 25%. Because of the mark-up, there is little benefit to the consumer.

 

5. “Our fees are a drain on local tax coffers.”

 

This is more a US-based issue concerning the rate on which taxes are levied on the internet sites' rates. Not worth going into – but you can check the website below.

 

6. “Advertising prices may have no bearing on reality.”

 

Many travellers can relate to this. Since July, the US Transportation Department has successfully sued Orbitz, Travelocity and TripAdviser for advertising fares/rates that are lower than the customer actually has to pay. New rules are on the way requiring ads to reflect the full price payable. Unfortunately for most Asian countries, the sort of advertising that Air Asia gets away with is still legal. Moral: always read the fine print.

 

7. “Our prices might all be the same.”

Shopping around for the best price might not be worth the time or effort—at least according to several class-action lawsuits filed since August. They allege that several third-party booking sites—including Expedia and its subsidiary Hotels.com, as well as Travelocity, Priceline and Orbitz—have been in cahoots with large hotel chains, such as Hilton Worldwide, InterContinental Hotels Group, Marriott International and Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, to charge the same rates, essentially rendering it useless for consumers to shop around for the lowest possible price for a hotel stay.

The lawsuits further allege that some of these online travel agencies have threatened to cut off the sale of room reservations for hotels that don’t offer the same rates to other sites. In turn, the hotels participate in price fixing in order to ensure they’ll turn up in the results and avoid removal from those sites, the lawsuits allege.

 

In my experience, this is far from always the case, and this again may be more of a problem in the US than elsewhere.

 

8. “A price-match-guarantee isn’t the same as a money-back guarantee.”

 

Many sites advertise a refund if you can find a cheaper rate elsewhere. The article cites a lawsuit where the consumer did not receive the full difference. It also points out that many such refunds are hedged with lots of conditions – like only within the 24 hours after booking. Some will provide vouchers for future bookings rather than cash.

 

9. “Not all surprises are nice surprises.”

 

Some sites now offer much bigger savings (up to 60% reduction) for “surprise” hotels – i.e. they do not tell you the hotel name at the time of booking. You select star rating and neighbourhood, pay your money and and then wait. Priceline says “it’s all about savings and less about specificity.” But leaving the hotel location entirely up to the booking site obviously leaves the consumer open to getting a hotel 10 minutes walk from a beach rather than on the beach itself.

 

10. “Adding complication to cancellations is our speciality.”

travel experts say cancellation notifications can fall through the cracks with both the vendors’ and third-party sites, but that the latter can be prone to more complications.

 

When airlines cancel or retime flights, those booking through travel websites may incur greater difficulty, especially if you are already en route. It highlights the case of a traveller en route back from Rome to Jerusalem with a stop-over in Milan. When she got to to the airport, she discovered the last sector had been cancelled and she had received no notification. She then had to purchase a full fare ticket and received no refund. This rescheduling of flights without notice to the consumer happened to me with Air Asia (in my case, months in advance without notice!). Moral: the consumer should always constantly check with each airline and not wait for the travel site to do it for them.

 

http://www.marketwat...05?pagenumber=1

[Rogie]

Being a naturally suspicious fellow of human nature (learnt through hard experience, my natural inclination is to be far too trusting!) I am even more suspicious of anything faceless, like talking on the phone with somebody you don't know, and I am even more suspicious yet if there is no human involvement at all, such as a deal done over the 'net to buy something, especially if that deal was decided by yet another on line site purporting to get you the 'best deal'. Sorry, but buying something on one site as a result of relying on a totally different site, in which no human face or even voice is involved, has to be some kind of mad 21st Century lunacy. Such is man's eagerness to get the 'best deal'. No doubt Stone Age man was the same. Offer him a bigger wheel for his cart he'd go for it, not bothering to check what stone it was made from. First stonemason he proudly showed his new cart to has to break the news his new 'wheels' are crap.