Beware of discount travel sites’ hidden fees. Here’s where they hide them.
Discount travel sites like Travelocity, Expedia, hotels.com, booking.com etc have their place in the travel world. They can definitely save you money. They send out promo codes and package deals that can be advantageous, as opposed to booking from the hotel itself.
When does it not save you money to use a travel discount site?
- FLIGHTS.
You don’t ever want to use a discount site to buy flights.
Why?
These sites don’t get any discounts on flights and neither do most travel agents. The rates are the same as they would be on the actual airline website. Discount sites are still good for comparing prices and finding the airline that works for you, but when you go to book do it on the airlines’ official web page.
Since discount sites don’t get a deal on airfare, they need to keep their agents afloat by charging a small fee to book airfare. If you’re buying a package deal, they may discount the hotel enough that the fee is still worthwhile. If you are just booking air, you are probably paying a service fee without knowing it.
Orbitz and Expedia have done excellent jobs of hiding their booking fee policy deep in their terms of service. These booking fees are usually between $2-$12 but why pay for something if you don’t have to?
Also be weary of booking over the phone. Often these budget companies and even the airlines themselves will charge fees to make reservations over the phone
2. The dreaded change fees
Change fees can be downright outrageous. If you ever do need to change a reservation you are better off just booking an entirely new flight. Try to avoid change fees at all costs by comparing airline change fee policies. (This is like 90% of the reason Southwest is my fave airline, NO CHANGE FEES). Many booking sites have a free cancellation option for hotels. Sometimes the free cancellation option is a few dollars more, but could be worth it for peace of mind if there’s a chance your plans could change.
Another great plan to avoid change fees is Trip Protection. I have a credit card that has built-in trip protection (Chase sapphire preferred) and will reimburse me if I get sick and can’t travel. They won’t reimburse me if I change my plans voluntarily, but they will protect me from weather and illness.
3. Hotel fees not include in price and due at the hotel upon checkin.
My friend and I almost made this mistake when booking a Vegas trip. Some travel sites list all of the fees that a hotel will charge in their total when booking. Some will only show the basic room price and sales tax. Some cities have certain taxes just on tourism or Airbnb’s and some locations have extra fees for parking and even WiFi. Websites may not include these fees in the total and just put in tiny letters underneath the price that you will be charged $30.55 (for example) per night when you check in. They do need to disclose this but they don’t need to make it easy to find. When booking a trip to Vegas we thought some hotels were charging drastically lower rates than others - nope! It was just the fees. Be aware of the total and read the fine print for all the fees.
happy travels!
Stephanie
