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When to use and avoid Orbitz, Travelocity and Expedia
Online travel agents like Orbitz, Priceline, Travelocity and Expedia are handy, touchy-feely tools that many Internet users find useful when booking hotel and airline reservations. It's important to keep in mind, though, that these tools are travel agents, and just like the travel agent down at the local strip mall, they take a commission from any booking you make. Conversely, since airlines control inventory, they should have the best idea of what prices and volumes they have and 99% of the time will offer the best price. Most airlines even have best price guarantees to promote this.There are, however, instances in which an online travel agent are useful. In addition to the easy-to-use interfaces, areas in which the TA might help are if they were to:
- Have negotiated a discount (ie, corporate or consolidator) with the airline. In this case you need to pay particular attention to the fare class that you're booked in; many consolidator tickets, for example, some from airfare.com or your local Chinatown TA don't qualify for frequent flyer miles.
- Combine a series of tickets into one itinerary. For example, last April when I was trying to find a cheap ticket to Buenos Aires I checked all of the canonical search engines and could only find tickets for 1100$. Orbitz, however came up with a price that was 300$ cheaper. Why? Because they found a fare sale between Washington DC and Argentina on Delta and nested it into a regular Northwest DTW-WAS 100$ flight. Result? Net savings of three hundred bucks. Typically, standard airlines wont search and book outside of their service, so their websites can't do this.
10 tips for smarter flying
Filed under: Transportation, Budget Travel, Internet Tools
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
John in KS Jan 31st 2008 5:42PM
We always look thru all the sources to find ticket prices, once we have the lowest price we call that airline and check the prices, we usually can get a better fare thru them. also check off shore carriers. They usually have cheaper fares, better seating, non-stop flights and cleaner planes. Good Luck
Robin Jan 31st 2008 6:07PM
I'm an online shopper for the best airline tickets but shoppers beware when you book a flight through travelocity or other online agents, remember to check your seating, they can tend to forget that part and you are stuck in the airport waiting for another flight because they forgot to asign you a seat, also check the airport your leaving from to make sure your flight time is correct.
Leslie Aug 5th 2008 3:38PM
Robin,
Not having a seat pre assigned has nothing to do with having a seat on the plane. Any airline or travel agent should tell you that pre-flight seat assignments are a courtasy and that only a small percentage of seats are made available for pre travel assignment. The bulk of available seats are held back for day of travel assignemt by airline agents at the airport. Not having a "seat" on a flight usually means everyone else on the (always overbooked) flight showed up earlier than you, and you were bumped from a full flight. The remedy for this is to show up and check in EARLY for your flight . Even with a "seat assignment", if you show up late and they will give "your seat" to someone who checked in before you.
Hank Feb 2nd 2008 12:28PM
I check the multiple travel sites,than check the airlines,
on line,find the best price,usually less than the
travel sites.Get an e-mail ticket,save $$$. Also get my
bparding pass. Never had a problem,alsp always got
seat of my choice.
Peter Catterick Mar 5th 2008 3:21AM
Avoid Orbitz AT ALL COSTS.Had good experience with Travelocity and Expedia. Had to re issue tickets because they had put in wrong return dates on an international site. cost to me $968 EXTRA. Their customer service took over an hour to reply with a weak answer. terrible company.
Marla Apr 4th 2008 12:58PM
I am a Vacation Travel Specialist or in your words a travel agent. It is true that we as agents get commissions on hotels and cars, but this does not cost the client anymore than if they book it themselves. Agents do charge a ticketing fee on airline tickets because lets face it noone works for free, but this price is based on each agents own discretion. All internet companies and airlines directly charge this fee also. At the agency that I work for being The Travel Solution, my mother owns this business and has for 9 years. Our clients have used the internet at one time or another, and have always called us and told us that they will NEVER make this mistake again, as we are a very personalized agency that cares for all of our clients as if they were family. This is why we have a successful business. I do not understand why people would want to spend their time shopping the internet, when they can call a travel agency such as ours and let us do the work for you at a minimal price.
online Jul 3rd 2008 6:51AM
Marla, yes a travel agency will find the best price plus an extra 10, sometimes 5 per ticket. I can do this myself, but not everyone.
I suppose in the very near future almost everyone will fly on e-tickets, and will do the bookiing online. Orbitz and travelocity are too expensive usualy, expedia seemed to change the policy offering sometimes better prices. I use kayak.com, sidestep.com, smartertravel.com etc, have to check my links or book through airlines directly, if using just one airline.
Brenda Jul 3rd 2008 10:15AM
To add to what Marla said. The general public is under the misconception that travel agents will cost them more. Yes, many will charge you a ticketing fee if you are just wanting to book an airline ticket only, but for everything else, the customer does not pay the agent, the supplier does, at no additional cost to the customer. Often the customer will get more for their money, or upgrades and perks, because of the supplier/customer relationship. But money aside, there is nothing like having an expert on your side, working for you. I've heard nightmare stories from people who booked cruises or large trips with complicated itineraries on some of those huge online sites. Shop for a travel agent like you would anything else. Ask them about their experience and how much they've traveled, look for professional certifications, (CTA, CTC, CTIE) and affliations with ASTA, CLIA, IATA etc.
Happy Travels!
Joli Jul 18th 2008 10:21AM
I am definitely a bargain hunter and always do loads of fare research before committing to a ticket, especially for overseas flights. I don't usually find good deals on Orbitz, Expedia, or Travelocity, but like yourself, was able to get my ticket $300 cheaper this time because Orbitz was able to give me an outbound and return flight on different carriers.
Cindy Aug 16th 2008 9:04AM
I'm another travel agent, have 25 years of experience and there are a few tricks of the trade WE still can use for our clients' benefit. One thing when people book online, they pay more attention to the cost NOT the practicality of the schedule, ie a 25 minute connection in Atlanta etc., or an overnight somewhere for an over the water flight. It might be cheaper but how smart is that?
I do resent someone calling me, using MY expertise for flight info and then booking online in order to (in one case) save $7.00.
Angelique Sep 8th 2008 8:56PM
When it comes to booking JUST a flight, I've taken the easy route, and gone with online. But I cannot tell you how much it meant to have a wonderful travel agent on my side when our flight got delayed in Denver, causing us to miss our connecting flight out of Miami to San Juan, Puerto Rico. I called her while we were sitting on the plane with technical difficulties, told her they said it would be 10 minutes before they knew if their small fix would be the right fix. When I called her back 10 minutes later, worried that we were going to miss our cruise the next day, she already had a flight out for us the next morning, contacted the cruise line to let them know we'd been delayed, and had a hotel room booked for us that night in Miami. Everything was taken care of for us, without any extra expense, because we had a wonderful travel agent who knew her stuff.