Internet Bargains – Watchout!

I’m not saying you can’t get good travel deals searching the big travel consolidators like Orbitz, Travelocity or Priceline. In fact, I know you can get some very good deals from these companies. But don’t be fooled. The price you are getting is not always what it is cracked up to be.

On Saturday I took a call from a lady wanting to book into one of our more popular resorts. She asked for a seven night stay at a particular room category. I gave her the price. It was $2,494 for the room, all inclusive based on two persons staying in one room. She said she was looking at the screen of one of those consolidators. She said she could get it for a price of $1,829 including airfare. Well I am the first one to admit I wasn’t thinking too fast. I said if she could get that good a price—go for it.

Then I got to thinking. That just seemed too good to be true. So I went and checked the price myself. Yes, there was a price for $1,829. But that price was per person, whereas the price I had quote was for a couple. Even then, if they got a price of $1,829 per person, and my price was $2,494, she would be paying a total of $3,658 including airfare, where my price only included the room so maybe that was a good deal, depending upon the airfare.

But then I checked the details more closely. That price was for a lower room category than she actually wanted. So I changed the room category which now brought the price up to $2,073 per person. That meant she was now paying $4,146. I then checked the flights on this great price. Well, they would have a 10 hour stopover in Dallas, arriving in Dallas after midnight and flying out at 10 the next morning (I guess they could sleep in the airport on one of the comfortable airport chairs). That didn’t sound to appealing to me so I found a flight with only a 4 hour connection, and during the day. Now the price jumped up to $2,475 per person.

Okay, so now we were set. By booking the hotel and airfare together on one of those consolidators I was spending $4,950. The price I quoted was $2,494. But then I needed airfare. So I found the same flight for $625 per person. So we add $625 per person for two people to the $2,494 and we actually get $3,744. In this instance, booking through us for the resort portion, and booking the airfare separately actually resulted in a better price, unless you wanted the worst air flight possible. And that price was actually better by approximately $1,200. I also checked just the hotel portion for this resort and the base price quoted for the room was identical to ours, but the consolidator wanted to charge for airport transfers and we always include those for free, at this particular resort.

Again, I am not saying you won’t find some great deals on these consolidators. Sometimes they guarantee resorts and hotels a certain number of rooms, and if they cannot sell those rooms they’ll dump them at the last minute. But be very careful of these air/hotel combos. The air being quoted is usually the most undesirable itinerary possible, and to get the better travel route and price, you may very well pay more than if you booked the air and resort separately.

By the way, if you’re looking for airfare we recommend Kayak, and you get Kayak right on our website.

I wish I’d gotten that lady’s phone number. I’d like to see if she really got the deal she thought she was getting.

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