How to piss users off....Travelinsider

My next task was to book a hotel in Vienna for one night (before our Danube River Christmas Markets cruise). After doing some price comparisons, it seemed the lowest cost for one night at the Bristol was $256 on Travelocity. I made a booking, but only after I'd given my credit card number did I notice the rate had changed - there was $78 in taxes and fees now added to the initially quoted rate (a 30% increase). Why didn't they show these taxes and fees on the initial page quoting rates?

I called Travelocity immediately to cancel, and was told 'if you cancel within 365 days of making your booking, a one night cancellation fee will apply'. My booking was only for one night, so this meant there'd be no refund at all after their display tricked me into booking a room that I thought would cost $256 and which actually cost $334! I asked why, if they knew how much the taxes and fees would be, they didn't show them at the start of the booking process, a question to which they had no credible answer.

I asked to speak to someone who could waive this fee due to me making an honest mistake based on their misleading display which I had immediately called them to correct. I was told no-one in the company would be able to waive the cancellation fee. I asked if the CEO would be able to waive the fee, and was told he couldn't do that, either.

I then spoke to a supervisor, Joanne, who said she had never had anyone call up to complain about the unexpected addition of taxes to a hotel rate before. Plainly I wasn't going to get any straight talk from her, either.

Eventually I got through to a third level supervisor, Holly, who agreed to lift the charges immediately. Holly was pleasant, sensible and helpful, but isn't that what the two people below her in the hierarchy are paid to be?

Instead, they lie to me and try and bully me into accepting an unfair situation. While I'd hate to see Holly lose her job, does no-one at Travelocity understand that if they employ and empower sensible front level customer service staff, they won't need to also employ two more levels of supervisors above them, and can quickly and positively resolve issues that otherwise cost a lot of time and generate a lot of ill-will?

All of which confirms a recent British study that challenged consumers to use the internet to self-package a holiday. The study showed that travel agents can source a cheaper holiday in less time.
The study pitted consumers against independent travel agents to find a holiday for a family of four, or a break for two adults from various UK airports. Agents took an average of 15 minutes to source a package holiday versus an average of 111 minutes it took consumers searching the internet. The agents found a better deal in over half of the trials.

The study showed that consumers found the internet to be confusing, repetitive and a 'bottomless pit'.

And talking about travel packages, beware of so-called 'package discounts'. I read this item with cynicism :

A travel industry analyst for Forrester Research says online travel agents can make margins above 20% on vacation packages, compared with 15% on individual hotel room bookings, and consumers can save about 15% by booking a package over individual reservations.

One of the seminal events that caused me to start my own travel wholesale company back in 1990 was looking through the brochure of a (soon-to-be competing) wholesaler and noting their three night Sydney package was more expensive than buying the individual items separately (transfers, accommodation, and day touring) - and also for sale in their brochure. I asked the company's president how it was the package was more expensive than the individual components and he said 'That is because of the extra work and extra service that goes into creating the package'.

Of course, many travel packages do give genuine savings, because they provide a good way for suppliers to hide who is discounting what. But simply referring to something as a package does not automatically guarantee its good value. Caveat emptor.

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