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Not true. But I won’t discuss that. Here’s something else — the most critical part of a booking — the booking itself. Go talk to third party aggregator chat bo

Not true. But I won’t discuss that. Here’s something else — the most critical part of a booking — the booking itself. Go talk to third party aggregator chat bot when you realise you don’t even have a booking that you booked. 4-5 days later if you’re lucky you’ll receive an apology email if you’re lucky, which mentions that they do not want you have that experience and they’ve send it for feedback to the relevant team. I rarely book hotels via third party aggregators now. Either direct or I use my employee’s travel assistance parter portal where I have same protections as my work travel just that I’ll have to pay from my pockets.

vGPU 4y ago
Re: issues w/ travel plans - I’ve gotten stranded or left SOL before. My general course of action is to just buy a new ticket/room/whatever and file a claim on my credit card. My wife cracked the bumper of a rental. Chase paid. Flight got canceled. Polish air refused to give me a refund until 6+ months later after I had filed a complaint with DOT. I booked a new (more expensive) flight and Amex covered the cost. I did get absolutely screwed once though. Turns out you can’t book a hotel in Paris after midnight because the system rolls the date over. Ended up sleeping on a couch in the lobby that night.
PaulHoule 3y ago
I can say overall I've had OK experiences with aggregators, but my style of tourism lately has been motortourism with partially determined plans so I often book rooms a day or two ahead. I agree though with the sentiment of a post up in the hierarchy that it's a problem that middlemen dominate the listings for hotels, restaurants and such.
rjh29 4y ago
If your hotel double books you, they're out of rooms and can't help. If Booking.com double books you, they can pull strings to give you a different room in any hotel on their site (and they do). I don't doubt you had that experience personally, but it doesn't match my experience at all, and I spend 1/3 of my life in hotels.
- iudqnolq 4y ago
  I showed up at a (cheap) hotel booked on Booking.com earlier this year. They had no record of my booking. They couldn't help me. I spent the next hour on the phone or on hold with a booking.com rep. They claimed the hotel had made a mistake and should be the one to fix it. They attempted to contact the appropriate person at the hotel but were unable to. About four hours later somebody appropriate from the hotel responded to the booking.com rep and "found" the "lost" booking. I brought up the policy you mentioned, and the booking.com rep told me that they hotel gets a chance to fix it first. They seemed quite surprised the hotel ghosted them for four hours, and told me that eventually at some point at night they would book me some other room. So I'd say the booking.com policy you mentioned isn't quite as valuable as you might think at first.
- TylerE 4y ago
  If you’re booked 3rd party you’re much more likely to be the one bumped I. The first place. You’re also likely to get the least desireable rooms on the least desireable floors.
  - rjh29 4y ago
    People say that but it doesn't ring true in my experience. Let's face it, you're just paying more for the same service if you book directly.
    - Benjamin_Dobell 4y ago
      Strangely, at least in Australia, you often pay more for booking directly. On multiple occasions I've checked a hotel's website and found aggregators with cheaper rates, then literally walked in the front door and asked what's the best they can do. It's worse and I end up getting my wife to book on her mobile phone from the parking lot and let her complete the check-in. Don't get me wrong, generally not a fan of middlemen. But the experience when booking a hotel directly comes down to the owners/management, and it's going to vary wildly compared to one of these big aggregators.
      - 4y ago
lmm 4y ago
Again that's the opposite of my experience. If I've booked on Booking.com my booking is right there, on their website and in my inbox. If I book directly with the hotel, do I have a booking? Uh, maybe. Roll of the dice when I show up.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 4y ago
  This is super interesting. I know it happens, but I'm decently traveled and I've never had it happen to me (booking directly with the hotel and having that booking not be available). I've probably stayed in at least 500 individual direct bookings with hotels in my lifetime, to at least give some numbers to the anecdata.
- scarface74 4y ago
  I literally live in hotels for seven months a year across the US. I have never seen this happen. But I only stay at Hilton and Hyatt brand hotels.
  - lmm 4y ago
    Sticking with a single big corporate chain has most of the same advantages as using a big booking site. But I never found a single chain that had hotels everywhere I wanted to go; indeed a lot of the places I end up wanting to to don't have any name brand hotels at all.

vGPU 4y ago

Re: issues w/ travel plans - I’ve gotten stranded or left SOL before. My general course of action is to just buy a new ticket/room/whatever and file a claim on my credit card. My wife cracked the bumper of a rental. Chase paid. Flight got canceled. Polish air refused to give me a refund until 6+ months later after I had filed a complaint with DOT. I booked a new (more expensive) flight and Amex covered the cost. I did get absolutely screwed once though. Turns out you can’t book a hotel in Paris after midnight because the system rolls the date over. Ended up sleeping on a couch in the lobby that night.

PaulHoule 3y ago

I can say overall I've had OK experiences with aggregators, but my style of tourism lately has been motortourism with partially determined plans so I often book rooms a day or two ahead. I agree though with the sentiment of a post up in the hierarchy that it's a problem that middlemen dominate the listings for hotels, restaurants and such.

rjh29 4y ago

If your hotel double books you, they're out of rooms and can't help. If Booking.com double books you, they can pull strings to give you a different room in any hotel on their site (and they do). I don't doubt you had that experience personally, but it doesn't match my experience at all, and I spend 1/3 of my life in hotels.

iudqnolq 4y ago
I showed up at a (cheap) hotel booked on Booking.com earlier this year. They had no record of my booking. They couldn't help me. I spent the next hour on the phone or on hold with a booking.com rep. They claimed the hotel had made a mistake and should be the one to fix it. They attempted to contact the appropriate person at the hotel but were unable to. About four hours later somebody appropriate from the hotel responded to the booking.com rep and "found" the "lost" booking. I brought up the policy you mentioned, and the booking.com rep told me that they hotel gets a chance to fix it first. They seemed quite surprised the hotel ghosted them for four hours, and told me that eventually at some point at night they would book me some other room. So I'd say the booking.com policy you mentioned isn't quite as valuable as you might think at first.
TylerE 4y ago
If you’re booked 3rd party you’re much more likely to be the one bumped I. The first place. You’re also likely to get the least desireable rooms on the least desireable floors.
- rjh29 4y ago
  People say that but it doesn't ring true in my experience. Let's face it, you're just paying more for the same service if you book directly.
  - Benjamin_Dobell 4y ago
    Strangely, at least in Australia, you often pay more for booking directly. On multiple occasions I've checked a hotel's website and found aggregators with cheaper rates, then literally walked in the front door and asked what's the best they can do. It's worse and I end up getting my wife to book on her mobile phone from the parking lot and let her complete the check-in. Don't get me wrong, generally not a fan of middlemen. But the experience when booking a hotel directly comes down to the owners/management, and it's going to vary wildly compared to one of these big aggregators.
    - 4y ago

lmm 4y ago

Again that's the opposite of my experience. If I've booked on Booking.com my booking is right there, on their website and in my inbox. If I book directly with the hotel, do I have a booking? Uh, maybe. Roll of the dice when I show up.

SOLAR_FIELDS 4y ago
This is super interesting. I know it happens, but I'm decently traveled and I've never had it happen to me (booking directly with the hotel and having that booking not be available). I've probably stayed in at least 500 individual direct bookings with hotels in my lifetime, to at least give some numbers to the anecdata.
scarface74 4y ago
I literally live in hotels for seven months a year across the US. I have never seen this happen. But I only stay at Hilton and Hyatt brand hotels.
- lmm 4y ago
  Sticking with a single big corporate chain has most of the same advantages as using a big booking site. But I never found a single chain that had hotels everywhere I wanted to go; indeed a lot of the places I end up wanting to to don't have any name brand hotels at all.