Online Travel Sites Comparison
Posted by Samuel Carter | Under Travel & Leisure Wednesday Feb 10, 2010There are many discount travel sites out there that want your money but which one is the right one to look at? Take a look below to see what we think about our studies of these sites.
Before you surf between Travelocity, Expedia, Priceline, Orbitz and a host of other discount sites, you may want to read the following piece in which I will be comparing the different discount travel sites available and some of their particulars.
Usually you will find that cancellation policies are not as ridged when you are dealing directly with a specific airline or hotel, and booking fees are not included as they are with discount travel sites. They sometimes offer very lucrative awards to returning customers.
Because it constantly searches for the cheapest in hotel accommodations, airline tickets and car rentals on as many sites as possible, Kayak.com is able to find deals that the larger discount travel sites don’t.
Other meta-search sites, such as CheapTickets.com, are around, but no one gets the respect that Kayak.com does. Both Kayak.com and SideStep.com, which is owned by Kayak, often don’t charge a fee because they are paid by the hotel or airlines, other online agencies or through advertisements.
Taxi and other transportation information are available from Vayama.com’s Getting Around section. Vayama.com does, according to destination, charge a booking fee.
With a standard site, such as Travelocity.com, you can combine everything into a package. Travelocity offers a 24-hour guarantee, but it does charge fees, including one for telephone booking. Sometimes these fees are discounted or eliminated according promotional procedure.
Expedia has the name and the prices are solid. They also have a good awards program that has no blackout dates. If you are into rewards, check them out now.
Orbitz.com is known to cater to eco tourism and offers updates from all United States airports. It also guarantees hotel rates, refunding the difference if you find a similar reservation at a lower price at another site within a 24-hour period.
Although Hotels.com doesn’t charge for cancelations, they recommend that you contact the hotel directly regarding confirmation of reservations or specifics in regard to room preference, etc.
There aren’t many Orbitz promotion code lying around but they are all pretty good.