I love saving money, after all why pay more when you can pay less?! Especially when it comes to travel! We’ve all heard stories of unknowing travellers overpaying for a vacation because they didn’t shop around. Well, I’m the girl who shops around! I love getting the best price and often find it through OTA’s (Online Travel Agents). More commonly known by their brand names OTA’s are sites like Expedia, Trip Advisor and more. They are also referred to as 3rd party platforms. The question is though… are these OTA’s always the best way to go? Let’s take a deeper look at some of my personal experiences with The Pros and Cons of booking Expedia, Flight Hub and other 3rd party apps!
Flight Hub:
One thing I love to book cheap is airfare. The way I see it, once I’m on the plane we’re all going to the same destination and therefore flights have less variables to watch out for then with other OTA bookings. Recently I have had several great experiences with booking cheap airfares through Flight Hub. A quick google search for cheap airfares and Flight Hub often comes up. Below is 3 examples of great fares I have booked in the past year. The last shows why I believe Flight Hub is able to offer a cheaper fare than the airlines own website:
Ireland:
June 3/22 – I paid $326.31 through Flight Hub to fly to Dublin from Toronto on a Westjet flight. This price included one checked bag, no itinerary changes and I got my aisle economy seat. No drawbacks.
UK:
July 22/23 – I paid $389.81 through Flight Hub to fly to London from Toronto on an Air Transit flight. The price included one checked bag, no itinerary changes. About 3 weeks prior to my flight, Air Transit sent out a bidding option to upgrade to Business Class lie flat seats for the 7hr flight. This was done directly through Air Transit. (so the no itinerary changes obviously wasn’t accurate.) I bid I believe $200-250 and secured this business class window seat for under $600.
USA:
On Sept 7/23 – I paid $870 (which I later converted in free through my credit card points) through Flight Hub to fly to Boise, Idaho from Toronto on Delta Air Lines. The price did not include checked bags, seat selection or itinerary changes. When I compared the fare to Delta itself and other websites the cheapest prices were $975- $1100. Here’s why (IMO):
- Seat selection for me would have been $26.38 per seat and I had 4 flights = $105.52 ($975.52)
- Checked bags for me were $30 USD. I didn’t have checked bags so it was something I didn’t need to pay for.
Basically booking through Flight Hub gave me the option to remove the fringe benefits I didn’t need. I didn’t need to pay for seat selection and I didn’t need to check a bag. A lot of sites “include” these features as standard are actually already hidden in the fares. Delta does offer a no fringe option called the Basic Economy Fare BUT THERE TWO MAJOR DIFFERENCES BETWEEN my FLIGHT HUB flight and their BASIC ECONOMY:
- During boarding, Basic Economy Fares board last, so if the flight is full and there isn’t enough space on the aircraft, your carry-on will get checked. My Flight Hub booking awarded me Main 2 category which was HUGE. I got to keep my carry-on with me on the flight. (Main 3 is after Main 2, then Basic Economy is last).
- Basic economy on Delta was more expensive when I looked and they still had to pay $30USD for a checked bag on the flight.
Flexibility with any travel plays a huge part in finding cheap pricing. I have had several other flights where Flight Hub wasn’t the cheapest so it pays to shop around. Note to mention… Once you do a search for pricing with Flight Hub you will get a lot of emails from them.
Expedia:
Okay… so this is the reason I wrote this blog today. Expedia covers a variety of different options. Vacation packages, hotels, activities, insurance and car rentals it can be an easy one stop shop. I personally use Expedia primarily for hotels. I plan to continue to do so even after today, but will be more mindful when I do. OTA’s are great for discounted hotel room rates which is why I love them* but beware that when a hiccup arises it can get complicated.
* A lot of large brand hotels will match OTA’s prices. If you find a cheaper rate on an OTA and want to book directly through the hotel, contact them to see if they offer a price match (or better yet price beat option). Check out my blog about Marriotts Best Rate Guarantee here:
Today’s “Expedia” Story:
Last month I booked a small Inn in Nova Scotia on Expedia. The rate on Expedia was $20 less than the Inn’s website. Our trip was for an expensive pre-paid excursion so I went ahead with Expedia to save $. (I didn’t notice I didn’t get a confirmation email.) Unfortunately, the pre-paid excursion got cancelled due to weather so we no longer had a reason to travel. Here is the process to cancel my hotel reservation; it took 2 hrs to complete. (not worth $20 savings).
The Resolution –
- Called hotel to cancel, hotel said I was booked through Expedia so I had to speak with them
- Checked my Expedia account & had no record of reservation both via .com and .ca
- Called back hotel got reference number
- Tried Expedia’s live chat with reference number, chat was disabled (auto response action) because they had no record of a reservation.
- Called hotel back got credit card info used (last four digits and expiry date)
- Googled Expedia’s phone number for Live Agent support 1-866-310-5768 but couldn’t get to a live agent as the reference number wasn’t the one they were looking for. Tried every automated option applicable over a half hour process.
- Called hotel back asked them to kindly send a screenshot of what they had which they thankfully did.
- Called Expedia back and picked “book flight” option to get a live agent. Live agent told me the reservation was via a third party… WAIT WHAT?! MY THIRD PARTY USED A THIRD PARTY?! The agent gave me the phone number to the third party Travelpass and transferred my call directly.
- Agent at Travelpass told me I had to call Expedia. I explained Expedia had just told me to call them and she chuckled. After a hold she gave me a number to call which ironically was the number I had been given for her. I told her you just gave me the number to call you. So she gave me two more numbers… one was on their website (855-391-0213) and another one was (855-475-0010).
- I called the second number and reached Malcom. I added my friend via 3 way calling, because she was also on the reservation. I gave Malcom all of the information and he found our reservation. He checked the terms and conditions and fortunately we had “a few hours left to cancel” which was 6pm that day.
- Malcom was not a call to Expedia, or a call to Travelpass, Malcom worked for and our booking was actually through reservationcounter.com !!!!
- We asked Malcom to send us a confirmation email about our cancellation to both of my email addresses and a copy to my friends email also. (it has been 10 hrs since that call ended no email received yet). This probably explains why I didn’t receive a booking confirmation either.
Now you may be wondering would I still use Expedia after all of this? Yes absolutely! I would make sure to book through my account only though. Booking through your account also builds points which is an added bonus on top of the savings. Are you looking to book something through Expedia?! Here is a link (I only post links to companies I actually use myself)
Trip Advisor and Viator:
Similar to Expedia, Trip Advisor also covers a variety of different options including vacation packages, bundles, hotels, activities, insurance and car rentals it can also be an easy one stop shop. I personally use Trip Advisor for their reviews as a valued travel resource and to book outings & excursions (Viator also for the latter.) Even after some hiccups they are a valuable part of my global travels.
Book your Trip Advisor finds here:
Would you like to hear some of the hiccups from Trip Advisor and Viator?! Let me know in the comments! Otherwise I hope you enjoyed The Pros and Cons of booking Expedia, Flight Hub and other 3rd party apps!
