Back in April, Orbitz rolled back its hotel booking fees, in the face of some smashmouth competition between the online travel agencies. At the time, Orbitz promised that the hotel fee cuts would last until July 15. But no: They’ve been extended.
Orbitz was one of the last agencies to reduce its airline booking fees. Those fee cuts were set to resume on June 1. They didn’t. Until further notice, the fees are history.
It’s a brutal world and a nasty fight for market share, and agencies aren’t bringing the fees back. Expedia, Travelocity, Priceline, and Hotwire all eliminated their airline booking fees.
But other agencies haven’t reducing the hotel booking fees the way Orbitz has. Orbitz is trying to carve out a space as the site for hotel bookings.
On the one hand, they’ve got a better price than other agencies, so this gives Orbitz a competitive advantage that travelers would be wise to take advantage of.
But it simultaneously shows that Orbitz is hurting and needs to cut prices in order to generate business.
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July 16th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
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#Travel – Back in April, Orbitz rolled back its hotel booking fees, in the face of some smashmouth comp.. [link to post]
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July 17th, 2009 at 1:39 am
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No wonder I’ve had fantastic luck with Orbitz lately…
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July 19th, 2009 at 3:38 am
Cutting price is has good effects in short term. But not that good in long-term benefits and maintaining customers.