Hi,
What do you use to compare hotels?
I usually book from either Booking, agoda, hotels, tripadvisor or expedia but its tedious comparing them when one can offer specials for being logged-in/members only.
Which is the best at comparing all of them in one without comparing the hotel comparisons!
Thanks
Trivago is my new favorite. It always lists the best prices available based on my experience. Although tbh i do end up checking individual booking sites just in case.
Piggybank and others have raised a good point re potential discount codes available. Unfortunately i do that part manually.
Also, make sure that you're logged-in for "member only" deals, and also, most of the time it's cheaper to book through mobile apps (especially with agoda and booking.com).
Logged into the APP (ie- actually have to download the app) or is logging into the site through your mobile browser sufficient?
Both! Member deals on the websites can be good. But there are also often "app exclusive" deals too. Sometimes these can stack as well.
If you want to learn about the online hotel booking industry, watch this episode of The Checkout from the ABC website.
Online hotel booking is a duopoly owned by two companies that cover 85% of the market:
Expedia (who also own Hotels.com, Last Minute, Orbitz and Wotif, to name a few). Expedia owns the Trivago search engine, so clicking on their 'View Deal' link always seems to redirect you to their affiliate sites.
Priceline (also parent company to Agoda and Booking.com), they run the Kayak search engine which seems to be more impartial, as it'll list the cheapest booking site prices which can come from either Expedia-owned or Priceline-owned websites.
A good search engine site would generate search results from all providers, not just the ones they're affiliated with. I doubt there is one definitive or 'ultimate' search engine site you can rely on and be able to disregard all others due to the nature of the online booking industry. It's best to use a combination of a few sites just to make sure you're getting the best deal.
You may want to have a look at the companies who occupy the 15% of the online market. Hotels Combined looks to be the most popular search site for Australians that isn't owned by Expedia or Priceline, ranked #483 by Australian net traffic at the time of writing. The plus side of Hotels Combined is they'll often include a quote for booking direct with the hotel website. Only Expedia ranked #270 and Wotif ranked #327 are more popular by Australian traffic numbers.
My problem with comparison sites is that they only show you the normal price. Since the vast majority of hotels are the same price on every booking site, saving money can only be done by using discount codes and promotions which the booking sites offer from time to time such as 10% off discount codes or spend $400 get $50 off deals. Unfortunately I have not yet found a way to find all of the discount codes being offered at any given time but if you don't mind doing the extra work looking for the codes then you are likely going to save money compared to just using comparison sites.
You raise a good point. Online booking sites earn somewhere around 15% commission every time a booking is made. They'll often provide discounts less than their earned commission so they can still earn a net profit from each transaction.
The discounts can take the form of:
internal member-targeted offers (eg. book a flight with Expedia and often they'll give you a discount if you book a hotel in the destination city for the same dates)
external codes anybody can use, often posted on OzBargain
redemptions through cashback websites. I find Aussie cashbacks sites are pretty tight offering no more than 5%-6% off, I usually use UK cashback sites (UK bank account required) which offer 10%-12% cashback during sale periods.
Unfortunately there is no website that will factor in these additional discounts, this is something you'll have to research for yourself.
I usually compare hotels primarily on features within the price band that I've chosen. Sometimes I may have to choose a different price band if the destination requires it. After that usually the prices for a given hotel from booking sites, and the hotel itself, are within a few percent of each other, so then it's up to you how much time you want to spend time optimising by checking the various sites and applying any discounts you can find.
There are some small differences even under the same stable, e.g. for a given hotel, Agoda will charge your CC and reimbuse the hotel, while Booking leaves you to pay the hotel yourself. So this affects how you budget and carry your money.
most are run by two companies only, so all are really the same. Look up The Checkout article about them.
Ive stopped looking for the cheapest price and started sticking to just the one Hotels.com to maximise the rewards feature, 1 free night after 10. After travelling around Europe a few years ago and having reservations across 3 or for sites, it just made it easier to have it all consolided to one site and one app.
Hey all, sorry to bump this old topic but I'd like to know your feedback on reliability of these hotel booking websites.
Expedia, Agoda, don't get good reviews from productreview.com.au :(
There's 2 major groups that own majority of the comparison sites.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Booking_Holdings
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expedia_Group
Hotels.com and Booking.com are probably the most prominent ones.
They're perfectly fine to use in general but make sure you read all the fine print and understand fully what you are purchasing. They're sometimes cheaper because there's specific restrictions or exclusions. Check, check and check again.
Also, always cross-check rates with the hotel's own website directly to make sure you're getting the best deal. Sometimes it's cheaper to go direct if booking well in advance.
As with pretty much anything online, there's extreme positive and extreme negative reviews for absolutely everything.
@Hybroid - Agree with what you're saying. It's the extreme negative reviews that cause concern for me - because you're dealing with a middle man e.g. Agoda who gets your hotel bookings, etc. When you show up on the day at the hotel, they don't have you're reservation. :(
That's never happened to me using hotels.com or booking.com. I'm not familiar with Agoda and haven't used them. You can always call or e-mail the hotel directly to confirm before you travel.
There are sooo many sites.
Add Trivago or HotelsCombined to your list.