![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
No more Expedia for me
Apr. 22nd, 2009 09:51 amOnce upon a time, Expedia was my favorite way to book vacations... I'd book my flights and book my hotel rooms and, occasionally, even book my rental car. But those days are officially over.
It started last November when we booked a hotel room in Spokane for Thanksgiving night. We were having dinner at my aunt's place down in Clarkston, but wanted to visit my dad north of Spokane the next day and figured that would be a good place to stay for the night. It's actually a big night for hotel usage, with so many people traveling to visit family for the holiday, but we got a decent deal on a hotel in a good location and pre-paid for it so we wouldn't have to worry about anything (especially since we were likely going to be arriving a bit late). Yeah, well, imagine our extreme unhappiness when we arrived to discover that Expedia had never bothered to actually book the room for us (you know, the one we'd already PAID FOR). After some back and forth with the guys at Expedia who couldn't find us another room, they basically said "oops, sorry... I guess we'll give you your money back." Swell. So, we're stranded five hours from home on Thanksgiving without a hotel room (you know, the one that we had *guaranteed* by prepaying). Thankfully, the clerk at the hotel really went to bat for us... calling around the area until he found us a room at a Howard Johnson's a little further into town. I was a little nervous, because it was about $40 cheaper a night (yes, that could be considered a positive, but I was very worried about what sort of fleabag motel we would find) and was pleasantly surprised to find very nice, older but newly remodeled hotel.
Needless to say, I have never booked another hotel room through Expedia... although I gladly use their database to get an idea of what hotels are in an area, before going directly to that hotel's website to book a room.
And now... I'm never going to book another flight through Expedia. Thankfully, the current issue is nowhere near as bad as the debacle with the hotel room. We booked our flight to Hawaii through Expedia and made our seat requests at that time... and I'll admit I was a bit concerned when our confirmation popped up with no seat assignment listed. Apparently, I had reason to be concerned... because for our six hour flight for our 20th Anniversary vacation, we're seated six rows apart and on opposite sides of the airplane. Lovely.
I headed out to the Hawaiian Airlines site to see if we could swap seats around and the flight is apparently fully booked, with no empty seats anywhere. We'll definitely be talking to the airport attendants tomorrow to see if there's anything that can be done. But I'm already drafting my letter to Expedia letting them know my new philosophy when it comes to their company: Never again.
It started last November when we booked a hotel room in Spokane for Thanksgiving night. We were having dinner at my aunt's place down in Clarkston, but wanted to visit my dad north of Spokane the next day and figured that would be a good place to stay for the night. It's actually a big night for hotel usage, with so many people traveling to visit family for the holiday, but we got a decent deal on a hotel in a good location and pre-paid for it so we wouldn't have to worry about anything (especially since we were likely going to be arriving a bit late). Yeah, well, imagine our extreme unhappiness when we arrived to discover that Expedia had never bothered to actually book the room for us (you know, the one we'd already PAID FOR). After some back and forth with the guys at Expedia who couldn't find us another room, they basically said "oops, sorry... I guess we'll give you your money back." Swell. So, we're stranded five hours from home on Thanksgiving without a hotel room (you know, the one that we had *guaranteed* by prepaying). Thankfully, the clerk at the hotel really went to bat for us... calling around the area until he found us a room at a Howard Johnson's a little further into town. I was a little nervous, because it was about $40 cheaper a night (yes, that could be considered a positive, but I was very worried about what sort of fleabag motel we would find) and was pleasantly surprised to find very nice, older but newly remodeled hotel.
Needless to say, I have never booked another hotel room through Expedia... although I gladly use their database to get an idea of what hotels are in an area, before going directly to that hotel's website to book a room.
And now... I'm never going to book another flight through Expedia. Thankfully, the current issue is nowhere near as bad as the debacle with the hotel room. We booked our flight to Hawaii through Expedia and made our seat requests at that time... and I'll admit I was a bit concerned when our confirmation popped up with no seat assignment listed. Apparently, I had reason to be concerned... because for our six hour flight for our 20th Anniversary vacation, we're seated six rows apart and on opposite sides of the airplane. Lovely.
I headed out to the Hawaiian Airlines site to see if we could swap seats around and the flight is apparently fully booked, with no empty seats anywhere. We'll definitely be talking to the airport attendants tomorrow to see if there's anything that can be done. But I'm already drafting my letter to Expedia letting them know my new philosophy when it comes to their company: Never again.
