Melo Villareal
Book Your Next Vacation Online
There was a time that the only way to book your travel is to go through a travel agency. If you go directly to an airline to buy your tickets, you have to pay the full fare. Travel agencies can offer lower prices because they get it wholesale. Nowadays, traditional travel agencies are facing a real threat to their business: online booking sites.
Not so long ago, most people felt antsy about paying money to an online travel site, so travel agencies still ruled. You can still get great deals, but you had to go there physically to make your travel plans. Of course, if you like the person-to-person contact, this would still be your preferred service provider. However, if convenience is your priority, online booking does have the edge.
Aside from convenience, you can get quite incredible deals from online travel sites. Take Thomson Holidays, for instance. Once the underdog in the travel industry in the UK, the company scored heavily when they offered package deal holidays to Majorca for 3 and 4 nights for only £19 a night in 1969. Other travel companies quickly jumped on that particular bandwagon, and when the Internet came along, it was simply a matter of changing their selling venue. Thomson remains one of the top sites for budget holidays in the UK, and they even offer cruises. Reviews are mixed, however, but it is undeniable that £ 511 per person all-inclusive for 7 days in Akyarlar is pretty good.
Of course, a budget holiday may not always be all that it is hyped to be, and the customer service may not be top-notch. Thompson Holidays has had its share of bad reviews, with one dissatisfied customer going so far as to put up a rant blog that topped the search ranks for the keywords “Thomson Tunisia review” or ‘Thomson Tunisia trip.” The blogger, Andy Sharman, was compelled to go to such lengths after a disastrous vacation in a “dirty” hotel in Tunisia because Thomson failed to address his concerns in a timely manner. One might argue that you pay for what you get, but there is really no excuse for poor customer service.
Such incidents are not exclusive to online travel sites, however. If you book with a traditional travel agency to the same hotel, you would probably have a bad experience, too. Sometimes, it is just the roll of the dice. Some Thomson clients had nothing but positive feedback for their holiday experience. Here are a few advantages of booking online in more detail.
Easy
The main benefit of booking your holiday online is ease and convenience. You don’t have to leave your home and battle traffic or find a parking space. You can book your flight, reserve your accommodations, and arrange for a rental car from your laptop, and in most cases, you can get them all on one site. Think about all the time you saved! You can do this at any time of the day, too, so if you want to book it during your lunch hour or at 2 am in the morning, you can. You can even do it during your commute as most travel sites are mobile-friendly, too!
Affordable
The problem with traditional travel agencies is you have to go with what they have in their listings. With online travel sites, you can jump from one site to another to look for the best deal you can find, especially if you book months in advance or choose to travel during off-peak seasons. You can even include travel insurance at great prices. One disadvantage of booking online way in advance is that the airlines or hotel may cease operations before you get there. One workaround is to pay with your credit card. The credit card company is compelled to refund your money in such cases.
To find the best deals, all you have to do is make a general search for “cheap holiday” and you will get more than 200 million results. How about using a Thompson Discount Code? Many travel-related sites even offer Internet-only promotions to encourage people to book online. Some airlines even charge you more if you book the same flight over the phone, tacking on a customer service fee.
Flexible
Plans change, and when that happens, you need to cancel or change your itinerary. Your travel agent can do that for you, of course, but it is far simpler to do it yourself if you booked your travel online. All you have to do is go to the site where you made your reservations, key in your reference numbers, and make your changes. In most cases, if you cancel or change your booking before the prescribed deadline, you will not have to pay any rebooking or cancellation fees. Virgin America, for example, will allow you to cancel or rebook our flight online even 24 hours before you are supposed to fly.
User reviews
Sure, you’ll get a few hecklers and some paid reviews, but overall, you can count on user reviews, to be honest. This is crucial when you are planning to jump into unfamiliar territory. If you are considering an all-in holiday package, you can check on customer feedback on the airline, the hotel, tours, cruises, attractions, and even the country or area itself to see if it is right for you before you commit to anything. Many reviews will also provide valuable travel tips. You have what you need to make an informed decision. It may be better to check independent sites like TripAdvisor rather than rely on the reviews posted on the site itself, though, which is unlikely to publish unfavorable ones.
Booking your vacation online is practical, convenient, and affordable. You even have the option to pay via bank deposit or cash if you are leery about giving out your credit card details. It really is the only way to travel today.
Searching for the best hotels and affordable flights for your next vacation? Check out our complete list of affordable hotels and resorts via Agoda or you may also see available Airbnb properties in the city.
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