In the art of travel planning, the skill is to know where you can read between the lines. There is always something that escapes the eye, and if you master the art, grabbing the cheapest hotel deals is just a step away. Read on further to know how!
1. Use The Aggregation Websites
In every business, there comes a time when the business looks for a ‘market monopoly’. In fact, that will be the ultimate aim of any good business. Travel is no different. When the OTA industry came with the idea of monopolistic service provider websites, there was no option for the customer but to go ahead with grabbing what is thrown at them.
But, then came the “service of the services” – the aggregator industry. An aggregator website essentially gathers pricing information from all online service providers and offers the cheapest price for a property.
The traditional search involved “price based” approach where you could book what was offered to you the cheapest. What one missed out on was- “the price of the same property offered by different service providers and OTA websites”.
The aggregator websites such as Trivago, TripAdvisor and Skyscanner allow you to search the price of the same property from different websites. This allows the customer with the flexibility to grab the cheapest hotel deals for the preferred property rather than working other way round.
2. Skip the ‘Complimentary Syndrome’
Trust me on this! Nothing comes for Free. Not even the complimentaries. So, if you still live in the notion that you are not billed for that 7-10 breakfast table, you are in a fool’s paradise. Do a simple check with a search engine though to find out.
Without Any Selections:-
In this option, I have tried to select a hotel for my year end trip for a 4D/5N stay in Bangkok. I get several options such as Free Breakfast, Free Cancellations and Pay Later Option. Without any selections, the price of the stay (without any taxes) is INR 2996/-. Let’s check what happens when you select the Free Breakfast Option with your booking.
This is what it turns out when you go for a payout without the complimentaries included.
With Complimentary Selections:-
In the second search, the Free Breakfast Option is selected and we can see the jump in the prices instantly. It doesn’t end here. When checking out, you are paying two major components on this amount which are:-
Internet Handling Fees – about 10% of the total cost (Often given different names such as booking fees, service fees, etc)
GST – 7%. Most services use Published Tariffs instead of Actual Tariff for tax computation which means that if your published tariff is INR 3000/- and actual tariff is INR 2750/- your tax is calculated on INR 3000/- only.
Since, the price of the complimentaries have already been included in the base price, you are paying almost INR 3500/- on the breakfast alone. Alternatively, there is always a choice of a-la-carte menu which is always cheaper and is enough for one person to consume when compared to a buffet.
So, instead of paying endlessly for services, it is always a good idea to pay for what you can use.
3. Book During Off-Peak Hours
Dynamic Pricing might have crept in well in the airline website strategy but in the hotel industry, it is still struggling. It has to be, as the number of hotels are much higher in supply than the number of aircraft at any given time.
Also, if you might not know, the Dynamic Pricing module is often a ‘manual practice’ of playing with algorithms than AI. So, someone has to sit behind the desk watching when customers are piling up on the front end a page to make hotel bookings.
Choose a time when the traffic is lower usually early mornings. Late evenings is not a good idea, as unlike what you think, the data companies benefit data users more at night than during the day time. So, you do not want to hit a button when there are many others competing on a page for bookings.
Check Out:- 4 Air Trawell Hacks To Save Time and Money
4. Compare Internet Handling Fees From Websites
This is among the trickiest parts of both flight as well as hotel booking websites. Although, this is what is unavoidable, you can always compare the internet handling fees / booking fees etc among various websites while completing your bookings.
Also, as you can see on the invoice above, the taxes work out to about 17% and the internet handling charges are included in the taxable part of the invoice due to which the price shoots up the sky.
But there are some services such as OYO Rooms and Agoda which have lesser internet handling fees and compared to the others. While you make a choice of booking hotels, you should carefully check the invoice structure before you press the CONFIRM Button.
5. Use Coupon Websites
This is often the most avoided of all. The coupon websites are best ways to earn rooms at budget prices. There are websites such as Coupon Marathon, Couponplusdeals, Coupon Dunia, etc where you can easily grab offers on Airbnb Accommodations, Hotels, etc.
Try out one of the coupons now
6. Refer And Earn Method
The Refer and Earn Method has been one of the best ways you can get the best offers in hand. Off late, if you notice, there has been a subtle growth in the hotel websites offering refer-and-earn method since Airbnb started it first.
Now most of the hotel websites such as Goibibo, Homestay, FABHotels etc, allow you to refer and earn credits refer your friends while they travel. While booking a hotel for yourself, you can use such credits for earning the cheapest hotel deals.
Get the full list of hotel websites here.
7. Earn Hotel Room Nights
Another way of getting cheapest hotel deals is to use the hotel loyalty programs that allow you to collect nights for your (or your friend’s stay).
There are two hotel websites that let you earn hotel nights for your stay and hotel memberships. Expedia has a membership program called the Expedia VIP Access where the members can earn Free Hotel Nights against the reward points.
Hotels.com on the other hand is open-to-all program where you earn nights consistently for your stays apart from the applicable discounts. You can subscribe for alerts to unlock the Secret Prices by either becoming a member of the Hotels.com® Rewards or downloading the Hotels.com app
Check Out:- 5 Best Hotel Programs To Earn Airline Loyalty Points
8. Sign Up For Deal Alerts
Another way to stay updated with the cheapest hotel deals is to sign up for the price alerts. Price alerts particularly help you to target the properties that you were trying to look for and could not book it at a particular time due to higher prices.
TripAdvisor sends you customized alerts on your email of properties that you have searched at a particular time periodically. If you are planning to book a particular property, simply search the property first on the TripAdvisor Search Engine. You are then auto-subscribed to the alerts and should receive messages on your email when the rates change.
9. Book And Pay Later
Not many people either use it or understand the technique but, I find it a good tool. The hotel room rates are bound to increase in peak seasons and we cannot stop them from increasing.
The Book and Pay Later strategy helps you to hold the rates at a current date, so that till such time you decide to travel or make changes, the rates of the property do not change. As other travelers get delayed to plan their move, you are at an advantage of holding the cheaper hotel rates than the others and the same price is available until you decide to change plans.
Some properties allow you to hold the rates and pay up to 48 hrs before the journey date. This lets you to lock on to the hotel prices on the day of the search and do not bother until it is time for you to move out for the trip. You can use this strategy with Booking.com as well as Agoda. On Booking.com, most of the bookings are available at Book Now Pay Later option. In Agoda, you might have to check the individual hotel’s policy as some hotels do demand you to pay within few days of the booking confirmation.
10. Hack Hotels
This is an unique and different strategy followed by HackHotels.com a company that offers rates equal to or lower than the booking price on your invoice as available. You need to upload the invoice of the hotel booking you made earlier (which you can do with a book now and pay later option). Hack Hotels looks out for an affordable rate for the same or another property and provides you the offer for booking. You can then choose to book the hotel as offered through the hacked price.
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