Consumers, beware! It can get pretty scary out there when you book your travel all by yourself. Consider these notes of caution.
2 You arranged your family’s vacation all by yourself and didn’t think twice when your daughter decided she didn’t want to go with you. She can get a little testy anyway, sometimes. So you asked your niece to take her place and just assumed she could use your daughter’s airplane ticket. Not so fast, auntie. The security agent at the gate was super nice when she explained what the airline ticketing rules are, but that didn’t help when you had to call your sister to tell her to come pick up her daughter. Thanksgiving dinner conversation might be a little tense this year.
3 The listing for the hotel you booked online said that your room was located in the villa section of the resort, so you thought you were getting an actual villa. Turns out yours was one of 16 rooms in stand-alone “villa” accommodations and what you actually had was just a regular guestroom. Bummer. Who knew it would be so difficult to navigate all this travel industry lingo?
4 You assumed the remote city you flew to late at night had Uber service. Why wouldn’t it? So you didn’t arrange for a hotel transfer and ended up sleeping at the airport because you had to wait for cab service to begin again in the morning.
5 You are done talking to people and just want to communicate over your phone, so when you reserved your annual vacation online, you did it with just three clicks of the mouse. Voila! You really are smart. You were so proud of yourself you didn’t take time to read the small print on your small phone and didn’t see that your trip was completely nonrefundable, no matter what. Which was painful to learn when the new owners of the corporation you work for called a mandatory meeting for the very day you were going to depart.
6 Things were going really well at the airport on your way home from your trip until you heard there was a blizzard back in New York. When “cancelled” signs went up for every flight listed on the departure board your fellow passengers got on the phone with their travel agents to rebook them. But you didn’t use a travel agent, did you? You sent an e-mail to the “info@” address listed on the website you booked your trip on, but didn’t hear back from them until the following Monday, after you’d already rented a car on your own and driven 2,000 miles to get back home.
7 You were so excited about that getaway with a group of your best friends. All of them booked through a travel agent, but you, ever the independent soul, did it on your own because you know you are smarter than most people. What a horror that first morning turned out to be when you were the only one to get a bill for your first big meal together. Turns out their agent had been able to get them all the valuable perk of a free breakfast, every day! The website you booked on didn’t provide that. Who knew a breakfast buffet could cost $49? This turned out to be the most expensive trip, ever.
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