Expedia stole $350 from me.

[jg10003]

I booked a flight from Los Angles to Fort Lauderdale using Expedia. It was one of their “bargain fares”. It was listed as a 5 hour flight for $260. By the time I finished typing my name, address, etc., the fare went up to $350. I bought it anyway. After paying, the itinerary showed a 9-1/2 hour flight with a 2 hour layover in Chicago. Customer service refused to give a refund or book me on another flight. Since I paid with a debit card instead of a credit card, I could not cancel the charge. I am warning everyone I know – “Use Expedia at your own peril”.

[Coventina]

1. Yeah, I've been burned a few times on those "bargain travel sites".

Now, I might surf them, but I tend to book directly on the airline / hotel sites directly.

At least when you do that, you can appeal to their good names / reputations.

It worked for me recently with American Airlines when I had a dispute with them.

[LisaL]

2. That sucks.

[OrwellwasRight]

3. Post it everywhere you can.

If you have enough FB/Twitter/Blof followers they may be shamed into doing the right thing so that you will retract the negative comments.

[jg10003]

4. I am. I would appreciate my fellow DU'ers reposting this on FB, twitter, etc. Thanks.

[mnhtnbb]

5. The travel sites have algorithms that detect interest in certain flights.

If you are going to book something, you have to be prepared to make the decision when you first look
at the options. I've repeatedly seen fares go up--within very short time, like less than an hour and they may now be faster--
if you look at an option and don't immediately select it.

[Laffy Kat]

6. I've stopped using them.

It just adds another layer to the arrangements. There is no reason to use the service.

[GeorgeGist]

7. I bought it anyway

[jg10003]

8. I bought a non-stop flight, they sold me a 9-1/2 hour flight with layovers that

I was unable to use. They should have informed me of the change before I bought the ticket.

[Initech]

9. Expedia blows. So does Hotwire.

I stopped using Expedia a long time ago. And I stopped using Hotwire after I had to change a flight and they hosed me for an extra $100 on top of the airline change fee, and I had to wait 24 hours - which I didn't have - in order for Hotwire to confirm the changes with Northwest. After that I have placed a "fuck third party travel sites" moratorium when I book. I will only book from the airlines, hotels, or rental car places directly.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

10. I've always hated hotwire

I used to fly most weeks for work. I used skiplagged.com to search but I only book directly on the airline site. The airline gives you 24 hours to cancel and get a full refund. At least all the major airlines did. About 10% of the time I used orbitz and combined a flight and hotel.

In addition to non-stop and connecting flights, skiplagged finds "hidden city" flights. Things have been influenced by the discount airlines like Spirit and Frontier so things are a bit cheaper now. For example, in 2015 I went to Atlanta almost every week. I bought tickets about a week ahead. Delta had most of the business and Delta's usual price for PHL-ATL 7 days ahead was $325. However, Delta's price for PHL-ATL-MYR was $82. I would book to Myrtle Beach and just not take the connecting flight. The only drawback is you can't check any bags.

I used expedia a couple times. My current tactic is to only buy flights from a site that shows all of the flight info on the page together before confirming the purchase. Not just the day and destination but times, flight numbers and connecting airports as well. Before you confirm, take a screen shot of the page and save it. If anything bait and switch happens and the site refuses a refund, call your bank and report it as fraud.

[cbdo2007]

11. It is very misleading and unfair, but they didn't steal from you.

You still are traveling to the location you want to go to, and would have had an opportunity at the final screen to confirm your purchase...which you obviously accepted.

That being said, the bait and switch at the last minute is sooooo frustrating, and happens to me at places online all of the time and I just feel like an idiot for spending so much time browsing their site for them to try to jack me around at the end. The last time it happened was leading up to Christmas I was shopping for some clothes for my wife on Gap.com....I had spent HOURS searching for clothes and putting things in my cart, I go to check out and use one of their promo codes, and oh now all of a sudden that code is just for purchases on your Gap card (didn't say that anywhere in the "fine print&quot , so I called their number and spent another hour on hold and then 30 minutes talking to their Customer Service rep, who finally agreed to give me the discount after I had to email her a screen shot of the terms of the online code, then at the last second she tells me the total and it has an extra $12 shipping added on, which was supposed to be included. Shopping online is a huge hassle, and I dread it half the time. The other half the time I do get pretty good deals, so that's what keeps me coming back.

I'm sorry this happened to you. Hang in there and thanks for notifying us, I will definitely steer clear of Expedia in the future.

[jg10003]

12. I did not have the opportunity to confirm the change from a non-stop...

flight to a flight with a 2-1/2 hour layover. The final screen showed the price increase, which I agreed too, but not change from a 5 hour non-stop flight to a 9-1/2 hour flight with a connection. that little bit of information only appeared AFTER I paid.