Opaque sites -- work sometime, but not always

On my current trip, I found that opaque sites often provide the best hotel and rental car prices, but not always. And no matter how often I travel, I almost always find some surprises. My trip involved a hectic different-place-every-night itinerary, so I had plenty of tries.

HOTELS. Boston was my first overnight hotel stop, and the opaque sites failed me completely. Hotwire's lowest price for any of the districts I could use started at more than $300 a night, and I had no intention of paying $300 a night for a hotel room in Boston.

For my Priceline bids, I started with the new site, www.thebiddingtraveler.com, which suggested a bid of $180 would likely be successful. But even when I bid up into the mid-$200s -- which would add up to more than $300 after taxes and fees -- those bids were all refused.

My guess is that something big was happening in Boston that night, because the opaque sites should have done much better. My fallback position? A prosaic AARP rate well under $200 at a hotel outside the districts I preferred but close enough to work.

For my stop near Charlotte airport, Priceline worked flawlessly, and I got a $95 a night room for $80. But Priceline didn't give me a good enough deal at my final stop, Warrenton Va., to offset the inflexibility, so I went with the measly 10 percent AARP discount. This time, Priceline scored on only one of three, and Hotwire didn't score at all. But that's not typical of my experience, which has generally been good with both.

RENTAL CARS. I needed two car rentals for this trip: for two days in Charlotte, picking up and returning at the airport, and for two days in the Washington area, picking up at Baltimore and returning to Dulles. For direct comparisons, I checked an intermediate size car -- with Avis, where prices were shown.

For the Charlotte rental, Priceline quoted $79 on its full-disclosure page, Avis quoted an AARP rate of $82, Hotwire's best opaque quote was $102, and the Avis no-discount price was $118. I tried a blind bid on Priceline that would have given a final price about $4 a night below its open price, which was refused. I finally went with the Avis AARP rate largely because of the superior liability coverage provided on the AARP program. But Priceline's open rate was very good.

For the Washington area rental, Hotwire quoted an opaque rate of $54, the AARP rate on Avis was $66, Priceline's open rate was $67, and the Avis no-discount rate was $73. Here, I went with Hotwire; Alamo provided the car.

Overall, I found several surprises in the car process:

-- Hotwire's high price in Charlotte was a puzzler -- about $20 higher than Avis/AARP and Priceline's full-disclosure price.

-- Also in Charlotte, when I tried the blind bid (unsuccessfully) on Priceline, its suggested bid price that stood a "very good chance" of acceptance was actually $4 a day higher than its full-disclosure price. Go figure that one.

-- The rental companies' CDW (collision damage waiver) charges are out of control. Avis wanted $27.99 a day -- a rate that was actually higher than the supposed pre-tax and pre-fee base rate.

-- New (to me) was the fact that Hotwire and Priceline now offer third-party primary collision coverage for $9 to $11 a day. I hadn't rented in more than two years and this one had eluded my attention. And it illuminates the degree to which the rental companies' CDW is inflated. You can bet that those third-party insurance companies are not losing money on their $9 to $11 coverage rates, so about two-thirds of the rental companies' daily CDW charges are pure gravy. No wonder they push it so hard.

For collision coverage, I still recommend relying on your credit card if you have one that offers the coverage, If not, the third-party coverages look a lot better than the rental companies' fat rates.

Send e-mail to Ed Perkins at eperkins@mind.net. Perkins' new book for small business and independent professionals, "Business Travel When It's Your Money," is now available through www.mybusinesstravel.com or www.amazon.com

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Shop the flash sites -- but carefully

As I've been reporting recently, "flash" or "private sale" is the current "big thing" in travel deals. You have a very short time to buy the deal, but it's usually good over several weeks to months. And some of the deals are, in fact, really good. But the flash sale system also entails some caveats.

Flash sale deals come in two flavors, with distinctly different risks:

-- Firm reservations for fixed dates.

-- Vouchers valid over a period of months, but "subject to availability."

The least risky deals are those in which you arrange a firm reservation at a firm date. Agencies that deal almost entirely with hotel and resort accommodations -- such as Jetsetter, Spire, SinqueAway and Vacationist -- typically arrange confirmed reservations on fixed dates. Potential problems with these deals are minimal. I've found, for example, that hotels generally give guests on big-discount deals the least they can within the limits of the contract. That means you're likely to get the least attractive rooms and locations rather than the best.

Vouchers are more problematic: You buy the right to an accommodation or service at any time over a period of many months, but "subject to availability." Most coupons, such as you get through Groupon and Yuupon, are voucher deals. The problem with vouchers is finding a mutually agreeable period when you want to travel and the provider offers availability. And even though some are pitched as "weekend" escapes, many are limited to midweek stays.

The system has a big potential for the sort of abuse that has been typical of "vacation certificates" for years: With those, each time you call with dates you want to visit, the reservationist regretfully informs you that the deal is not "available" for those dates, but you should keep trying. Ultimately, you either give up or the voucher expires.

I've checked around and found no indications that the travel vouchers you get in current flash sales are such scams, in any way. But paying in advance for something "subject to availability" always scares me a little.

Beyond those differences, buying through a flash sale of either type entails some other potential problems of which you should be aware:

-- Some flash sale deals are either totally nonrefundable or at least carry a big cancellation penalty. Any time you put out a lot of money in advance for a nonrefundable or big-penalty purchase, consider protecting yourself with a "cancel for any reason" travel insurance policy.

-- Most flash sale deals for hotel and resort accommodations focus on up-market options. The prices may be very good for what you get, but they generally aren't the lowest you could find. Several recent postings I've seen, for example, cover big discounts on high-end hotels in Las Vegas. Surely, $100 for a room that generally goes for $200 is a good deal -- the room might well be a big suite with Jacuzzi -- but if you're satisfied with a standard room in a four- or five-star Strip hotel, you can find one for well under $100 through Hotwire or Priceline.

-- If you've already decided where and when you want to visit somewhere, you can't be sure of finding a flash sale deal. Sure, you probably could find something attractive just about any time you want to visit Las Vegas, Orlando, New York, or San Francisco, but you're likely to come up empty handed for most other destinations. Flash sale deals are at their best for impulse travel: You browse through, see a great deal, and think, "That's a great idea -- let's do it."

None of this is to deter you from checking out the flash sales. So far, I haven't heard of any problems. At least for now, many hotel and resort operators obviously view them as one of the preferred ways to fill unsold rooms. But the "opaque" buying agencies, Hotwire and Priceline, still have lots of comparably good deals, too, and you can find them for any location and time you want to visit. So use either system or both systems -- just don't pay retail!

Send e-mail to Ed Perkins at eperkins@mind.net. Perkins' new book for small business and independent professionals, "Business Travel When It's Your Money," is now available through www.mybusinesstravel.com or www.amazon.com

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