Nothing Opaque About Priceline's Take on getaroom.com

So what are Priceline.com's and Hotwire's opinions about getaroom.com and its model?

I was unsuccessful in reaching Hotwire Group President Clem Bason yesterday about getaroom.com, the start-up launched by the founders of hotels.com, because Bason was said to be -- of all things -- traveling. I would still love to hear from Hotwire on this issue.

But, I asked Priceline spokesman Brian Ek how he sees the hotel landscape and whether consumers would be better served to use getaroom.com over Priceline.

"Regarding your questions, it’s just about impossible to draw any comparisons since we’re hearing that our major hotel chain supplier/partners aren’t supporting it [getaroom.com]," Ek said. "They see it as non-opaque and dilutive to their ADRs (average daily rates)."

"From a hotel’s perspective, if a customer can get a discount at the exact hotel they’re looking at, why would they ever pay full price?" Ek mused. "It just hurts the hotel’s ADR at a time when hotels are doing their best to keep ADRs up."

Indeed, there apparently are a paucity of major chains using getaroom.com, which displays published and discounted rates on its website and asks consumers to phone its call center for additional unpublished bargains.

I checked getaroom.com today for Boston hotels Aug. 14-16 and found merely a dozen hotels displayed -- and just three local properties, a Radisson, a Millennium and a Wyndham, that are part of larger brands.

On Ek's point about ADR dilution, the Wyndham Boston Chelsea displayed a $200 base rate per night with a line through it and showed that room was now being offered for $160 per night.

That may be great for the consumer, but for the hotel's brand -- not so much.

Indeed, the Wyndham Boston Chelsea was transparently offering a discounted rate. Over at Orbitz.com, that same room was being offered for a base rate of $176.25.

I searched getaroom.com for Chicago hotels on the same nights and found an underwhelming 15 hotels on display there.

Interestingly, getaroom.com may have changed its mode of prompting consumers to phone its call centers for discounts.

While in the past getaroom.com displayed a message to "call for special unpublished rates" within the displays of some individual properties, now I see it is showing that message at the top of pages without pointing to specific hotels for cut-rate discounts.

That change may be a way to reduce the dilutive effect of a property's discounting -- or at least a bow to hotels' sensitivities on that front.

I had another thought about the apparent lack of chains' participation in getaroom.com.

In addition to concerns about discounting and lack of opacity, do getaroom.com owners Bob Diener and David Litman, who also co-founded hotels.com, have to battle still-raw resentment about hotels.com's distribution clout back in the day?

Methinks that may be a smoldering issue.

Meanwhile, Priceline, with its scale and flexibility, may have it all over getaroom.com and some other players in terms of the depths of discounts that it can offer travelers.

Comparing getaroom.com to Priceline, however, is apples to grapefruits. Priceline is established and getaroom.com is a newbie.

Also, although Priceline's opaque deals may be of better value overall for consumers, getaroom.com has value too because consumers know the identity of the hotel they are booking before they provide their credit card numbers.

And, that latter tack will appeal to plenty of consumers.

Still, Priceline President and CEO Jeffery Boyd wasn't talking about getaroom.com specifically, but he addressed the discounting issue during the company's second quarter conference call Aug. 10.

"We make business decisions as to whether to commit resources to matching those promotions and I think here domestically, our Name-Your-Own Price savings still are dramatically more favorable to the customer than one-night free if you buy four nights," Boyd said, referring to prevailing discounting trends.

Boyd added: "So we feel like we are very strongly positioned, even with that kind of promotional activity here, although there’s nothing to say that in future, we wouldn’t be able to offer that kind of a thing here in the United States and there’s nothing in the booking.com model or the Agoda model [two Priceline subsidiaries in Europe and Asia, respectively] that prevents them from offering that kind of lower pricing for multi-night stays, which is really what the principal promotional activity has been here in the United States and in Europe."

To paraphrase what Boyd seems to be saying to competitors and their discounting: "Bring it on."

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Where in the World is the Orbitz Hotel Business Model?

Orbitz Worldwide is about to change its hotel business model and go-to branding in Asia-Pacific.

It's an evolution of OWW's global, multi-brand strategy, where its core hotel business model varies from region to region.

In North America, where full-service online travel companies Orbitz.com and CheapTickets.com prevail and vacation packages are vital, and in Europe on ebookers' turf, OWW sees the merchant model remaining its dominant practice.

But, in parts of Asia-Pacific, Orbitz will tweak the RatesTogo.com modified retail model by expanding the booking window from 28 to 365 days, and in many markets OWW will designate HotelClub as the lead brand.

RatesToGo is a unit of OWW's HotelClub, a hotel-only site that is strong in Asia-Pacific and Europe. Today, HotelClub uses the merchant model for gateway and other major destination cities, and RatesToGo uses the modified retail model, where consumers prepay the RatesToGo commission and booking fee in the form of a deposit and pay the balance to the hotel upon checkout.

The commission generally is 10 percent to 15 percent.

Mike Nelson, president of the Orbitz Worldwide Partner Services Group, said the strategy soon will change so that HotelClub will be the lead brand in emerging markets and in "secondary cities" in Asia-Pacific, and HotelClub will offer both the merchant and modified retail model with the longer 365-day booking window.

However, the strategy will vary market to market, Nelson said, with RatesToGo and HotelClub coexisting in the current status quo in Australia, for instance, where RatesToGo is strong.

OWW's initial focus for expanding the modified retail model from last-minute inventory to bookings 365 days' out, and pairing it with merchant model rooms on HotelClub is in Asia-Pacific, Nelson said, but he doesn't rule out a broader rollout.

Asia-Pacific is fertile ground for the modified retail model because, among other advantages, it eliminates the need for the hotel to set up a commission-payment system, Nelson said.

And, that makes it easier for HotelClub to sign new hotel partners, especially among smaller or independent hotels.

And, in focusing on a niche of emerging markets and secondary cities, OWW may be able to avoid head-to-head competition with some of the region's strongest hotel players like Ctrip in China and Rakuten in Japan.

At least, that's the hope.

Oh, by the way, HotelClub's new modified retail model will have it's own catchy branding.

At least, that's the hope, too.

Related Post

As the Online Travel Companies Turn

Friday's Travel InsideOut

Southwest and JetBlue now are flying into some major airports instead of off-the-beaten-track landing strips. Will they be able to maintain their value proposition as they get right in the middle of all of the hub-bub?

Wall Street Journal: Southwest Lands at Logan, Bringing Low Fares Mainstream: Next week Southwest Airlines Co. will do something that Herbert Kelleher, its legendary former chief executive, said would never happen: The airline will offer flights at Boston’s Logan International Airport. Read more

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Following are two articles, one from the Los Angeles Times and the second from the Havana Times, detailing efforts by U.S. citizens to defy the Cuba travel ban. Hey, it's Travel InsideOut, you know.

Los Angeles Times: Violator of Cuba travel ban seeks to force court action: Erika Crenshaw returned to Los Angeles this week from a 10-day trip to Cuba with a message for authorities charged with enforcing a ban on travel to the communist-ruled island: Come and get me. Read more

Havana Times: US Travel Ban on Cuba Losing Teeth: While visiting Cuba is still illegal and subject to fines for US citizens, Washington’s travel ban appears to be losing some of its teeth. Read more

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A new tool for revenue managers helps hoteliers determine how to set their opaque rates on Priceline. How high is too high? How low is too low? Let’s limbo some more:)

The Center for Hospitality Research: Setting Room Rates on Priceline: How to Optimize Expected Hotel Revenue: Executive Summary: This report and tool combination develops a novel approach to set prices on Priceline.com to maximize revenues received from releasing rooms to Priceline. When setting rates on Priceline, hotel properties face a straightforward auction-like pricing decision. Read more

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A new hotel application on Twitter shows more experimentation with travel search and planning on the social media site.

InventorSpot:Twihotels, The Twitter Hotel-Finder Launches: Hotel booking sites like Hotels.com can locate a number of hotels anywhere in the world and if you are diligent enough to cross-reference with TripAdvisor you can most likely obtain a review on that hotel's performance. But until now, there was no one site that could surface hotel recommendations for you firsthand, without a lot of searching and cross-referencing. Twihotels is filling that void nicely with a new app they just rolled out in August. Read more

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It’s too soon to tell whether there will be fewer cruise-ship repositionings or vacation cancellations, but hurricane watchers have downgraded their hurricane forecast after a pacific start to the hurricane season.

Travel Weekly: Hurricane forecast altered after a quiet two months The lack of hurricane activity prompted the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to alter its 2009 forecast on Thursday. Read more

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I’m betting that Orbitz will take Ratestogo.com’s modified retail model out of Asia and Europe and into North America in a meaningful way.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Does Orbitz Ratestogo.com Mean Merchant Model To Go.com?: Orbitz Worldwide CEO Barney Harford is bullish on subsidiary ratestogo.com, the Sydney, Australia, hotel business primarily selling last-minute rooms in Europe and Asia. Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Thursday's Travel InsideOut

Here’s a Google crystal-ball double bill, featuring my interview with Google’s Rob Torres, and separately Alex Bainbridge’s post about how keyword bidding on hotel names may evolve in the next few years.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Google: We Won't Be a Copycat in Travel: After writing "Kayak's Hafner Awaits Google Hotels" and the "Brave New World of Google Travel 3.0," I spoke with Google's managing director of travel, Rob Torres, and learned a lot more about what Google won't do in travel. Read more

Musings on travel ecommerce blog: Google travel is coming… could it be a hotel PPC system?: I have been reading this great blog post over on Dennis Schaal’s blog. Kayak Hafner awaits Google hotels Well worth a read (and interesting comments too). Kayak CEO Steve Hafner thinks “it’s only a question of time” before Google begins displaying hotel pricing, a move that could change the online-travel ecosystem. Read more

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Family strife reportedly is driving an IPO for Hyatt Hotels in the midst of the sort of down economic times that would make any family squabble. After the IPO, ownership wouldn't be all in the family, but they still would control the company.

Business Week: Though Hotels Are Slumping, Hyatt Preps for IPO: It has been a stock offering investment bankers have been drooling over for decades. Hyatt Hotels has a prominent brand name and a multibillion-dollar market value. On Aug. 5 the privately held company filed with federal regulators to begin the process of selling shares to the public. Read more

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Pundits are speculating that the Travel Promotion Act may take a back seat to the Cash for Clunkers goldrush as legislators seek to do wheelies to get out of town.

Dow Jones Newswires: Clunkers Vote Could Derail Tourism Bill Favored By Reid: WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- The push in the Senate to approve a $2 billion extension of the popular "Cash for Clunkers" program could prevent Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., from bringing up a bill aimed at boosting the flow of foreign tourist dollars into the U.S.

The perceived urgency in extending the popular and economically stimulative clunkers scheme may leave no time in the crowded Senate schedule this week to turn to the Travel Promotion Act, according to several Senate aides. Read more

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It's going to be a long hard road to get the Yahoo-Bing agreement implemented and Yahoo has several out clauses if things don't go according to plan. Also, according to the agreement, Yahoo gets certain payments from Microsoft that weren't initially publicly disclosed.

Financial Times: Yahoo-Microsoft search deal has escape clauses: Yahoo’s recently announced search alliance with Microsoft has escape clauses that allow the top internet destination to pull the plug if the partnership stumbles, according to a regulatory filing late Tuesday. Read more

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From zero to hero -- suddenly online travel stocks have some legs.

Investopedia: Online Travel Stocks Taking Off: At the onset of the economic recession, online travel stocks were among the hardest hit last year. As recently as this spring, many of the companies in this space were trading at or near 52-week lows. Fast-forward a few months and these stocks look to be taking off on a trip to the top. Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

As the Online Travel Companies Turn

When Expedia.com eliminated booking fees on airline tickets in March, I half-expected to see Orbitz Worldwide readying a bankruptcy filing.

That's because Orbitz got a huge chunk of its profits from those air-booking fees, and I knew there would be great pressure on Orbitz to match Expedia's move, which Orbitz did in April.

But, alas, analysts and pundits sometimes tend erroneously to view companies statically, as if they don't have the capacity to change.

After releasing its second quarter results this morning, Orbitz Worldwide had a heady day on Wall Street, with its stock price rising some 23 percent to $4.60.

Orbitz bested analysts' estimates. It cut and optimized its marketing spend, continued with other cost reductions, focused on organic, unpaid marketing through search engine optimization, and saw domestic air transactions rise 23 percentage points quarter-over-quarter.

Orbitz is not out of the woods, by any means. It still has a huge amount of debt and its ongoing challenge is to convert its rhetoric about growing its hotel business into concrete gains.

But, Orbitz indeed is a company in transition.

And, just as Orbitz seems to be handling its loss of booking-fee revenue, the online travel companies (OTCs) one day may be forced to cope with a hotel merchant model that is just too much of a hassle to retain because of the tax issue.

But, we would be wrong to think that adverse court rulings on the hotel tax question would spell the demise of the OTCs.

They are not static creatures and they have the capacity to adapt.

New business models for selling hotel rooms are possible and indeed are emerging.

Don't think for a moment that the OTCs are down for the count.

Wednesday's Travel InsideOut

Forrester Research analyst Henry Harteveldt has a pet peeve: Online travel companies, he claims, have done little to improve the user experience. A just-released report that he authored, Using Digital Channels to Calm the Angry Traveler, takes off on that theme of consumer unease with booking travel online. Orbitz’s Total Price on hotels and the TripAdvisor Fees estimator notwithstanding, the online travel set has much work to do to make Harteveldt -- and online customers -- happy.

New York Times: Worst Part of a Trip May Be Booking It on the Web: If you dreaded sitting down at your computer the last time you made travel arrangements or felt frustrated by all the time and effort it took to sort through pages of results for flights and hotels, join the crowd.

A new report, to be released Tuesday by Forrester Research, found that far from embracing the do-it-yourself era, many consumers were fed up with the complicated process of planning and booking travel. Read more

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There indeed appears to be life for Orbitz after air-booking fees. The online travel company posted a profit in the second quarter by increasing air volume, cutting marketing and other expenses, and focusing on search-engine optimization to wrangle free conversions that accrue right to the bottom line.

Travel Weekly: Orbitz reverses Q2 results with a $10 million profit: Orbitz Worldwide reported net income of $10 million in the second quarter, compared with a $5 million loss a year earlier.

The company’s revenue plunged 18.6%, to $188 million, but Orbitz achieved second-quarter profitability because it slashed operating expenses by 23.1%. Read more

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If there’s one thing that many airlines can’t stand, it is a good scrape. Well, just as American Airlines did in the U.S., Ryanair in Europe is on a campaign to stop search engines from combing its website for fares. AA was successful and stopped the scraping. Ryanair is hoping for similar results.

Travolution: Another scraping case for Ryanair lawyers: Travelviva, an online German travel business, is the latest “screen-scraping ticket tout” to face legal action from Ryanair in the Irish courts. Read more

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Expedia Inc. began leveraging its SeatGuru unit to display seat reviews in the flight-booking path on Expedia.com. Taking a page or two from the hotel-review trend, the move provides some momentum toward expanding user-generated content into the airline sector. The writer below seems to have missed the fact that Expedia owns TripAdvisor/SeatGuru, but what’s the big deal about sharing a flight review or two among friends.

TravelDailyNews: New exclusive partnership of Expedia.com with SeatGuru: Expedia.com customers can now select the best airline seats, based on user generated reviews from real flyers, thanks to a new exclusive partnership with TripAdvisor's SeatGuru, the Web's most comprehensive source for airline information. The partnership, announced, integrates SeatGuru flyer reviews of airplane seats into the seat maps for most flights sold on Expedia.com. This development marks the first time user-generated airline content is available on an online travel booking site. The availability of SeatGuru's reviews allows Expedia.com customers to travel more comfortably by helping them select better airplane seats, such as those with additional legroom, and avoid bad seats, such as those with limited recline. Read more

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Holland America, Royal Caribbean and Norwegian Cruise Line plan to reposition ships outside Alaska next year as they feel the pricing pinch from Alaska sailings.

Reuters/Yahoo Finance: Slumping economy hits Alaska cruise business: ANCHORAGE, Alaska, Aug 4 (Reuters) - Poor economic conditions are squeezing the cruise business in Alaska, a mainstay for the state's seasonal tourism business, hurting leading ship operators Carnival Corp & Plc (CCL.L) and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd (RCL.N) (RCL.OL). Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Orbitz Cuba-Travel Campaign Hits 70K Signers

The Orbitz petition drive to pressure the Obama administration to overturn the roughly 50-year-old U.S. ban on travel by Americans to Cuba recorded its 70,000th signer July 30, less than three months after the campaign began.

Orbitz Worldwide spokesman Brian Hoyt said the goal of OpenCuba.org is to attract 100,000 signers.

Hoyt said Orbitz would then present the petitions to elected officials in Washington, D.C. in the fall.

I'm happy to see that supporters of the drive include Cuban-American organizations, as well as the National Tour Association, the U.S. Tour Operators Association (USTOA) and the Adventure Travel Trade Association.

I am disappointed to see that a broader swath of travel companies and associations hasn't followed Orbitz's laudable lead and stepped forward on this issue of such import to the rights of Americans and to the travel industry.

Travelocity, Priceline and Expedia where are you on this?

American Express, Carnival Corp., Hertz, ASTA and NBTA why are you sitting on the sidelines?

It is time to get behind this effort and to display some guts.

Bing-Yahoo Alliance Could Be Long-Term Issue for Travelocity

The ink barely is dry on the Yahoo-Microsoft search partnership in which Yahoo will use Bing technology as the default search engine on Yahoo websites and will lead both companies' sales efforts on CPC advertising.

I have few solid answers at this point, but only questions about what this might mean for Travelocity, which is the air, car and hotel provider for Yahoo Travel.

As you know, when Microsoft launched Bing, it integrated Bing Travel (Farecast), the metasearch and advertising/media business that Microsoft acquired, into the Bing search engine.

A new Yahoo-Microsoft website outlines some of the terms of this new search alliance.

Among the key planks:

• "Microsoft's Bing will be the exclusive algorithmic search and paid search platform for Yahoo! sites. Yahoo! will continue to use its technology and data in other areas of its business such as enhancing display advertising technology.

• Yahoo! will become the exclusive worldwide relationship sales force for both companies' premium search advertisers. Self-serve advertising for both companies will be fulfilled by Microsoft's AdCenter platform, and prices for all search ads will continue to be set by AdCenter's automated auction process.

• Yahoo! will innovate and 'own' the user experience on Yahoo! properties, including the user experience for search, even though it will be powered by Microsoft technology."

This latter element presumably is a key safeguard for Travelocity regarding what might happen to the Yahoo-Travelocity contractual relationship. That is, Yahoo will "own the user experience" on Yahoo sites and undoubtedly maintain its contractual home page link to Yahoo Travel, aka Travelocity.

But, in my opinion, this new Bing-Yahoo alliance greatly buffs up Bing Travel -- and also helps Bing Travel partner Orbitz -- because Bing-Yahoo will get about 30 percent of the U.S. search market compared to Google's roughly 65 percent.

So, six months or so from now, when consumers search for New York to San Francisco flights from the Yahoo home page using Bing search technology, one can only wonder how Yahoo will handle the display.

Will it be branded Yahoo but look like this with a link to Farecast's predictive technology?

Will the search display integrate Yahoo Travel in a way that is absent now?

Today, a New York to San Francisco air search on Yahoo displays Yahoo Travel as the fourth organic search result.

The prominence that Bing Travel gets in Bing search results is absent for Travelocity when consumers use the current Yahoo search box for travel queries.

As a company that specializes in metasearch and facilitated search, Bing Travel may have an edge over Travelocity through the Bing-Yahoo alliance because Travelocity, unless it enters travel search in new ways, focuses most of its efforts on its role as an online travel agency, although it, too, is trying to build its advertising/media business.

However, the Yahoo-Bing alliance may benefit Travelocity, too, in the short term, as advertisers welcome a viable alternative to Google.

As you may recall, there were some people who accused Travelocity of killing FareChase by offering Yahoo a sweeter deal a few months ago and convincing a restructuring Yahoo to drop its own FareChase metasearch offering.

So, I wonder if, a few years from now, we might look back at today's Microsoft-Yahoo alliance as a harbinger of the phasing out of the Travelocity-Yahoo relationship.

Nothing on this front is certain, of course, but I am sure that I am not the only person today who thought about this type of scenario.

Meanwhile, today's Microsoft-Yahoo news means that Google undoubtedly will be dusting off plans for the Brave New World of Google Travel 3.0.

Along with Twitter yesterday introducing a search box of its own on a new Twitter home page, the past couple of days have ample potential for disruption.

Wednesday's Travel InsideOut

Does Twitter's new home page disintermediate deal publishers a tad? The entire travel industry -– airlines, hotels, car rental firms, cruise lines, wholesalers, and destinations eventually will take note of the change that Twitter made to its home page yesterday, putting “search” front and center. All of these sectors eventually will be searching for ways to respond.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Twitter Travel Search: the Start of Something Big: Twitter relaunched its home page to emphasize "search," and the impact will reverberate for travel, financial services, lawn mowers -- you name it. Read more

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It’s a busy news day with the Twitter news above and this Bing-Yahoo development, too. A search partnership, which instantly makes Microsoft Bing a player, may be welcomed by travel advertisers as a hedge against the Google behemoth.

TechCrunch: Microsoft-Yahoo Search Deal Imminent: Analysts Weigh In: As we first reported yesterday, Microsoft and Yahoo are on the verge of announcing a complicated search and search marketing alliance that will combine the no. 2 and no. 3 players in search into something that may have a chance of competing with Google (although combined they will still have less than half of Google’s 65% or so search market share). The deal will be announced shortly after signing, and could come as early as today (Wednesday). Read more

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Jay Witzel is out as president and CEO of Carlson Hotels Worldwide.

Finance and Commerce: Joly takes over Carlson hotels: Minnetonka-based Carlson, parent company of Carlson Hotels Worldwide, announced a reshuffling Tuesday that will give Hubert Joly, president and CEO of the lodging, restaurant, travel and marketing giant, leadership of Carlson’s hotel business. Read more

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Barry Diller, the man who controls Expedia Inc. and IAC, is up to something again in the media business, pledging to "bridge the gap between traditional television and the Internet." Expedia meets Home Shopping Network meets YouTube?

Business Week: Diller, Silverman: Expect the Unexpected: You can go blind trying to keep track of Barry Diller's many twists and turns. The 67-year-old former TV programming wunderkind started as the ABC (DIS) program executive who brought America the Movie of the Week; became a Hollywood mogul when he green-lit Steven Spielberg and his Indiana Jones franchise for Paramount Pictures (VIAB); bolted to the studios, where he correctly divined that the Big Three TV world order was falling apart and launched Fox Broadcasting (NWS), which began fracturing TV's viewing audience. Along the way, Diller had a hand in perfecting the notion of online shopping when he ran QVC and then put online travel and concert booking into a higher gear after buying Expedia (EXPE) and Ticketmaster (TKTM). Read more

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A lodging industry analyst compares current RevPar woes to the aftermath of 9/11 and the pundit is pretty glum about the pace of a recovery.

Yahoo Finance/The Wall Street Transcript: Lodging Industry RevPAR Declines Worst Ever: All Segments Down Significantly and No Upturn Until 2011: n the following brief excerpt from just one of the 10 detailed interviews in the 44 page report, Lodging industry expert Smedes Rose discusses the outlook for the Lodging Industry and for the REITs specializing in that sector and picks high return stocks with sustainable dividends for investors in this industry. Read more

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Is Orbitz a phoenix rising or a company rolling a rock uphill in its attempt to build a strong hotel business?

Dennis Schaal Blog: Is Orbitz Poised for a Priceline-like Comeback?: I reported yesterday how Barney Harford, the Orbitz CEO six months or so into his tenure, is stirring things up at 500 W. Madison St., Chicago, in trying to come to grips with building the Orbitz hotel business. Read more

Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Twitter Travel Search: the Start of Something Big

Twitter relaunched its home page to emphasize "search," and the impact will reverberate for travel, financial services, lawn mowers -- you name it.

Twitter announced the new home page on its blog today.

If you are a travel company and not on Twitter, the new home page may change your thinking fast.

If you run a travel company, whether you are involved in social media or not, this will impact your business.

If you are a deal publisher like Travelzoo, Smarter Travel, Cruise Critic, Travelscream, getaroom.com or Voyij, you have new competition because companies can post their deals without you.

I entered the term Cancun vacation into the Twitter search box and found the following tweets about packages, resort credits, contests and a lot of irrelevant clutter, too.

Here's a sampling:

bestcancuntrip Tell us about your best family vacation experience and WIN 8days/7nights in CANCUN in a five-star Resort! http://ow.ly/ip26 about 3 hours ago

bestcancuntrip Cancun Family Vacation Package! Stay in 5-Star beachfront resort Club Internacional for $599, 5Days/4Nights http://ow.ly/ioYM about 5 hours ago

DunhillVacation travel tuesday continues with another great caribbean vacation. Secrets Resorts & Spas in Cancun. $200 resort credit http://ow.ly/iod9 about 10 hours ago

bestfares Little Peso Vacation Deal Of The Day 4 Night, 4-star Hyatt Regency Cancun Weekend Getaway Airfare Included From $339 PP http://bit.ly/M1fnd about 10 hours ago

So, if you are a travel company seeking to push some deals or tout your brand, or you are a consumer looking for bargains that aren't stale, Twitter search gives you an immediate, fresh way to go bargain hunting and soothe your wanderlust.

The new home page, with its emphasize on search, is an unsophisticated test that undoubtedly will evolve and force changes at search engines like Google and travel metasearch engines, too.

Airlines, hotels, cruise line, tour operators, wholesalers, car-rental companies -- take notice.

Contrast the Twitter Cancun vacation search with a Google search of the keywords.

The Google search for Cancun Vacations is dominated by paid ads -- something the Twitter search hasn't dabbled with yet.

The Google local business results for Cancun vacation include a map pinpointing the locations of the relevant businesses. There are no maps in the Twitter results for now, but the tweets provide more of a sense of immediacy than the Google results.

To its credit, the first Google organic search result after the local business results is a link to Orbitz for Cancun packages and hotels, a relevant result.

I'm not saying that one search mode -- Google's or Twitter's -- is better than the other (although Google has had a lot more time and resources to define its search algorithms, of course). Twitter is a newbie in all of this.

But, what I am saying is that Twitter search will change Google, Bing, Facebook and Kayak, as well as Carnival Cruise Lines, JetBlue, Hertz and Mark Travel.

Make your own list.

With the introduction of Twitter's new home page, we witnessed the start of something big today.

Is Orbitz Poised for a Priceline-like Comeback?

I reported yesterday how Barney Harford, the Orbitz CEO six months or so into his tenure, is stirring things up at 500 W. Madison St., Chicago, in trying to come to grips with building the Orbitz hotel business.

I spoke to a handful of analysts about Orbitz's prospects and they agreed that a rebound would take a protracted effort.

The Orbitz situation, in its broad outlines, sort of reminds me of Priceline's struggles when its stock was trading at $1.31 on Dec. 29, 2000. Orbitz Worldwide stock, trending upward, sits at $2.41 before this morning's open, a lowly figure when compared with Priceline's stock at $122.72.

I speculated a few weeks ago, that some sort of Orbitz-Kayak combination could be in the offing because Orbitz, with all of the consumer traffic that it draws, needs to leverage its potential in the advertising/media business.

One of the parties called my idea "ludicrous."

Alas, my ideas have been called worse.

But, there indeed was something to my speculation because Orbitz recently relaunched Trip.com, a facilitated-search vehicle, to take advantage of all those lookers who don't book.

In researching this post about Orbitz, I also learned that there was speculation late last year and early this year that Orbitz separately had talks with Priceline and American Express about merger agreements.

A Priceline combination with Orbitz might have helped Priceline expand into European and Asian markets that it has yet to penetrate.

However, I'm told that an Orbitz consolidation with American Express, which didn't lead to a contract signing, was much closer to fruition than the Orbitz discussions with Priceline.

Amex has yet to distinguish itself in the online travel arena -- far from it, actually. Perhaps its rumored talks with Orbitz were a bid to jump-start that effort.

However, the feeling I'm getting now from speaking with a handful of analysts is that nothing is imminent on the Orbitz consolidation front, including other scenarios such as an Expedia-Orbitz merger, a Travelocity-Orbitz marriage or a Kayak-Orbitz joining of forces, although all of these players undoubtedly have pondered these strategic combinations.

Tom Botts, a partner in Hudson Crossing, says there would be too much conflict in an Orbitz-Kayak merger because Orbitz "has staked out a position as a friend to many," including its relationships with Bing Travel, FareCompare and Kayak, among others.

Botts believes Orbitz will pursue a go-it-alone strategy for now.

Along the same lines, Soleil Securities analyst Jake Fuller believes an Orbitz-Kayak combo is not on the table, noting that Orbitz buying Kayak "wouldn't work."

With the Orbitz balance sheet loaded down with $652 million in debt and a market cap of $200 million, Kayak would need to access hard-to-obtain external capital if it were to ponder an Orbitz acquisition, Fuller said.

It's also unknown, Fuller said, whether the Blackstone Group, which controls Travelport and Orbitz, are in a selling frame of mind.

Another industry veteran, who declined to be identified, suggested that an Orbitz-Kayak merger would be a winner in terms of its potential in travel search and the media business, but some sort of paradigm shift would have to occur to make it financially feasible.

"Something would have to happen," this analyst said, mentioning that perhaps Blackstone would forgive some of Orbitz's debt for the right kind of deal.

Forrester Research travel analyst Henry Harteveldt says he doesn't see Orbitz combining with another online travel company like Priceline, Expedia or Travelocity because of antitrust reasons, but he could envision OTCs picking off parts of Orbitz Worldwide, such as ebookers or HotelClub, if OWW conducted a fire sales of its pieces.

"I think the Orbitz franchise is solid," Harteveldt says. "The challenge for them is to rethink their user experience. The shopping experience hasn't changed much since they launched."

Another analyst, who commented anonymously, said Orbitz must focus on generating enough free cash flow to pay down its debt much quicker than it has been doing.

He doesn't believe Orbitz, under Harford, whom he termed "the smartest guy in the room," will become insolvent, but could face a protracted struggle with its "product not becoming very big."

The up-side, this analyst said, is that Orbitz could rebound, if some of its hotel initiatives take hold, in two to three years.

Several analysts said it was too soon to tell whether Orbitz can make the kind of comeback that Priceline began to pull off some seven or eight years ago.

All were awaiting some hint of Orbitz's prospects from the release of its second quarter financial results Aug. 5, and wanted to assess OWW's results for the rest of 2009 before taking a position on OWW's fate.

Said Botts of Hudson Crossing: "I don't know enough yet to say if it is the phoenix rising."

Tuesday's Travel InsideOut

Is Orbitz CEO Barney Harford rolling a rock up a hill in the face of recessionary headwinds or is he finally making good on the company’s oft-promised, but never delivered effort to build a viable hotel business?

Travel Weekly: Orbitz on new track under Harford: Barney Harford, who had helped craft Expedia’s Asia-Pacific hotel business and served as a consultant to Kayak, walked into the perfect storm in early January when he signed on to replace Steve Barnhart as president and CEO of Orbitz Worldwide. Read more

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Separately, and using different tactics, Delta and United are doing everything they can to retain the allegiances of their most loyal, if sometimes fickle, customers.

Wall Street Journal: Delta Woos Elite Travelers: Delta Air Lines Inc. is expected to change its frequent-flier program to let travelers roll over extra elite-qualifying miles and credits from one year to the next. By allowing customers to roll over miles and credits that aren’t needed to reach a status level, the airline hopes to discourage travelers from splitting their loyalty among multiple airlines. Read more

Hudson Crossing Travel Industry Insight: United Actually Reduces a Fee. Yes, You Read that Correctly: Today, United Airlines announced they were dropping last-minute fees for Mileage Plus frequent-flyer award ticket redemption. Yes, this is not a misprint but a case of an airline actually dropping an irksome fee. Currently, non-elite Mileage Plus members are charged $100 to redeem within six days of travel and $75 within seven to twenty days. Read more

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Starwood understands that even Luxury Collection guests, known to romp from “magnificent desert retreats to breathtaking seaside villas,” can benefit from some social media love. That’s why Starwood is unveiling a “private community” platform for this jet-set guest segment.

Travolution: Starwood brand unveils online community service: The Luxury Collection, part of Starwood, has teamed up with private community ASMALLWORLD to unveil a travel community platform. Read more

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The hotel tax issue continues to hound online travel companies, as evidenced by developments in San Francisco, and now New York City’s looming hotel remarketer law has drawn the ire of traditional travel agents and wholesalers, as well.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Travelocity Pays $2.7 Million Hotel Tax to San Francisco: Travelocity paid $2.7 million to the City of San Francisco on July 23 as part of its obligation to "pay first" before being able to appeal the city's hotel tax assessment. Read more

Travel Weekly: New York City enacts tax on all resellers of hotel rooms: Opponents of a recently enacted hotel reseller tax in New York predicted last week that the measure would discourage travel sellers from booking rooms in the city and thus exacerbate the deep slump the Big Apple is seeing in its hospitality sector. Read more

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There’s momentum in Congress to ensure that certain meetings’ destinations don’t become victims of AIG-backlash syndrome.

MercuryNews.com: Reid tells agencies to end travel 'blacklist': LAS VEGAS—Nevada Sen. Harry Reid wrote to cabinet secretaries and the heads of all federal agencies on Monday to ask them to not rule out cost-effective destinations for meetings just because they are popular spots for tourists. Read more

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Through disparate offerings ranging from pool parties to its meetings business, the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Vegas has notched remarkable occupancy numbers as it makes a splash with its Paradise Tower expansion at the height of this recession.

UpTake Travel Industry Blog: Hard Rock Hotel Gambles all it’s Chips on Paradise Tower: The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas is placing a massive bet on the successful opening of the 490-room Paradise Tower expansion. And surprisingly enough, it looks like their gamble might just pay off. Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Travelocity Pays $2.7 Million Hotel Tax to San Francisco

Travelocity paid $2.7 million to the City of San Francisco on July 23 as part of its obligation to "pay first" before being able to appeal the city's hotel tax assessment.

The payment covers what the city argues was Travelocity's outstanding hotel-tax obligation on the retail rate -- as opposed to the tax recovery charges Travelocity previously remitted to hotels on its net rate under the merchant model. The payment covers the period from the beginning of 2000 to the third quarter of 2008, including taxes, penalties and interest.

As I wrote, Expedia and its Hotwire unit already paid the city $35.6 million and Priceline wired over $3.4 million. Orbitz is believed to be in the assessment process.

The payments -- some $42.7 million -- do not "prove" that the three online travel companies ultimately will owe the city the tax. Instead, a Superior Court in Los Angeles ruled that San Francisco's pay-first ordinance was proper, and thus it did not decide the merits of the tax issue.

So, the utlimate outcome of the case is undecided. It would be premature to count out the OTCs because they've recorded their share of victories around the country.

Still, this has not been a great few months for the OTCs.

As I reported , Expedia reached a proposed settlement with Washington State consumers in a class-action suit that revolved around the way the OTC presented its "taxes and fees" in merchant model hotel sales.

The judge in the case earlier found that $184.5 million in damages would be "warranted" in the case. The actual amount of the settlement has not been disclosed.

And, in another downer for the OTCs, New York City recently adopted a law that taxes the service fees of hotel "remarketers" -- a provision that not only targets the OTCs, but traditional travel agents and wholesalers, as well.









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Trip.com Revived and Will Lodging.com Be Next?

Orbitz has resuscitated Trip.com for facilitated search in a bid to build its fledgling advertising/media business.

I'm betting that Lodging.com, which was part of Cendant Travel Distribution Services and now is part of the Orbitz Worldwide portfolio, will be next.

Trip.com was relaunched in the context of Orbitz trying to leverage under-utilized or unused assets.

Today, if you surf to Lodging.com, you are redirected to Orbitz.com.

In a Cendant 10-K report, published in 2004, Cendant said of Lodging.com: "Lodging.com provides consumers access to specially negotiated rates at more than 10,600 economy, mid-level and luxury hotels in markets around the world. Lodging.com customers also have access to Galileo's entire published hotel rate inventory, and can book vacation packages through Neat Group's packaging engine on the Lodging.com site. With a network of nearly 4,300 distribution affiliates, Lodging.com also offers hoteliers access and control over their pricing and yield management."

As with Trip.com, I believe that Orbitz soon will tip its hand about a relaunched Lodging.com, which arguably is a very valuable domain name.

Perhaps it will be a hotel booking site or maybe a hotel metasearch or facilitated search offering?

I don't know the details, but as Orbitz does everything it can to build its hotel business, allowing Lodging.com to languish wouldn't be prudent.

A multi-brand strategy pays dividends for SEO, becomes another driveway for consumers entering the Orbitz mansion, and also enables a company to bid on more Google keywords than it would be allowed to do if it were limited to one brand.

In principle, a reinvigorated Lodging.com makes a lot of sense.

Thursday's Travel InsideOut

Orbitz -- she of pressurized travel transactions -- hopped onto the media/advertising bandwagon in a super-charged way with the relaunch of Trip.com. For those of you who remember the ill-fated and nebulous Trip.com brand under former owner Cendant, we can say that at last Trip.com has a raison d’etre.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Mega, Not Meta, Move: Orbitz Enters Search Business: I wrote several weeks ago that Orbitz would attempt to maximize all of those lookers perusing its shop, take its media business a leap forward and get into the search business, possibly through a merger of some sort with Kayak.

Well, Orbitz, has entered the search business on its own, for now, by relaunching Trip.com as a search business. This fairly huge development was brought to my attention by Tom Botts of the Hudson Crossing Travel Industry Insight blog. Read more

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There are more warnings that this could be the Winter of our discontent, with airline bankruptcy filings looming.

Wall Street Journal: Loss at AMR Narrows: American Airlines parent AMR Corp. on Wednesday reported a $390 million second-quarter loss as collapsing travel demand continued to erase gains from lower fuel costs.

The results are the latest evidence that the airline industry is flying through one of its toughest summers ever. The other four large U.S. hub-and-spoke carriers -- Delta Air Lines Inc., UAL Corp.'s United Airlines, Continental Airlines Inc. and US Airways Group Inc. -- also are expected to announce second-quarter losses when they report next week. Read more

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United is not alone, of course, in feeling the pinch from and lack of control over credit card fees. Even federal agencies haven’t been able to negotiate lower fees from the banking kingmakers of plastic. (Note: the story below inaccurately says that United “last month” began passing along its fees to some travel agencies. Actually, the initiative is slated to begin July 20.)

New York Times: Card Fees Pit Retailers Against Banks: The most profitable item at Patricia Orzano’s 7-Eleven store on Long Island is coffee. Slurpees are a distant second.

But as more customers use plastic to pay for even small purchases like these, she has watched a growing share of her revenue vanish in a stream of credit and debit card fees that retailers say raise the price of goods and sharply lift the cost of doing business. Read more

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AirTran claims it’s the first carrier to install Wi-Fi throughout its fleet, and it offers tips about onboard-surfing protocol. I can’t wait until airlines allow passengers to use their cellphones during flights, and I’m looking forward to those yakety-yak-yak do’s and don’ts, too.

Yapta: AirTran the First to Establish "Internetiquette": AirTran Airways announced on Tuesday that it’s the first airline to equip its entire fleet (136 aircraft) with Wi-Fi. The cost for access is $9.95 for flights under three hours, $12.95 for flights longer than that and $7.95 for Blackberry/iPhone access. Read more

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Kayak, Airfarewatchdog.com, Hotwire and Yapta good, says Consumer Reports. Expedia and Orbitz price guarantees, not so much.

Consumer Reports: Travel Price Guarantees Come Up Short: Whether it's for a hotel, a cruise, or the fare to get you there, many travel sites offer a "best price guarantee," and will "refund you the difference" to match any lower price you can find. Some sites, such as Delta, will also throw in a travel voucher for up to $100. Read more

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Arthur Frommer looks askance at cruising. After all, it’s not “travel,” he sniffs.

TravelMole: Cruising? That's not traveling:
Don’t get him wrong. Arthur Frommer likes cruises but “travel, it’s not.” Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Updated: Wednesday's Travel InsideOut

Travel Weekly posted a new story , correcting a story posted in Wednesday's Travel InsideOut. Travel Weekly now states that United did not mail a letter to a second set of travel agencies about its new credit card policy.

Travel Weekly: United: Only one batch of agencies informed of new card policy: United Airlines informed Travel Weekly on Wednesday that it has sent just one batch of letters to selected agencies, informing them that they won't have acces to the airline's merchant account. Read more


San Francisco reportedly won an important round in the hotel-tax battle against Expedia and Hotwire.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Expedia.com, Hotwire Reportedly Pay $35M in Hotel Taxes to San Francisco: Andrew S. Ross broke the story today that Expedia and Hotwire wired some $35 million in hotel taxes to the City of San Francisco.

If true -- and I'm trying to confirm it -- the development is a shocker. Read more

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Orbitz continues to apply pressure on Expedia's hotel business by extending Orbitz's policy to reduce its own hotel-booking fees.

Orbitz.com Press Release: Orbitz.com Extends Hotel Booking Fee Cut: Orbitz.com (www.orbitz.com) today announced the extension of its dramatic booking fee cut on all of its hotels around the world. This move follows a successful promotional trial that began in April. Read more

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My colleague Nadine Godwin at Travel Weekly produced a trifecta in her unparalleled reporting on United's new credit card policy, slated to begin implementation July 20. Her three stories follow.

Travel Weekly: United informs more agents about credit card cutoff: United Airlines has sent out a second round of letters to agents, informing them that the carrier will cut off access to United's merchant accounts, effective Aug. 3. Read more

Travel Weekly: Alaska, JetBlue not matching United's new card policy: Alaska Airlines said it has no plans to cut off agencies from access to its merchant accounts when agencies book its air services. Read more

Travel Weekly: For United, credit card policy might have unintended effects: United is cutting off credit access for several travel agencies starting July 20, but if three affected agencies reached by Travel Weekly are any indication, the carrier won’t save much on merchant fees. Nor will it enjoy the consolation of eliminating GDS fees on targeted agencies' business. Read more

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A hole in the fuselage of a Southwest Airlines 737 jet triggers inspections and safety concerns.

Wall Street Journal: Southwest Incident Renews Maintenance Worries: Federal aviation investigators are examining a Southwest Airlines Co. airplane that developed a one-foot-wide hole in its main body midflight, a setback for the discount airline just four months after it agreed to pay a $7.5 million civil fine for maintenance lapses. Read more

YouTube: Video: Southwest, Boeing Inspecting 737 Planes: View it

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Expedia Inc. takes a step to integrate TripAdvisor's content with Expedia.com.

EyeforTravel News: TripAdvisor destination content now available on Expedia: Expedia.com has launched a new interactive Drive Getaway ideas tool. The tool, developed in partnership with TripAdvisor, provides users with ideas for driving-distance trips accessible from their starting city on a single tank of gas or less. Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Mega, Not Meta, Move: Orbitz Enters Search Business

I wrote several weeks ago that Orbitz would attempt to maximize all of those lookers perusing its shop, take its media business a leap forward and get into the search business, possibly through a merger of some sort with Kayak.

Well, Orbitz, has entered the search business on its own, for now, by relaunching Trip.com as a search business. This fairly huge development was brought to my attention by Tom Botts of the Hudson Crossing Travel Industry Insight blog.

All of the online travel agencies, who rightly refer to themselves as online travel companies, are attempting to ratchet up their advertising/media businesses because trying to make consumers complete a transaction sometimes appears to be as easy as finding the proverbial needle in a haystack.

So Orbitz, through Trip.com , will attempt to garner meaningful revenue through all of that traffic.

Perhaps one day Orbitz's search business may eclipse its transaction business.

Tim Hughes blogged the other day about the differences between online travel agencies and metasearch companies.

One difference that he didn't talk about in any detail is that metasearch and other companies that facilitate searches of other booking engines, which is Trip.com's tack, are sprouting up faster than you can keep track of. Meanwhile, launches of new OTAs are rare.

The reason is because search and metasearch is where the money is at, and the OTA business, with looker-to-booker ratios climbing every second, is under increasing pressure.

After all, Expedia Inc., with Expedia.com as its jewel, recently launched flight metasearch through TripAdvisor.com.

It is interesting that although Orbitz and Kayak haven't merged -- and such a game-changing move may be far-fetched or in the cards -- Kayak and sister brand SideStep are participating in Trip.com.

And so is everyone else, including Expedia, Hotwire, Priceline, Travelocity, Bing and fly.com, among others.

Of course, Orbitz's Trip.com is now in competition with many of these companies in the search business. Expedia, after all, has TripAdvisor, Travelocity fields igoUgo, Bing has Bing Travel and fly.com belongs to the Travelzoo portfolio.

This is a huge move by Orbitz, and more proof that Orbitz Worldwide CEO Barney Harford was serious when he said the company would push hard to ramp up its advertising/media business.

With air booking fees gone, the media/search business is looking so much more important.

Update: Expedia.com, Hotwire Pay $35M in Hotel Taxes to San Francisco

I confirmed that Expedia and Hotwire indeed paid some $35 million in hotel taxes to the City of San Francisco on Monday, a necessary step if they want to further challenge the assessment administratively and eventually in court.

I wrote about this yesterday, but now have more details.

Jim Emery, San Francisco's chief of complex litigation, told me that Expedia and Hotwire had filed a notice of appeal July 1, a step in challenging an earlier ruling that the city's pay-first rule is valid. But a judge in Los Angeles Superior Court, which is handling the San Francisco case, dismissed Expedia and Hotwire's petition July 9, Emery said.

So, no court has determined whether Expedia and Hotwire actually owe the tax. But, to challenge that assessment and to seek an $8 million refund (which no one is talking about publicly but I believe is related to an admininistrative assessment against hotels.com), Expedia and Hotwire had to pay first.

Only after taking these administrative steps can they challenge the assessment in court.

Emery said the city is having discussions with Priceline ($3.5 million) and Travelocity ($2.5 million) about their tax tabs and "I expect they will be paying within a week, although we haven't closed the loop."

He said that Priceline and Travelocity previously agreed that they would go along with the Los Angeles Superior Court findings regarding San Francisco's pay-first rules.

Meanwhile, Orbitz spokesman Brian Hoyt confirmed that his company is engaged in administrative proceedings with the city over any potential tax liability.

Hoyt said Orbitz continues to be "concerned" about what he characterized as anti-tourism, anti-consumer and "discriminatory attacks through the court system."

He said cities would be "far better off" working with the online travel agencies instead of against them.

Although the OTAs dropped out of selling merchant-model hotel inventory in Columbus, Ga., and Travelocity exited the Baltimore market, Emery said he has "every expectation" that the online travel companies will continue to conduct their merchant-model hotel business in San Francisco.

Wednesday's Travel InsideOut

San Francisco reportedly won an important round in the hotel-tax battle against Expedia and Hotwire.

Dennis Schaal Blog: Expedia.com, Hotwire Reportedly Pay $35M in Hotel Taxes to San Francisco: Andrew S. Ross broke the story today that Expedia and Hotwire wired some $35 million in hotel taxes to the City of San Francisco.

If true -- and I'm trying to confirm it -- the development is a shocker. Read more

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Orbitz continues to apply pressure on Expedia's hotel business by extending Orbitz's policy to reduce its own hotel-booking fees.

Orbitz.com Press Release: Orbitz.com Extends Hotel Booking Fee Cut: Orbitz.com (www.orbitz.com) today announced the extension of its dramatic booking fee cut on all of its hotels around the world. This move follows a successful promotional trial that began in April. Read more

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My colleague Nadine Godwin at Travel Weekly produced a trifecta in her unparalleled reporting on United's new credit card policy, slated to begin implementation July 20. Her three stories follow.

Travel Weekly: United informs more agents about credit card cutoff: United Airlines has sent out a second round of letters to agents, informing them that the carrier will cut off access to United's merchant accounts, effective Aug. 3. Read more

Travel Weekly: Alaska, JetBlue not matching United's new card policy: Alaska Airlines said it has no plans to cut off agencies from access to its merchant accounts when agencies book its air services. Read more

Travel Weekly: For United, credit card policy might have unintended effects: United is cutting off credit access for several travel agencies starting July 20, but if three affected agencies reached by Travel Weekly are any indication, the carrier won’t save much on merchant fees. Nor will it enjoy the consolation of eliminating GDS fees on targeted agencies' business. Read more

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A hole in the fuselage of a Southwest Airlines 737 jet triggers inspections and safety concerns.

Wall Street Journal: Southwest Incident Renews Maintenance Worries: Federal aviation investigators are examining a Southwest Airlines Co. airplane that developed a one-foot-wide hole in its main body midflight, a setback for the discount airline just four months after it agreed to pay a $7.5 million civil fine for maintenance lapses. Read more

YouTube: Video: Southwest, Boeing Inspecting 737 Planes: View it

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Expedia Inc. takes a step to integrate TripAdvisor's content with Expedia.com.

EyeforTravel News: TripAdvisor destination content now available on Expedia: Expedia.com has launched a new interactive Drive Getaway ideas tool. The tool, developed in partnership with TripAdvisor, provides users with ideas for driving-distance trips accessible from their starting city on a single tank of gas or less. Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.

Monday's Travel InsideOut

Orbitz Worldwide shuffled the deck a bit in the wake of Dean Sivley’s exit a couple of months ago from Orbitz for Business and his appointment as president and CEO of Travel Guard. The OWW chief operating officer post will not be filled, the company said, as its previous occupant, Mike Nelson, takes over as president of OWW’s Partner Services Group. Nelson will bring along some of Sivley’s alliance marketing/media-business duties in the expanded PSG.

Securities and Exchange Commission/Orbitz Worldwide: DEPARTURE OF DIRECTORS OR CERTAIN OFFICERS: On July 8, 2009, Orbitz Worldwide, Inc. (the “Company”) announced certain organizational changes in the way that it aligns its business, product and technology teams with its major areas of strategic focus. As part of those changes, Michael Nelson will transition from Chief Operating Officer to President, Partner Services Group and will have responsibility for partner services and customer operations on a global basis. The Company does not currently intend to appoint a new Chief Operating Officer. Read More

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In increasing the Star Alliance’s antitrust immunity, the DOT disregarded much of the advice of the Dept. of Justice and gave short shrift to the concerns of online travel agencies. The decision means Continental, United, Air Canada and Lufthansa can coordinate the way they market to travel agents, wholesalers and corporations.

Travel Weekly: STAR ALLIANCE GETS CONTINENTAL AND ANTITRUST IMMUNITY: The Transportation Department on Friday approved the Star Alliance’s request for expanded antitrust immunity that would bring Continental into the group as part of a four-carrier joint venture with Air Canada, Lufthansa and United.

In so doing, the DOT rejected most of the advice of the Justice Department, though it accepted some suggestions to limit immunity in certain markets dominated by Star members. The grant of immunity extends to 10 of the alliance’s 22 members: Air Canada, Austrian, BMI, LOT Polish, Lufthansa, SAS, Swiss, TAP Air Portugal, United and, now, Continental. Read more

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We’re waiting for the other shoe to drop, so to speak, on United Airlines’ new credit-card policy for travel agencies. Will a global distribution system (GDS) bias United’s flight displays out of the stratosphere so they will be impossible to find? Will some of the online travel agencies take similar steps? Expedia, for one, hinted at its displeasure.

Dennis Schaal Blog: EXPEDIA NOT SO HAPPY ABOUT UNITED’S CREDIT-CARD PLAN: Major online travel agencies have been missing-in-action about their take on United Airlines' plan to make some travel agencies foot the airline's credit card fees, beginning July 20.

Expedia recently broke the silence, if you read between the lines. Read more

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ICANN – not to be confused with Carl Icahn – is feeling the heat on its travel spend. Turns out that the power behind Web-domain management feels that personal navigation in the form of global travel is a worthwhile endeavor. (We believe Carl Icahn probably travels a lot, too.)

ComputerWorld: ICANN's $12M TRAVEL BUDGET: GOODWILL MOVE OR INFLUENCE BUYING?: ICANN now spends 22% of its budget on travel and meetings in far-flung locales worldwide. Is it looking to build grass-roots support for its decisions or using its growing financial resources to influence various power players in the domain name community?

The group responsible for managing the Web's domain name system, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), has grown in the 11 years since its inception to become a powerful organization with a nearly $55 million budget built on the domain registration fees it receives. Read more

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United, American and US Airways are in the cross-hairs amidst new speculation about “the most vulnerable airlines," although one analyst says they likely will dodge the bullet again.

Wall Street Journal: U.S. AIRLINES FLY INTO CREDIT SQUEEZE: The recession, plunging travel demand and a tough lending environment are battering U.S. airlines, raising the prospect of a liquidity squeeze that could lead to bankruptcy filings by winter if conditions don't improve.

The five largest hub-and-spoke carriers are expected to report second-quarter losses, starting with AMR Corp.'s American Airlines on Wednesday and followed by Delta Air Lines Inc., UAL Corp.'s United Airlines, Continental Airlines Inc. and US Airways Group Inc. next week. Read more

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Key Hilton decision-makers and the investor crowd got together on Mexico expansion. The Hilton Garden Inn brand finds Mexico ripe for development.

TravelAgent Central: HILTON REINFORCES EXPANSION PLANS THROUGHOUT MEXICO: Hilton Hotels Corporation hosted a development forum in Mexico City this week to reinforce the company’s plans to expand throughout Mexico. The event, held at the Hampton Inn & Suites Mexico City – Centro Historico, came following the recent announcement of the company’s plan for the first Hilton Garden Inn management agreement in Chiapas, Mexico. The forum brought together executives from Hilton’s development team, representatives from three of the company’s brands (Embassy Suites by Hilton, Hilton Garden Inn, and Hampton Inn by Hilton), and key decision makers from Mexico’s hotel investor and development community. Read more

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Travel InsideOut is a Dennis Schaal Blog daily feature. Get a thorough-going look at the day's travel industry top and tangentially interesting stories. Feel free to comment on them below.

Travel InsideOut is Copyright (c) 2009 by Dennis Schaal. All rights reserved.