Ryanair partnership takes off

RYANAIR, Europe’s No.1 airline, and SiteMinder, the global hotel industry’s leading guest acquisition platform, today announce a partnership to provide European hotels direct access to sell their properties on Ryanair Rooms. 

Ryanair Rooms is the only hotel booking website that gives hotel guests 10% of the hotel booking price back in flight credit, to use against Ryanair flights. The website is now available as a distribution channel to SiteMinder’s 30,000 hotel customers across #Europe and around the world, which can now offer their guests a new incentive to ‘Go Direct’.

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The January Blues

RECENT research by ATOL, the holiday protection scheme, has found that 5.2 million Brits are set to book their holiday this month.

The price of the getaway is still the number one factor when booking holidays, with over a third of Brits (35 per cent) admitting they are looking to grab a bargain by booking their next holiday early.

Another quarter (26 per cent) say they are looking forward to sunshine and hot weather after such dreary weather this winter.

However, despite a large number of expected holiday bookings in January, seven out of ten (69 per cent) of those surveyed admitted they do not always seek financial protection for their holiday getaways, putting themselves at risk of being out of pocket if their airline or travel company goes out of business.


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On the rails . . .

AUSTRALIAN owned International Rail has just launched its new live booking system for rail systems in UK and Europe, allowing agents to book trains instantly for their clients. Available for trains in the UK, Europe, Eastern Europe and Scandinavia, as well as popular intercountry services such as Eurostar and overnight trains; the website will connect directly to the European reservations systems, managing director Jonathan Hume said.
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Technology enabled travel planning

WITH innovative marketing tactics, service providers in holiday planning and booking process market in the UK are reversing the impact of Brexit and fuel hikes. Technological solutions such as OTA bookings, apps, bots, and advanced payment tools are encouraging travelers to facilitate well planned holidays. 

As part of its recent development in holiday planning and booking process, Thomas Cook has introduced two novel features such as Direct Debit Payments and Zero Deposit Offer for its summer 2019 program. With the former, end-users can choose to book their holiday plan against a minimum token amount. The latter eases end-users by booking their holiday packages without any advance payment.

Technology enabled travel planning is gaining momentum in holiday planning and booking process market in the UK. Leading holiday organizers are infusing advanced technology with meticulous planning to deliver superlative hospitality experience to end-users in holiday planning and booking process market in the UK. Noted travel planner Thomas Cook has confirmed its incorporation of Bold360ai to improve customer services. With this AI enabled service solution, Thomas Cook has garnered happy customers across Europe with the project first rolling out in the UK.

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Bidroom and Visa buddy up for European cardholders

IN the EU, almost half (49%) of internet users have booked holiday accommodation or travel via the internet. In the UK specifically 83% of people used this method to book their holiday in 2017.

As more and more consumers turn to online travel agencies to book their travel, Bidroom offers an alternative method of finding affordable hotel accommodation online. The platform provides a 0% commission private booking channel with direct reservations, in turn Bidroom asks hotels to provide members between 5%-25% discount compared to the advertised prices on major hotel booking platforms.

European Visa cardholders can register at visa.bidroom.com to enjoy six months free access to the membership-based booking platform enabling them to browse through over 120,000 hotels and apartments worldwide.

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Riding the waves

KITESURF holiday booking platform kitesurfholidays.com enables kitesurfers to easily plan their next dream #holiday through matching up accommodation options in classic #kitesurfing destinations with kite schools, equipment rental and kitesurf guiding.

With kitesurfholidays.com (https://www.kitesurfholidays.com) accommodation providers are able to sign up to the platform in 20-25 minutes and can add photos as well as full details of room types, their facilities as well as details of local beaches, towns and bars.

If they provide lessons or equipment hire then they are also able to set these up as packages and become a one-stop-shop for booking a kitesurf holiday. If they only provide accommodation then they will automatically become linked with local kite schools to ensure that kitesurfers who book accommodation can then easily find lessons or equipment hire.

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Easy Reserve celebrates 10 years in business

EASY Reserve is an online holiday rental company based in Ireland, with support offices in Italy and the United States, that, since its foundation in 2007, has continued to expand and grow.

Today, it offers tens of thousands of vacation rental accommodations all over the globe through its several vacation rental websites, including, www.easyreserve.com, www.italy-villas.com, www.tuscany-villas.it and www.holidayhomesprovence.com, which are translated into multiple languages including English, Italian, French, German, Spanish, Dutch and Danish.

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Saturdays busiest booking day of January

THE first Saturday in the New Year is dubbed “Sunshine Saturday” in the UK. It is the busiest day of the year for holiday bookings in Europe. As a recent survey carried out by the world’s largest travel group TUI Group has shown, January has become the busiest month of the year across Europe for the tour operator, with huge spikes in bookings observed each Saturday in January. 

This year, the busiest day for holiday bookings in the UK was January 7 with more than 27,500 TUI customers in the UK booked their annual holiday. Mediterranean beach holidays remain one of the most popular holiday types among British tourists, some top destinations include the Balearics, Corfu and Rhodes. 

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State of the Art Holiday Bookings at Lakeside

A NEW state of the art Thomson store opened at the end of September providing a new, improved and exciting holiday booking experience at Lakeside. The new Holiday Design Store boasts a touch screen interactive map which offers in-depth information on exotic destinations and videos of resorts and hotels, plus dedicated booking booths with screens to bring holidays to life in the booking process.

It is also home to an Advice Bar with a dedicated self-service computer for customers to access reviews, excursions and visa information, or even book their own holiday – with staff on hand to answer questions, provide expert knowledge and offer a personalised holiday planning service.

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easyJet offers Apple Pay

EASYJET now offers customers the ability to use Apple Pay on Web for bookings made on easyJet.com. This makes payment a seamless “2 touch” process.

Apple Pay is already available via easyJet’s iOS mobile app however from today customers will also be able to confirm their booking via easyJet.com on their Apple iPad or Apple Mac in just a matter of seconds thanks to Apple Pay; a secure, quick and private one-touch payment function.

James Millett, easyJet’s Head of Digital, said:

“We’re delighted that from today we’re one of the first airlines in the world to introduce Apple Pay on Web for easyJet.com. We’re all about innovating to make it easier for customers and we’re proud to be leading the way in the future of payments.”

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Majority of travellers now book online

RESEARCH from MarkMonitor reveals that 68% of consumers globally exclusively book their #travel online. However, seven out of every 100 respondents surveyed ended up with plans not in line with their expectations, highlighting a need for increased education when booking online. 

The research, conducted by a market research company Opinium, analysed the online behaviour of consumers around booking travel online, including bargain hunting for seasonal goods and attitudes towards piracy. Opinium surveyed 3,257 consumers across eight countries, including the UK, US, Germany, France, Italy, Denmark, Spain, and the Netherlands.

With its focus on booking travel online, the survey results also reveal that of those consumers who booked a holiday that fell short of their expectations, posting a negative review was their first reaction (42%), above trying to get a refund (40%) and complaining to a licensing body (35%) — demonstrating the power of online word of mouth”. Alarmingly, following this bad experience, 37% of respondents reported that their debit or credit card details were misused or stolen, showing the requirement for increased vigilance when shopping or booking online.

Said Mark Frost, CEO of MarkMonitor: ‘With the growth of social media and a culture where consumers have the power to make their displeasure widely known through social networking sites, online brand protection has never been more important. This is especially evident in the fact that when asked how they vetted a travel site, almost half (47%) of consumers said they read the reviews.’

With one of the main reasons for using the internet to book travel being that it’s cheaper, 75% of consumers also go on to search for discounted goods online prior to their holidays, including sunglasses, clothing and shoes, event tickets, guide books, and luggage. But looking for bargains doesn’t mean buying cheap counterfeit goods or knock-offs as, overwhelmingly, the desire for genuine goods remains with 83% saying they wouldn’t willingly buy fake products to keep up with seasonal trends.

But of those 75% seeking discounted products online, almost 10% reported that they had bought something online that turned out to be fake — with clothing and shoes (33%) and sunglasses (28%) cited most often.

Says Mr Frost: ‘In an increasingly digital world, consumers are exposed to more and more online fraud, counterfeiting, and piracy. While the desire is still to buy genuine goods, fraudsters are becoming more sophisticated in their approaches, making it even riskier for consumers. For brands with an online presence, protecting themselves and their customers through a solid online brand protection plan is absolutely key.’

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Up in the air . . .

Emirates launches world’s longest air route

Emirates has launched its first direct service between Dubai and Auckland, New Zealand, which becomes the world’s longest scheduled flight at 8,825.3 miles. The service gets passengers from Dubai to New Zealand in less than 16 hours, cutting the journey time by three hours. The return flight takes 17 hours.

Air France signs with PayPal for online bookings

Air France is offering its customers in Germany and Britain the opportunity to purchase their tickets with PayPal on the online booking website and the Air France app.

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GoEuro launches in France

GOEURO.CO.UK, the search engine for comparing and booking rail, coach, and flight travel across Europe, has announced the launch of its full service in #France after signing a new partnership with the French railway operator, SNCF.

Travellers can now plan trips to more than 30,000 destinations all over France and across Europe – not only cities and airports but also rail, coach, and air travel options in a single search, eliminating the need to visit multiple websites to plan their entire journey … all in the user’s native language and currency.

Naren Shaam, CEO and founder of GoEuro said: ‘The addition of France is great for our users and a milestone for GoEuro. We launched less than three years ago, at a time when this form of simple online search was available only for air travel.’

Guillaume Pepy, CEO of SNCF commented: ‘France is the most visited destination in the world and rail, as the most competitive mode of transport, is the quintessential way to explore it. Through this partnership, GoEuro users are able compare and discover the convenience and great service SNCF has to offer.’

GoEuro now covers all rail, coach, and air travel in 11 markets which have a total population of 400 million and an additional 300 million foreign visitors each year.

France alone has more than 83 million visitors annually, and the French transportation network adds more than 3,000 train stations, 450 bus terminals, and 91 airports to the GoEuro system, enabling travellers to reach more than 30,000 European destinations in France as well as the UK, Germany, Spain, Luxembourg, Belgium, Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Poland, and Italy.

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Beware fake travel websites, says ABTA

A WARNING about fake travel company websites has been issued by the Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA), following an increase in reports of fraudulent sites.

The association has compiled a list of warning signs that suggest that the site might not be legitimate. These are:

• Prices that are considerably lower than competitors 
• Fuzzy logos for trade associations and credit card companies 
• Non-receipt of tickets 
• Bank transfer the only payment option 

ABTA urges users to research companies online before making a booking.

John de Vial, the association’s head of financial protection, said: ‘Our consumer helpline has seen an increase in calls from members of the public who are either checking the validity of a suspicious website or, worse, have already paid by bank transfer and then been fobbed off when trying to get hold of their tickets. We want to make consumers aware of this problem and stop them from being ripped off in this way.’

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PCs still tops for holiday bookings; mobile use flat

RESEARCH published by the Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) has highlighted a significant increase in the use of tablets to book holidays online. One in four (24%) of online bookers said they secured at least one get-away via a tablet compared to 18% in 2014, while the use of mobile phones remains flat at 16% of online bookers.

But ABTA’s Holiday Habits Report 2015 shows that the PC remains by far the most popular device for booking, with 91% of online bookers using a PC or laptop when booking at least one holiday online in the past 12 months.

The research suggests that people are finding the mobile phone booking experience more difficult than on a PC or tablet. Ease of use is cited as one of the key advantages of using a PC or tablet. 77% of PC users and 58% of tablet users found the booking experience easy, compared to only 41% of mobile phone users.

Victoria Bacon, ABTA head of Brand and Business Development said: ‘Personal computers remain the most popular device for people booking their holidays online, reflecting the fact that buying a holiday is often a more complex and high value transaction compared to other purchases. However, for the last two years we have seen significant growth in the use of tablets, reflecting their increasing importance as a device to book holidays online.

‘While smartphones have a long way to go to catch up with PCs and tablets when it comes to holiday bookings, their popularity among younger age groups suggests they will grow in relevance, so travel companies should continue to develop and grow their mobile sales strategies.’ 

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I’m drunk … I’ll book a holiday!

RESEARCH by online travel agency sunshine.co.uk found that as many as two fifths of Britons have booked an overseas holiday whilst intoxicated, with more than a quarter of them admitting that, when sober, they regretted the drunk booking they had made.

The main next-day regrets were about the cost of the holiday, the people they'd picked to go on holiday with, and the accommodation choice.

The survey found that 27% of those who'd made drunk holiday bookings contacted – when they’d sobered up – the travel provider to either cancel or make changes to the booking. The most common changes made included shortening the length of the holiday, downgrading accommodation, and changing the destination completely.

Chris Clarkson, managing director of sunshine.co.uk, said: ‘There are plenty of things that you shouldn't do when drunk; and whilst there are the more obvious ones like driving, operating heavy machinery or texting an ex-partner, booking a holiday should be right up there with them.

‘You need to have a clear head when booking a trip, or else you risk making mistakes that are hard to undo. There are often charges to make changes to a booking and even something as small as inputting your name exactly as it appears on your passport, as is required, can be a challenge after one too many vodkas.’

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