Online travel agency Orbitz removed its fees for booking flights between now and May 31. Orbitz followed the lead of Expedia and Travelocity, which recently eliminated their fees for purchasing domestic-plane tickets through the end of May. (orbitz.com/nofees). Cheaptickets announced the same offer (cheaptickets.com/nofees).
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Orbitz's removal of booking fees -- for everything except multi-airline itineraries -- represents a victory for consumers. Between the major online travel agencies, that's about $300 million that got transferred from OTA coffers back to consumers.
So now, the airline sites lost a price advantage and the playing field has been leveled, more or less.
Orbitz, however, is taking a big hit because it earned about 60 percent of profits from these consumer booking fees. I hope Orbitz can survive, but the sailing just got much choppier.
Posted By Dennis Schaal on April 8, 2009, 7:51 AM