Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How Booking.com manipulates users

ro-che.info

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

281–290 of 316 posts

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#281

Post by bogomipz »

gommm wrote: post #165
bogomipz wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And who is that in Europe? I tried both Agoda and Hotels.com without much success.

In Europe, I always check the price directly from the hotel, if it's last minute, I check hotels tonight and if the price is really much cheaper in booking.com, I call the hotel and get them to match the price. I sometimes use hotels.com though since I often can get a 5% cashback plus their reward scheme which gives me a free night every ten nights (effectively a 10% discount) Oh and for reviews, I check tripadvisor…

>"Oh and for reviews, I check tripadvisor since, on the contrary to booking.com, they actually publish bad reviews."

But what good is publishing bad reviews if they are fake? See:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/avaseave/2014/01/27/when-online...

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#282

Post by bogomipz »

paganel wrote: post #256
Osmium wrote: post #22

To anyone from Booking.com reading this: I'll go elsewhere next time I need to book a room. Dark patterns may help profits in the short-term, but they're terrible for your brand. Just ask TicketMaster. It isn't just tech-savvy users that will catch on to this either. If an everyday user uses Booking.com, reads reviews and thinks their room will be great, but then has a bad experience, they're going to stop trusting B…

> To anyone from Booking.com reading this: I'll go elsewhere next time I need to book a room I like to think that I'm take-savvy (I've been on this forum for quite a while) but I'll happily continue to use booking.com the same as I've done for the past 10 years, give or take. I don't care at all about their brand, I'm aware of their "dark patterns" and as such it's very easy to avoid them, what it matters for me it's…

>"what it matters for me it's that in the last 10 years they've always been reliable (as in 100% reliable) and on point with their descriptions and ratings, no matter the destination (from a 2-star hotel in the middle of the Carpathian mountains to a 5-star hotel in Istanbul).

I would say you have been unusually lucky then. The practice of fake reviews from booking.com are pretty well documented[1][2]. And 5 star hotels are generally a pretty safe bet just about anywhere in the world, you pretty much know exactly what the experience will be. Accuracy of a 5 star hotel says very little about booking.com.

>"In other words they really do provide value, the same way as Ryanair provides value (it doesn't matter that everybody likes to hate on Ryanair, everybody is still flying with them)."

You mean like suddenly grounding 50 flights a day for the next six weeks and giving customers no shortage of grief:

http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/ryanair-...

>"I also spend more than 5 minutes reading through the actual reviews before making a reservation ..."

That doesn't really mean much when the reviews are gamed does it?

[1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/07/06/bookingcom-invest...

[2] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonha-revesencio/the-truth-abo...

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#283

Post by mitul_45 »

akdumbagdum wrote: post #257
mitul_45 wrote: post #122

Well, I am joining Booking.com as frontend engineer this November and this makes me a bit worried. The only reason I chose to join Booking was Amsterdam (I wanted to live/work outside India for a couple of years). I have also heard the tech stack is kind of old and so learning-wise it might be an issue. Any tips on surviving and keeping the learning curve straight from a current/former employee?

Congrats first of all. However did you tell Booking about your motivation to join them - "The only reason I chose to join Booking was Amsterdam (I wanted to live/work outside India for a couple of years)". Its pretty standard for companies to ask that question.

Nah. That's one of the major reasons. Others being - working with a diverse culture, working on a big scale such as theirs, and building things based on data rather than opinions.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#284

Post by wackro »

8draco8 wrote: post #254
bvm wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Recruiters are like the Booking.com of people though.

Recruiters are there for a reason. I respect them even when they are a little bit annoying. We as tech industry are so spoiled with jobs looking for us not the other way around that we forget how great it is to have a recruiter that you can call any time and ask for a new job and he will not stop until he will put you in the new position for free (for you of course). Remember they are just doing their job and we shou…

> he will not stop until he will put you in the new position for free

Let me tell you about my first experience with a recruiter. I realise this is only one anecdote, but it sums up their usefulness.

As a fresh graduate I sent a recruiter my CV and he sent me two job specs. I applied for one and the company ended up making an offer. The salary was well below normal, the company's office was in the middle of nowhere in another part of the country, and I'd had to have moved out there and bought a car in order to do the commute. The deal was not a good one, but through the recruiter I negotiated higher pay. During this process I was warned about coming across as 'mercenary', and he made real efforts to get me to take the job quickly ('stop delaying', 'this kind of job won't come up again').

At the same time as having this offer on the table, I received a separate offer from a company I'd applied to independently, with a salary ~25% higher, great benefits etc, which I accepted, to the annoyance of my recruiter.

Once you get talking to a recruiter, they really do put you through the booking.com experience.

I accept their value. But it is limited.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#285

Post by 4ad »

tsycho wrote: post #114
drstewart wrote: post #29

Airbnb does this too. No matter where or when you search for, you'll see a notification saying something like: "Only 13% of listings are left for these dates. We recommend booking a place soon." As a random example, apparently Kamloops, BC is filling up fast for Dec 3-6 (midweek in the middle of winter). And so is Flint, MI on Feb 19th, a Tuesday.

My biggest problem with Airbnb is opaque pricing at the search page. They will claim a room is say $250/night, but after fees, taxes and cleaning charges, it might be $400/night. Cleaning charges in particular can vary widely. Even though Airbnb knows the exact travel dates and hence the exact amount, they still choose to show the lower daily price rather than the actual. I consider this a dark pattern too.

Yeah. Just like in the US they don't show taxes (which vary!) on products in retail shops. It's obnoxious, and I don't understand how this is legal, even in the US.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#286

Post by nnd »

8draco8 wrote: post #254
bvm wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Recruiters are like the Booking.com of people though.

Recruiters are there for a reason. I respect them even when they are a little bit annoying. We as tech industry are so spoiled with jobs looking for us not the other way around that we forget how great it is to have a recruiter that you can call any time and ask for a new job and he will not stop until he will put you in the new position for free (for you of course). Remember they are just doing their job and we shou…

Unless we are talking about talent agents (which are rare in software engineering), the actual job of a recruiter is to work in the interest of his company. Then there are third-party recruiters and sorcerers who don't represent your interests either.

"They are just doing their job" is a weak excuse. Most of the recruiters are doing such a bad job in matching the workforce with companies that they end up wasting everyone's time. The only reason why these brute-force approaches work is the surplus of demand in the current SE labour market.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#287

Post by bogomipz »

codermobile wrote: post #198

TripAdvisor supports booking on hotels and they show all of the comments. Plus, there are much more ratings and comments than anywhere else.

TripAdvisor also supports fake and unverified reviews:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/avaseave/2014/01/27/when-online...

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#288

Post by kayfox »

easychris wrote: post #177
PeachPlum wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go direct

Unfortunately directly booking with the hotel has drawbacks as well. 6 months ago I booked The Pullman Hotel in London directly (they had the same pricing as the online agencies). When I arrived late in the evening my room was not available: the (online, credit card backed) reservation I've made was "lost" and no more rooms available. There was no way to sort it out easily so I booked another Hotel (higher price, and…

If you booked with booking.com and the reservation was lost your pretty much SOL as well.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#289

Post by kappamax »

ekianjo wrote: post #263
gobengo wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

agoda.com is very good IMO at least around southeast asia. haven't yet used it in the West.

from what i heard agoda is the same company as booking.com

Just because they have the same parent company doesn't make them the same company imho. Pretty much like how the Ritz Carlton is not the Four Points, although they are both Marriott companies.

Re: How Booking.com manipulates users

#290

Post by lotsofpulp »

what_ever wrote: post #121
lotsofpulp wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Booking.com takes an 18% commission. Only a severely incompetent business would refuse to give you a lower price in exchange for them not having to pay that 18%. All the big franchises (Marriott, Hilton, IHG, Hyatt, Choice, Wyndham) will give you a cheaper “member” price at their direct website. Being a member is free, it’s just like airline miles and you even earn points.

Except that hotel room bookings work a lot differently for lot of hotels than any other types of bookings. Hotels usually sell rooms in bulk to Priceline, Expedia and other OTAs and possibly keep some for their own funnel. So they may not have the same incentive to sell at that price you saw on Priceline.

That is not true for the chain hotels in the US. They also all have best price guarantees where if you see a lower publicly advertised price than the hotel’s own website, then you get a free night. But that never happens since it’s all updated in real time now, and the hotel’s systems will not allow reservations at a lower price.
Post reply on HN