Expedia is legitWhile booking travel via an OTA can save you money, you'll always want to double check your reservations with the travel provider and only book reservations that you are fairly confident that you'll keep. Canceling can be a huge headache.
Expedia benefits from volume-based discounts, which means that the more rooms they book with a particular hotel, the lower the rates they can negotiate. This allows them to offer customers lower prices than if they were booking directly with the hotel.
Booking Holdings (which operates Booking.com, Kayak, Priceline, OpenTable, Agoda, and others) and Expedia Group (which operated Expedia, Hotels.com, Hotwire, trivago and others) are the largest online travel agencies (OTAs) in the world and operate through a dynamic portfolio of brands across different regions.
In many cases, Expedia can offer flight tickets cheaper than the airlines. Because third-party services often get a bulk discount, they can sell their flight deals for less than the average ticket prices.
Hotel fees on Booking.comThe hotel base fee also stands at 15%, and this can also rise to a 18% commission charge, if the host prefers to use the member service that Booking.com recommends.
Don't book through a travel siteOnce you find the lowest available price at the hotel you want to visit, call the hotel's reservation desk. Many hotels will meet or beat the best internet rate when you book with them. They'd much rather skip the commission to the travel site and book your stay directly.
Direct booking can be more profitable for hotels because it eliminates the commission fees that are typically charged by OTAs. These fees can range from 15-30% of the room rate, which can significantly impact the hotel's bottom line. By encouraging guests to book directly, hotels can increase revenue and profitability.