2010 January

After soft launch, Travelocity set to unveil desktop app and other deal tools

January 8, 2010 By Dennis Schaal 5 Comments

Travelocity has taken its ExperienceFinder feature and used it as the basis of several new deal-search tools that it has quietly rolled out over the last several weeks.

Within a new Deals Toolkit are Travelocity’s first desktop application, map-based shopping and a customizable deals engine, which has filters to enable consumers to search for flight and package deals by inputting theme choices such as romance, beach or family destinations.

Troy Whitsett, who headed up the design for the project, says with these tools full of graphics and filters in one display “above the fold,” little scrolling is necessary. Travelocity basically is giving consumers focused on bargains a concise, customizable and visual way to sort and search for their next getaways.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: deals, dekstop app, tools, Travelocity

Doubts emerging over airport body scanner reliability

January 8, 2010 By Kevin May 4 Comments

Airport security technology firms, perhaps seeing the bounty ahead if – as expected – governments around the world impose stricter checks on passengers, are questioning the performance of the controversial full body scanners.

One such company is Guardian Technologies International which backs claims in UK media this week that the widely talked about scanners do not accurately detect low-density explosives such as liquid and powder explosives.

The company has a product of its own to peddle, the PinPoint threat detection and identification system, but equally it raises an interesting point if the much lauded body scanners are unable to pick up the very materials that the recent alleged Northwest 253 bomber had on his possession.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: airline security, security, TSA

Thomson the ugly duckling over online consumer protection notice

January 8, 2010 By Kevin May 2 Comments

Thomson Holidays has admitted responsibility for what it says is a website error which saw its Build-Your-Own package holidays sold against incorrect insurance protection notices.

Online Terms and Conditions for the TUI-owned brand’s BYO holidays indicated that products were not covered by Thomson’s ATOL bond when in fact, the company says now, they were.

The error comes against an unfortunate backdrop of the ongoing war-of-words against online travel agency TravelRepublic, which won a court case against the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority in November 2009 over its own decision not to ATOL-protect customers who build their own holidays.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: atol, thomson, travelrepublic

Build-your-own package holiday on Thomas Cook and you actually go with Expedia

January 8, 2010 By Kevin May 8 Comments

Hugely intriguing move at Thomas Cook, one of Europe’s biggest vertically integrated tour operators, with the discovery that customers who build their own package holiday are in fact going on an Expedia trip.

Thomas Cook has yet to officially announce the change but Tnooz has learned that any customer who books a bundled deal (flight and hotel) is already being serviced by Expedia white label offshoot Worldwide Travel Exchange (WWTE).

The partnership is not simply a technological one – customers on a bundled deal are financially protected under an ATOL belonging to Travelscape (a little-known Expedia name often used to front its white labels), rather than the Cook’s ATOL bond.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: expedia, package holiday, thomas cook

US Travel Association redesigns website 1 year after merger

January 7, 2010 By Dennis Schaal 2 Comments

A little less than a year after the Travel Industry Association and the CEO-based Travel Business Roundtable merged, the rebranded US Travel Association has unveiled its new website.

The website runs on an open-source LAMP platform and uses Drupal for content management.

Eric Weber, U.S. Travel’s vice president of technology, says the redesign project, which took one year from concept to rollout, was shaped in the following manner, and the formula may be useful for other companies undertaking similar tasks.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: merger, redesign, US Travel Association

New Expedia tagline could change during global roll-out

January 7, 2010 By Kevin May 3 Comments

Expedia has confirmed its new logo and branding will be extended to other country sites – but the widely debated new tagline may be modified market-by-market.

An official says the company plans to roll out the new image worldwide over time but it has yet to make a decision if the “Where You Book Matters” script will accompany it.

The new marketing is being accompanied by three TV adspots in the US – the first of which launched this week.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: expedia

Will travel firms take the French approach over untamed Google Suggest tool?

January 7, 2010 By Kevin May 2 Comments

The result of a defamation case in Paris, France, has shed light on the lengths companies will go to if search engines are providing users with incorrect or damaging information.

The case, involving the Centre National Privé de Formation a Distance (CNFDI) and Google, centres on the search giant’s automatic drop-down on its homepage query box.

The system attempts to predict what a user is looking for and puts forward suggestions and the number of results available.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: Google, search

TripAdvisor relaunches AirFareWatchdog brand

January 7, 2010 By Kevin May 3 Comments

AirFareWatchdog has relaunched its website as it looks to push into new markets outside of the US including a dedicated version for UK travellers.

The TripAdvisor-owned brand launched five years ago and was snapped up by the Expedia Inc powerhouse in 2008 as part of its wider strategy to develop additional brands through its Smarter Travel Media division.

The new AirFarewatchdog site was cleaned up for the New Year period with a simpler user interface, says founder George Hobica.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: airfarewatchdog, expedia, tripadvisor

How Expedia handled the crisis, took ‘air out of the competition’

January 6, 2010 By Dennis Schaal Leave a Comment

Dara Khosrowshahi, the Expedia Inc. president and CEO, was getting downright philosophical about the crisis the company faced a year or so ago, the situation that led to its fee-cutting frenzy.

“I think it was [White House Chief-of-Staff] Rahm Emanuel who said, ‘Never let a good crisis go to waste,’” Khosrowshahi says, drawing some laughs from the crowd at Citi’s 20th Annual Global Entertainment, Media & Telecommunications Conference in San Francisco Jan. 5.

The end result was Expedia eliminated air and reduced hotel booking fees and took a pretty good whack at Orbitz and Travelocity.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: competition, Dara Khosrowshahi, expedia, fee cuts