Hotels & Stays

How the booking platforms really differ, what the fees add up to, and what to do when the room you paid for is not there.

Hotel pricing is designed to be hard to compare. The headline rate is the least reliable number on the page: resort fees, city taxes, cleaning charges and the exchange rate applied at checkout can move the real total by a fifth without the advertised price changing at all.

So the work here is comparing the things that actually decide the bill. Total price after fees rather than the nightly rate. Cancellation terms, which matter more than most people realise and are read by almost nobody. And what happens when something goes wrong, because that is when the difference between platforms stops being theoretical.

Start with what to demand when a hotel gives your room away. It happens more often than the industry admits, there is no regulation setting the payout, and the guests who ask for the full package get it while the ones who do not, do not.