Wake up! Stop dreaming… all this blah blah blah about rate parity… please, give me a break… it doesn’t exist!!! When will hotel finally get it and start understanding that as long as they do not become more professional in their revenue management they will not control their rate integrity…
Meta-search has destroyed the dream of many hoteliers. The sweet thought that we control our rates online has been crushed. Kind of naïve no?
How come? We control our rates no? We almost all use channel management systems and have revenue managers (aka glorified reservation supervisors). But still we can’t get it under control.
Or at least we thought we did till meta-search sites like Kayak, HotelsCombined and Trivago got big. These price comparison websites shop the hotel prices on many different websites. And the websites include tour operators and wholesalers. Yes your FIT rates can be found online.
But not only this creates the rate mess offered by hotels. We shopped the top 5 hotels on Kayak.com and HotelsCombined.com for New York, Las Vegas, London and Paris. Destinations where you would expect top hotels to have their house in order. Sorry, not even the glorious Intercontinental has it under control.
We have found rates to vary at least €20 / US$ 25 with some hotels. But many hotels show rates differences of up to € 100 / US$ 125. Amazing no? Below some slides to show the rate shop results…
