Just browsed the web for the cruise in Halong (Vietnam) and wanna book one room for 2 people including everything, it costs us 437aud….. Go into the shopback site to book, price is 465aud. So do I look at the price incorrectly or shopback tries to trick its customers?
who is the official shopback rep,
all my msgs from about pre christmas have been ignored, by gotyourback
I've noticed this all the time.
Clicking affiliate links increase the pricing.
Best pricing I have found is usually through TA.
Some people say browser extension by passes this.
What's TA?
TripAdvisor
This is pretty common, unfortunately. I've found that sites, Agoda in particular, will adjust their pricing based off of how you were referred to the site. For instance, if you are referred by Trip Advisor, they know that you have access to other rates and need to be competitive. If you simply search that same accommodation through their site, they can safely assume the customer has less knowledge of other rates and they adjust pricing accordingly. The pricing probably increases with a cashback referral, because they know you have extra incentive to book through them (to get the cashback).
I had a somewhat similar experience with Qantas a few years back. I found the flights I wanted, went to use a travel credit, got taken to a separate portal (because I was using credit) that listed the exact same flights at close to double the price. T
The travel industry has become so shady and predatory. Would love to see a big crackdown on the whole industry by the ACCC, but it seems highly unlikely.
I agree its annoying. But theres nothing illegal about this type pf price discrimination.
Think about student pr pensioner discounts - happens all the time.
Organisations have to cover their overheads and profits, so if you thw user are going to get cash back, agoda also needs to pay referal fees to shopback - guess what, youll pay for it. If you find it cheaper overall from another platform just go with that.
It may even be cheaper to skip agoda and go directly to the provider.
I noticed the same thing, supper annoying.
i think it has more to do with agoda rather than shopback.
similar problem reported with cashrewards https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/387446
hotels.com as well
Yeah. It’s always best to compare the prices without affiliates and using just the web browser on a pf and not the mobile ape
Has anyone had issues with having their cashback track? Booking.com usually tracks within a few hours however my bookings for Agoda has not been tracked for over 2 days
This is pretty common in online travel. Hotels flights and car hire companies for the most part, use "dynamic pricing" this means they refer a different rate card for your search usually based on the referring URL, they can identify if its a paid link (affiliate or even paid search) and show you a different rate vs going direct to the site. In essence they make the end user pay for their own cashback with an inflated price. Nothing to do with Shopback.
Just experienced this with Hotels.com - surely the ACCC would consider this misleading?
Maybe a rep such as SaveMoniezzz or idigaeroplanefood or maybe their store account gotyourback might have something to say…