Feb. 24 at 3:23 AM
Essentially, what an agent does is similar to what
$TRVG does - search aggregators to find lowest price
What happened to me: Searched hotel via Trivago -> led to TripAdvisor -> led to TripAdvisor Partner. Booked & paid (upfront = cheaper rate) - VISA charged
Rechecked bookings & hotel said no reservation. TripAdvisor Partner kept sending emails that they are looking into it but no follow-up. Hotel, Trivago & TripAdvisor no help
Agents that prioritize price will lead to these types of shenanigans - agents need guardrails/programming/learning to prioritize trust: historical failure rates, reviews, chargebacks, verification pings
Walled gardens emerging: Hotels/airlines block bots/scraping (robots.txt restrictions, API gating, data control to protect direct channels/preferred vendors) - limits agent access/comparison
Loyalty perks add stickiness - smart agents must optimize total value, not just price
All which favour incumbents & not new agents build by start-ups
$UBER $DASH $EXPE $BKNG