Which has announced the winner of its second annual Shoddy Awards, giving Brits a glimpse into the biggest scams of the moment. When it comes to travel, there are many places that would possibly rate you higher than you expect.
To compete for a Shoddy Award, nominees had to meet one of the following criteria: failing to meet an industry standard, potentially breaking the law, causing customer harm or confusion, or consistently underperforming in visitor surveys or customer champions’ lab tests. . Among them are some useful tips that you deserve to keep in mind, especially if you are looking for reasonable flights or trains.
He described Opodo as the “biggest disappointment” when it comes to booking flights. Although it appears that the site offers the cheapest indexed price, consumers face a number of hidden costs.
This means that when consumers reach the checkout stage, they will be faced with “high baggage fees,” seat selection, and a year-long Prime club “you didn’t know you had. “you asked. “
Opodo only achieved 28% visitor satisfaction in a 2024 survey conducted through Which?Connect Panel members enjoy booking flights online.
Which one? Travel wrote: “Opodo can offer the cheapest rate when using comparisons like Skyscanner, but don’t be fooled. In our most recent survey, flight bookings garnered a dismal 28% of visitors. One interviewee complained that Opodo would offer them “no. “service to the visitor. “
“Others said they had unknowingly signed up for its Prime service and only found out when they were charged later. We also discovered examples of excessive fees for extras such as luggage and seat selection.
If you’re looking for a budget flight, which one? Recommended travel via ebooking directly with “the airline of your choice”. They said, “Tip: Book your flights directly with the airline. Even the most productive online travel agents are just dead middlemen who make your vacation difficult.
When traveling by train, which one? Travel said in their video: “I’m still a victim of it and I bet you are too. These are the price ticket machines at stations. Our mystery shoppers have discovered that the maximum price tickets are replaced and the ones are not sold. cheaper”. Ticket price or may qualify more than double compared to online booking.
“On average, same-day tickets were 52 cents more expensive. And when only one in six exercise stations in the United Kingdom have full-time tickets, it’s a shame that self-service opportunities are up to the task.
Some of Which?’s mystery shoppers have found that most operators have replaced machines that don’t sell the cheapest tickets. Instead, they found that they could qualify more than twice the value compared to online bookings, and that the peak productive rates might not be available or hard to find.
An Opodo spokesperson commented: “Which of the searches violates the basic principles they will have to follow, and the crux of the so-called studies is arbitrary sampling directed at express brands. While we value each visitor’s experience, our findings are based on samples of only 42 respondents or less, which is not statistically representative given our 21 million visitors.
“Our regular surveys of 1. 5 million customers consistently show that nine out of 10 customers are satisfied or very satisfied; this metric is independently verified by third-party auditors. Which? Claims to be a serious customer research organization , but this evidence shows that we are more interested in clickbait than in providing customers with original and meaningful information. To protect the public from their misleading searches, we filed a formal complaint against them.
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