The only thing worse than a cheap hotel room is a cancelled one. You might have saved up for months, carefully accumulated leave from work, and figured out the quickest travel routes. Suddenly a family member gets engaged, telling you at the last minute. You absolutely can’t leave, and your plans unravel before your eyes.
You’d like to postpone it, but when you phone the hotel to cancel your room, they remind you that it’s non-refundable. All that money you spent on the best quality – you’re not getting it back.
This happens to millions of people all around the world. In the U.S. alone, 220 000 hotel bookings are cancelled every day! It’s such a widespread occurrence that it impacts the travel industry and the economy.
And it seems wasteful when you think about how many people would have loved to stay in that now empty room.
Buy it from them for half the price… or less
There’s a simple solution. Buy your hotel bookings from people who can’t use theirs. They’re willing to sell for whatever they can get, despite the high quality.
Of course, while the solution is simple, it takes complex planning and luck to make it work.
A company called Roomer found a way to take advantage of this situation on a mass scale. They give frustrated travelers the opportunity to list their non-refundable hotel rooms on their hotel-marketplace. The seller chooses a price, and it’s offered to buyers looking for a good deal.
The discount Roomer recommends to sellers is at least 50%, but many hotel rooms are going for much less. The top deal on their website right now is a 4-star hotel room with an 85% discount! We found many more similar listings, especially on their last minute deals page (as can be expected). These are all bookings that would have gone to waste.
The booking process is problem free
While this process involves a lot of logistics, you don’t need to know anything about that. Roomer takes care of it all, so that you don’t ever exchange details with a seller you don’t know or trust.
As part of that process, they verify the booking through their automated authentication system. Not only do they verify the booking exists, they make sure that you’re not being misled about what the rooms look like, or what they come with.
Ultimately it’s as easy (or easier) than using any other bookings website, and it comes with more peace of mind.
The hotels benefit too
A growing number of hotels and travel agencies partner with Roomer, and for good reason. Hotels lose revenue when rooms are left empty, even though they do not refund the initial outlay. Income from all extra services and purchases during the stay are lost.
These partnerships allow Roomer to offer deals straight from the hotels. Which makes it more than likely there’s something for you, regardless of the location or date. Your budget should no longer be the huge impediment to traveling that it always was.
Travel smartly and more often
Roomer’s idea is innovative, but intuitive nonetheless. Once you’re onto it, it’s going to be the way you book all your hotels in future.
One of the great perks of traveling cheap is that you get to do it more often. Instead of saving up for one expensive vacation, you’ll get to take many throughout the year, without ever compromising on quality.
