Travel Deal of the Day (May 11, 2007)

If you use hotwire.com to book travel, it is important to note that your past activity on Hotwire may influence the rates you are quoted for travel for future purchases on Hotwire.

The Deal:
Hotwire.com is known as an “opaque” travel booking website, in that it allows you to receive discounted air/hotel/car rates in exchange for not knowing the exact airline/flight times (for air travel), hotel name/location (for hotels) or car rental company (for car rentals). Hotwire (and Priceline) often provide tremendous discounts as opposed to booking through normal channels. One thing to note when booking travel on Hotwire is that the site tracks your past searches and purchases through internet “cookies,” so the price it quotes you may be based on your past searching and/or purchasing tendencies. What this means is that it may be best to search using your Hotwire profile and then clear out the cookies from your internet browser and search again without logging into a travel profile to compare rates.