Orbitz Price Assurance Guarantee

Another in a long line of major travel web sites that are throwing their hat in, as it were, to the response to the bad economy is Orbitz travel.  The official name of the company is Orbitz Worldwide, that according to a statement on the website the official framing of the company mission is "using innovative technology to enable leisure and business travelers to research, plan and book a broad range of travel products". Ok, that is pretty vague, so why not offer a little more of a laymen's explanation is that the company owns several global consumer brands in travel and aggregates suppliers inventory for hotels and airfare. Originally it was a cooperative between several of the major airlines, but as the travel industry has grown and matured so has the company. 

Well back to Orbitz Price Assurance Guarantee. Orbitz is doing something a little different in response to the economic down turn. Many of the web sites I've posted about offer a nebulous 50% or more discount to regular rates. I've always kind of found that difficult to try and gauge. Orbitz, however, is kind of putting their money where their mouth is. The price assurance is actually very simple concept. Stepping back on their technology, Orbitz tracks the purchases made by their customers. Once a customer makes a purchase Orbitz will track it to see if any other customer of their makes a purchase for a flight or hotel room, and if the subsequent price is less than what the original customer paid a refund for the difference will be made. 

This is some pretty good stuff and I'm banking we'll see some great innovative discounts in the travel industry as we all navigate through these troubled economic times.