KayakReviews 321

DO NOT book through KAYAK.COM!
Check their rates... then go to the airline or hotel site directly. I've booked many, many flight and hotels... some through KAYAK... for ex. If you change a hotel reservation to shorten your stay by ONE DAY... KAYAK charges a PENALTY of the FULL AMOUNT of the ENTIRE STAY! (read terms and conditions) it happened to me, booked 2 nights in Houston at $378, had a meeting cancel and CHANGED my reservation to only 1 night... they charged me a $378 change PENALTY... so I paid $700 for ONE NIGHT!. KAYAK.COM is COMPLETELY INFLEXIBLE on this policy. BEWARE!

Even though the site may say that hotel reservations can be cancelled without penalty, they will do everything they can to hold onto your money. Two phone calls and a lot of waiting later, I am still trying to get them to do the right thing. This is what happened: I got the beachfront room I wanted, but not with the beds I wanted (only clarified on making the reservation). Called the hotel to switch--they said to cancel the first reservation with kayak and they changed the room. Now Kayak is saying that the hotel has to waive fees to make a refund available!

Their search engine is the best consolidator and easy to compare and find lower fares and options.

USE THIS SITE FOR JUST THAT - never purchase a reservation! They have the WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE!

I made a reservation the site calls it - 'booking' for three rooms for 2 nights as a backup for a party that was coming up. I "cancelled the booking on time" on the website and it gave me the cancellation number. All three rooms were under this single booking.

One week later, I saw a credit for just one room. I called the customer service and the supervisor on the floor, they keep telling me that it only cancelled one room and they wouldn't be able to refund my money. I have printed the screen that shows clearly the cancellation of this 'booking' which clearly lists three rooms and total charge but they refused to refund. I am sure I am not the only customer who was robbed because of the hidden technicalities they didn't fix on their side of the system.

USE THE SITE FOR LOOK UP and NEVER PURCHASE ANYTHING because the CUSTOMER SERVICE SUCKS!

I was searching for last-minute flights over Easter weekend to attend a funeral. Of course, flights were hard to find and expensive. Two or three times I found reasonable prices on kayak.com and worked out schedules with another person travelling, only to find out when I came back to buy that the prices were obsolete. So disheartening and frustrating. I guess now that I understand that their prices are possibly obsolete I would handle my decisions differently, but this was such a discouraging process for me, under already emotional circumstances.

Today is 3/22/2012 and I received terrible customer service with CheapOair. I was also told i needed to pay another $150 to rebook my flight. After I agreed to do so because I need to get home ASAP... she then started to constantly ask me if i wanted to save $10 on my flight by booking a car. We went back and forth over and over how i live in DC and have my own car. She then STILL tried to get me to rent the car and than said but its saving you money... finally I told her to cancel my flight and i was going to go with another flight... over $70 more with one of there competitors... doesn't matter who but I will NEVER use them again!

Its not always about money but service!

NEVER USE KAYAK TO BOOK A TRIP!

This website is the worst travel site I have ever worked with. It really needs to check to accuracy of the sites it pulls its information from. It 100% unreliable and I have tried using them twice. The first time the hotel never got my reservation, the second time the hotel no longer exists... both time I was charged by Kayak to my card.

So here is my story.

I booked a hotel for President's Day weekend for my anniversary. When I arrived at the hotel they did not have a reservation for me and had no more reservations for me. I instantly tried call Kayak.com and after an hour of being on hold finally gave up and had to go find another hotel. Me and my boyfriend continued trying to call them over the next 3 days. I finally got back to someone who was very apologetic and said they were having a problem with the hotel chain I had booked with. They were very apologetic and said they would refund my money... 10 days later. They did call me again a few days later to say my request had been approved and the full amount would be refunded and also credited me $50 to my next trip.

So though I was flustered they did eventually fix the problem and I figured I might as well try and give them a second chance and use my credit with them. So I booked another hotel for one night in Tahoe. However this time I didn't want to show up again without them having the reservation. I called the hotel number Kayak gave me and it has been disconnected. So I did an internet search of the address and it gave me a different hotel name than the one Kayak provided and the hotel they supposedly booked for me is no longer open.

So yet again have to try and get ahold of Kayak, which is impossible, and get me money refunded.

Completely unexceptable. Never using them again and I would advise anyone else against it as well.

However they are getting their travel information is not working for them and I have read many other reviews with people having similar problems. They are not reliable and make vacations more stressful, and who wants that?

I had a glitch with my reservation. When I called customer service to try to resolve it, my call was routed to San Salvador. My call was escalated to the San Salvador call center manager, Lori. She was rude and extremely unprofessional. When I asked for her manager's name, she told me that she is the highest level that I was going to reach- there was no one above her. Very frustrated and almost in tears, I called the Kayak help # back. This time, I was routed to Manila. Long story short, I am out $132.60.
I feel like I have been robbed and no one at Kayak cares. Trying to get someone at the corporate office is almost impossible. I also posted this same review on the Kayak Facebook site- Kayak took my post off their Facebook page. It is obvious that Kayak is not interested in resolving any issues regarding their bookings. I am deleting my IPhone App. Sorry Kayak- it is just bad business.

AWFUL. We were planning a trip to Napa and booked our hotel through Kayak.com. HOWEVER, when we arrived, it turned out that the hotel had been mapped incorrectly in their system. It turns out that the hotel was over an hour away! At first, Kayak.com did not even acknowledge their own error. After we got them to acknowledge their error (in writing) they stopped returning our emails about getting a refund. Thankfully we used AmericanExpress and they promptly refunded our money (wagging their finger at Kayak.com all the way). An awful customer support experience. I would expect more from a company founded by a Kellogg grad. What a joke.

Don't book hotels directly through Kayak.com -- they don't guarantee the reservations!

I found a great hotel deal in Paris (France) for my honeymoon through Kayak. I booked my reservation directly through them (and paid upfront for the hotel).

Turns out it is scam. I had a friend in Paris call the hotel to confirm the reservation. They refuse to honor the reservation, as they don't work with Kayak.

I've now spent three days on the phone with Kayak. First, all of their contact numbers transfer you to customer service in India. They will not let you talk directly to anyone that speaks clear english in the States.

At first, they wanted to book me into nearby hotels which were literally three times as expensive... and they wanted me to pay the difference.

Next, they started promising to book me into another hotel, put me on hold and then the phone disconnects. Or they never pick up the phone again.

They refuse to refund my reservation, as there is a 100% cancellation charge.

After three days, I have spent over 10 hours on the phone (and on hold) with them.

Absolutely horrible experience.

My honeymoon is in two weeks and now I'm stuck trying to find a place to stay... and the rates are ridiculous because it is so close.

Do NOT use Kayak to directly book a hotel. They do NOT guarantee the reservation and they refuse to refund my money. (I'm working with my bank to dispute the charge on my credit card.)

I have to disagree with those who say Kayak.com is a one stop shop. I've used Kayak many times and I've started to notice a pattern: They don't show all possible flights, which means you might not be seeing the cheapest ticket amongst the results.

Lets use my most recent situation:
I did a search on Kayak and selected "my dates are flexible" in hopes that I can find a ticket cheaper than the date I originally planned on going. If it means saving $50 to board a day or two later/earlier, I'm going to take it. If $50 isn't worth saving to you, then I envy you for having such a privilege!
(I realize that leaving a day earlier means spending that $50 and more on hotel + food, but that's time spent in my destination that is totally worth it!)

According to Kayak, the cheapest ticket would be $1745, departing Dec 14 and returning Jan 22. Well guess what? Priceline.com showed a ticket at $1714, departing Dec 12 and returning Jan 22.
(At both websites I searched for Dec 13 departure and Jan 20 return, and the tickets both have the same number of stops and similar flight duration.)

So now I know from Priceline that the cheapest ticket is from Dec 12 - Jan 22. So, I decided to do a search on Kayak for just flights departing Dec 12th and returning Jan 22nd. Only THEN did the $1714 ticket come up on Kayak.
Why it didn't come up during my initial search is beyond me, but I don't find Kayak very honest for not revealing the cheapest flight to me until I specifically did a search for the date with the cheapest flight... Which defeats the purpose of Kayak.
I'm using it to find the cheapest flight but what's the point if it's not telling me the cheapest flights?

Kayak gets a boo from me. I'm not saying you should use Priceline, BUT I'd only use Kayak as a confirmation that I won't find tickets cheaper elsewhere. Don't trust Kayak to give you the cheapest tickets from the get-go!

WARNING: DO NOT TRUST KAYAK.COM RATINGS (specifically flexible date search)

It turns out the only date thoroughly searched is the specific date you specify. Dates around that date are only partially searched. You can loose hundreds of dollars, by assuming their data is complete.

Here is the final response from their customer relations:

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Hello,

Thanks for the specific scenario. I've reproduced what you are seeing so it was not something you were doing wrong.

The way flex search works is that we search providers who allow a search over multiple days. Since certain providers don't provide that data, we are sometimes not able to show all results within a flex search.

David Machado
KAYAK QA Engineer

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BOTTOM LNE: Don't trust their data. They do not indicate this incompleteness.
I wonder what other data is missing?

I have switched to Bing Travel. They also give better search controls.

--disappointed

The comparson of prices and booking process was easy. Also long as you don't have an issue. I used the site once to book business travel. All the rooms were non-refundable, so when I had to leave a day early they refused to refund the final night. The blamed the hotel. I also requested an itemized receipt broken down by date with the room rate and taxes. It took 13 phone call and 24 hours to even receive the email and then this was all they would send:
1st night - 163.20 USD
2nd night - 163.20 USD
3rd night - 163.20 USD
4th night - 163.20 USD

Taxes Paid - 69.92 USD
Total Amount Paid - 722.72 USD
Total Amount Due - 00.00 USD

They really don't care about their customer and I will never use them again.