Donna McIntyre: Online bookings all about trust

'It seems like decades since every journey started with a visit to the travel agents, relying on them to book a hassle-free trip.' Photo / Illustration / NZ Herald

Opinion

It's buyer beware when booking over the internet, says Donna McIntyre, but travel agents can get it wrong, too.

The email at 5am on the day we were flying from Auckland to Paris abruptly thumped home how much trust we place in travel bookings made over the internet.

The message from our Airbnb host in Paris told us her place had been flooded and we wouldn't be able to stay. Eek, what to do?

We had paid the lodging site already, it was high tourist season and we didn't have time to find somewhere before we went to the airport.

Don't worry, she followed up in a second email, she'd find us somewhere to stay. As we boarded the plane, we hoped our trust in this stranger, halfway across the world, would not be abused.

It seems like decades since every journey started with a visit to the travel agents, relying on them to book a hassle-free trip. Now so often we jump on the internet, particularly to sites recommended by fellow travellers.

Not that searching and booking on the internet translates to saving time. It's easy to pass hours poring over exotic locations and accommodation options on dot-com-this and dot-co-dot-nz-that only to feel confused by the proliferation of options, finally deciding on one only to find it's booked out.

Sometimes it's cheaper and easier to enlist a travel agent but, of course, that too entails trust. We once turned up at a hotel booked through an agency to find they had not factored in the international date line to our stay.

Friends-of-a-friend tried to book accommodation on Airbnb but grew suspicious when a particular host wanted them to circumvent the system and pay directly.

They didn't, but others did and the website has now banned that scammer.

And you read, too, of accommodation providers who had their homes ransacked by thieves.

It's a case of caveat emptor. If it sounds too good to be true (or too cheap), it probably is untrue.

Don't pay hosts directly - the site keeps the money until the guest is checked in so both host and guest can report anything amiss before money changes hands.

The only safeguard is to do your homework and check websites and agencies are kosher. Email potential hosts to establish a rapport and to suss them out. Always read the feedback.

Long story short, our flooded host did find us a nice apartment, and even refunded us €60 ($92) because the replacement apartment proved cheaper.

But it got us to thinking how so many travel arrangements do revolve around trust and how, in most cases, everything goes to plan even though we're arranging to travel with and stay in the places of people we've never met.

Sure, there are people out there who can't be trusted but they are, thankfully, in the minority.

As Airbnb says on its website, what truly keeps the site safe is human nature: People are "fundamentally good".