How the web giants fail travellers part II - Agoda and the big online travel agencies

Experiential travel’s all the rage. But you’re supposed to sign up for the experience first. Last weekend, I spent my 50th birthday getting an involuntary taste of life in a construction site masquerading as a resort. 

I decided to to keep my 50th very simple and head to the beach. Quy Nhon, on Vietnam’s central coast, is still off the tourist radar - which is why I like it. We booked three nights at what should have been the best place in the area, the Avani Resort and Spa, for $90USD per night.

I’ve stayed at the resort several times since its opening more than 10 years ago and was last there in 2012. At that time it was known as Life Resort Quy Nhon.

I wasn't expecting any surprises.

But things looked wrong from the moment I arrived.



The reception area was closed off. There were workers everywhere. The place looked and sounded like a building site.

Reception staff quickly assured me the room would be well away from any noise. All would be OK. 

As I left the check-in area to head to the room, things got worse. The pool and bar had been completely ripped up. As I entered the main accommodation block, it became clear that the whole property was a building site - reception, the pool and bar, the restaurant area and the room block.

I was later informed that only 8 of 60 rooms were operational.

When I saw the extent of building work, I contemplated leaving on the spot - but my options were limited. It was dark, there were no nearby hotels that would suit and my companion was arriving early on Saturday morning.

Photo: Mark Bowyer The corridor leading to our room.

Photo: Mark Bowyer Anyone for a dip?

I couldn’t believe that the resort was open. And it was appalling that we hadn’t been informed of the work going on.

I hadn’t spotted any reference to renovations when booking with Agoda a few days prior to arrival. When I mentioned this to resort staff, they assured me that Agoda did advise prospective guests of the work.

I went back and checked.

Sure enough, at the bottom of the resort's page on the Agoda website, in a tiny font size and also embedded in the top navigation, there was an “important note” link.

My guess is that close to nobody booking the resort sees these links. Check the page out and you’ll see why. If you booked using Agoda's very convenient mobile app, as I did, you'd be even less likely to see the alert.

There was nothing in the main resort information or the booking pathway that alerted prospective guests to the work. Those pages were too busy evoking seaside paradise with perfect images of the beach, the pool and the property.

Photo: Mark Bowyer Plenty happening out front too.

Photo: Mark Bowyer From our balcony.

Photo: Mark Bowyer A drink at the bar perhaps?

As a company that must spend hundreds of thousands of dollars ensuring users see the things they want them to see - aka. things that will optimise the sales process - Agoda was distinctly disinterested in ensuring customers were informed of the construction work.

I discovered later that some previous guests mentioned the building work in their reviews. But as I was familiar with the resort, I didn’t feel the need to check reviews.

The resort’s website was no better. There were more images of coastal bliss and a picturesque resort. There was an innocuous looking block of text without a heading on the booking page that mentioned the renovations.

Again, only the most determined readers would have spotted the hotel’s advice.

Agoda and the hotel must have made a commercial decision that it was better to run the gauntlet of a few months of bad reviews and deal with the consequences.

It’s an approach to customers that is increasingly the norm in the online world.

I spent more than a decade in the old bricks and mortar travel industry where legal liability for misrepresenting a hotel or resort, or exposing travellers to health and safety risks, were a constant concern.

Somehow, the internet giants like Agoda, have not only seized on the commercial efficiencies of the online space, they seem to have passed quality control and health and safety responsibility over to their unpaid reviewers - their customers.

That’s a huge cut to their business costs and a huge abrogation of their responsibility to their customers.

But it’s also the type of business model that gets big ticks from Silicon Valley investors.

The asymmetrical nature of the relationship between companies like Agoda and their customers means that occasional spectacular stuff-ups like this seem to be an acceptable cost of business.

It seems that it’s cheaper to fix problems after they arise than to take preventative action beforehand. Especially when a significant number of travellers won’t act on their grievances. 

That's not a good development for those trusting their precious holidays to online travel agents.

The other major online hotel booking agency in the region, Booking.com, was similarly halfhearted about declaring the renovations to travellers.

Both Agoda and Booking.com are owned by US giant Priceline.

After two disappointing nights at the Avani, we decided to leave and head into Quy Nhon town. The last straw was a big increase in work, dust and noise around our room on the Sunday afternoon just as I was planning a birthday nap.

It made no sense to be paying a premium for such a poor experience.

There were plenty of apologies from the General Manager as we left the resort. But I couldn’t help but remind him that there was nothing accidental about what had happened here. A decision had been made to leave the resort open during major renovations. And both the resort and Agoda had made only a casual “cover your arse” effort to inform guests of the work under way.

I’ve used Agoda a lot. I’m a big fan of their app and their technology. And if past experience is anything to go by, they’ll  probably handle the complaint process well. But I've also experienced poor quality control and disclosure with Agoda before.

Agoda and the hotel have only offered a refund for the 3rd night of our stay - the unused night. On the basis that the resort has been misrepresented online, I believe we’re entitled to better.

A refund of unused accommodation doesn’t inflict any real commercial pain on the offenders - the hotel and Agoda. They each retained two nights of booking income and the hotel kept its F and B earnings as well.

The cynical decision to remain open during renovations and the reticence about informing guests of the renovations under way is vindicated - for both the resort and Agoda.

The Avani Resort management and staff were very good. But they were put in an impossible position trying to defend the indefensible. They didn’t waste much effort

Some senior resort staff even said that they too were shocked the place had remained open.

But as I’ve just shown, Agoda and the resort have correctly calculated this to be a commercial risk worth taking.

That calculation must assume that comments on tripadvisor and other forums won’t inflict lasting pain once renovations are complete. 

The Avani in Quy Nhon isn’t the only Vietnam resort that I’ve recently discovered is being misrepresented by Agoda and Booking.com (and probably others).

Due to severe erosion, The Victoria Resort in Hoi An (and probably others too) has been without a beach since mid-2014. Not a trivial issue if you’re planning a beach holiday. Yet both Agoda and Booking.com continue to display images of rooms with beach access on their websites.
 
My last rant about web giants and travel looked at Google - complaining about the quality of its travel search results. Google plays a part in this tale too.

Do a Google search for “Avani Hotel” and Agoda and Booking.com ads will come up first. A little further down, Agoda and Booking.com rank very highly in search results too.

Of course there’s no connection between Agoda and Booking.com’s huge ad spend and their high ranking in Google search results. Right? But whatever criteria Google uses to establish a travel website’s “authority”,  ethical, visible disclosure of key information sure ain’t among them.


Disclosure
I booked and paid for this visit to Avani Resort Quy Nhon via Agoda. I made no request for discounted travel or other benefits from the hotel. I am presently pursuing the matter with the hotel and with Agoda. I will post information on the outcome soon.