Has anyone used or tried the new airfare search engine, Orbitz?

[Dan Murphy]

I heard about it recently, going live this week. It is a consortium of 5 of the major airlines and in the realm of Expedia and Travelocity. I have given it a quick look and it seems like it has some nice features. Any thoughts from anyone here?? Here is the link.

https://www.orbitz.com

 

[Laz]

I don't think it includes all airlines, like Southwest. In fact, I heard on the news that Southwest is thinking of Suing Orbitz for that and possible price fixing. Southwest claims that they offer lower prices only on Orbitz. Remember, Orbitz is owned by the major Airlines.

 

[juju]

I took a look and inserted some dates and it came up with a easy to read comparison for the airlines. It seems to be another good tool.

 

[TravelSheryl]

I have been using Orbitz for nearly a year as one of many sources for checking airfares.

In response to a request by a national newspaper, I have extensively tested Orbitz over the past few days since it's *official* launch. My search was limited only to determining if Orbitz offered the lowest available fare on a particular itinerary. I did not use the advance search options offered like checking other nearby airports.

The results of my searches have revealed that Orbitz is probably the best travel agency website as far as the number of fares and routings it offers; however, Orbitz is still not offering all of the lowest available fares available. In other words, there were quite a few instances where a lower fare could be obtained directly through an airline website.

As to Southwest's position on Orbitz, Southwest sued Orbitz in Federal Court in California in early May. The primary allegations in the lawsuit are that Orbitz is not listing Southwest's lowest fares and that Orbitz is listing non-valid Southwest routings. Some examples of non-valid Southwest routings that Orbitz lists are more than one connection (Southwest does not sell a ticket with more than one connection). Also, Orbitz has listed itineraries that may list the first leg of a connecting flight arriving at the connecting airport after midnight with the connecting flight departing 5 or 6 hours later. Southwest does not sell such routings. Southwest is demanding that Orbitz remove Southwest fare displays completely from their website. Orbitz's response is that they will display all fares publicly available. I guess it's not important to Orbitz that they provide only accurate fare displays, because I have certainly seen many examples of inaccurate Southwest fare displays on Orbitz.

 

[TravelSheryl]

Here's the story I provided some research for USA Today http://www.usatoday.com/life/travel/leisure/2001/2001-06-08-orbitz.htm

 

[kellymonaghan]

TravelSheryl, did your tests include actually trying to purchase a ticket at the lowest fare?

I tried to book an Orlando trip and discovered that the $151 low fare had "become unavailable during my search." I really believe that, too. The new fare was $500 and something.

 

[TravelSheryl]

No, I did not try to purchase. I was simply comparing the fares Orbitz displayed vs. the fares available on the airline websites.

Did you see on the sidebar in the USA Today story that I linked that the reporter was unable to purchase the fare she obtained on Orbitz as well, but apparently for a different reason than yours. She got an error message and then was unable to reach anyone at Orbitz over the phone.

 

[Rhony]

I have tried to book several times or at least get to the total price for tickets for us but the price that is quoted at the beginning for the flight when you are picking you times to arrive/depart are never the prices when you get to the total. Maybe things will get better. This has happened a LOT.

Rhony
1978 WDW-Offsite
Oct 2001 WL

 

[Disnydad]

I have not purchased anything from Orbitz yet. But, I have been playing around with it. So far they were still listing Southwest and when I went to the SW site it was accurate.

We will see.

 

[Scotch]

See post from flyer talk board: http://www.webflyer.com/forum/Forum50/HTML/006572.html Some people have found better UA fares on Orbitz than the fares offered through UA reservations and www.united.com site.

 

[fholdred]

I've tried several times, but it keeps saying that my e-mail address doesn't look like a valid address. I've tried it enough time I know it's not a typo on my part Guess it doesn't like long government e-mail addresses. I e-mailed them Tuesday, telling of my problem. Still waiting to hear from them. I've tried again today and the problem is still there. I'm not impressed so far.

Faith

 

[TravelSheryl]

If it's simply not allowing you to register due to your email address, you can always use web-based email such as Hotmail or Yahoo. Personally, I wouldn't rate a website based on their lack of ability to recognize my address as valid, but lack of a response to your email for 5 days is unacceptable and clearly not a good indication that they will provide the level of customer service they claim to.

 

[robinb]

I have SideStep installed on my PC. It fires up automatically when I search for airfares, hotel rooms and cars on websites like expedia, travelocity and orbitz. Normally I see the same airfares on both SideStep and Travelocity. That was not the case of SideStep and Orbitz. Orbitz showed a really really low fare to Paris on United, but SideStep showed a much higher price. Conversely, SideStep showed an even lower price on Delta, but Orbit showed a much higher price when I asked to see Delta flights only. My guess was the United flight was an "internet" only flight that was available to Orbitz because United is a partner. I'm not sure why Delta's price was so different.

 

[TravelSheryl]

Orbitz indicates which fares are web only by a little red dot next to the fare where the itineraries are shown.