Press Release Summary: 11 August 2008 - Travelsupermarket and other such travel price comparison sites do not always play fair with their customers, says Gareth Robinson of carrentals.co.uk. "While sites such as this bill themselves as travel price-comparison-sites, this is not at all what they are providing to their customers", he said.
Press Release Body: A true travel price comparison website will offer customers a wide variety of options and price comparisons. For example, they will show the price for a per day car rental, utilizing a variety of locations and lots of vendors. Travelsupermarket does not do this. Instead, they focus predominantly on airport locations without offering comparison prices for renting in other areas. For example, a recent price comparison (as of 4 August 2008) showed carrentals.co.uk offering price comparisons on some 49 locations, while Travelsupermarket only featured 21. All 21 of Travelsupermarket's locations were airports, while many of Carrentals' sites were in outlying areas where customers were likely to arrive by train or ferry. These areas included Vauxhall, West Hampstead, Wembley and Kensington.
Carrentals also found that Travelsupermarket was focusing their efforts on car rental companies that could afford to be listed on their site. In a scheme whereby rental companies pay Travelsupermarket to be listed on a "pay-per-click" basis, the results a customer gets when he attempts to compare companies will be skewed. With pay-per-click, advertisers will be charged each time a customer clicks their link on Travelsupermarket's website. Only those companies large enough to afford inclusion on the site will be included in the price comparison, since only their links will be offered to customers on Travelsupermarket. This is bad news for customers using Travelsupermarket because they are not truly getting the best price for their car rentals. In fact, often they are paying more since only the big players can afford to be included on Travelsupermarket's site under this pay-per-click scheme.
Carrentals.co.uk works on the far more acceptable and fairer cost-per-acquisition basis, which allows for much greater affordability for the smaller operators, those who can't afford the skyrocketing costs that a pay-per-click scheme could entail. To be included on the site, rental companies have only to pay a fee when they receive a new customer.
Because of the affordability of being included in its website, carrentals.co.uk includes over 50 car hire providers and over 7,000 locations worldwide in its database. This gives Carrentals' customers far greater choice when making a car hiring decision.
Launched in 2003, carrentals.co.uk is one of the UK's leading online vendors of car rental services. Modifications to their site in 2007 led to them becoming the first easy-to-use price comparison site in the travel industry, with more car rental vendors and locations in its database than any other site in the UK. Carrentals.co.uk was voted Best Car Hire Website in the 2008 Travolution Awards. To book a hire car or for further information about the site, visit them at www.carrentals.co.uk.
Press Contact: Rachel Builder or Anna Nicholls Context Public Relations carrentals@contextpr.co.uk Tel: 01625 511966 Fax: 01625 511967 www.contextpr.co.uk
Web Site: http://www.carrentals.co.uk
Contact Details: "pay-per-click" basis, the results a customer gets when he attempts to compare companies will be skewed. With pay-per-click, advertisers will be charged each time a customer clicks their link on Travelsupermarket's website. Only those companies large enough to afford inclusion on the site will be included in the price comparison, since only their links will be offered to customers on Travelsupermarket. This is bad news for customers using Travelsupermarket because they are not truly getting the best price for their car rentals. In fact, often they are paying more since only the big players can afford to be included on Travelsupermarket's site under this pay-per-click scheme.
Carrentals.co.uk works on the far more acceptable and fairer cost-per-acquisition basis, which allows for much greater affordability for the smaller operators, those who can't afford the skyrocketing costs that a pay-per-click scheme could entail. To be included on the site, rental companies have only to pay a fee when they receive a new customer.
Because of the affordability of being included in its website, carrentals.co.uk includes over 50 car hire providers and over 7,000 locations worldwide in its database. This gives Carrentals' customers far greater choice when making a car hiring decision.
Launched in 2003, carrentals.co.uk is one of the UK's leading online vendors of car rental services. Modifications to their site in 2007 led to them becoming the first easy-to-use price comparison site in the travel industry, with more car rental vendors and locations in its database than any other site in the UK. Carrentals.co.uk was voted Best Car Hire Website in the 2008 Travolution Awards. To book a hire car or for further information about the site, visit them at www.carrentals.co.uk.
Press Contact: Rachel Builder or Anna Nicholls Context Public Relations carrentals@contextpr.co.uk Tel: 01625 511966 Fax: 01625 511967 www.contextpr.co.uk
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