Hotels and Airfare: It Never Hurts to Ask for a Refund
Published on - March 16th, 2007 (by J.D. Roth) Bankrate doesn’t just offer banking information and investment advice; it also has a section of user-submitted frugal tips. Each month, the person who submitted the best tip wins $100. February’s top tip came from Brenda Miller:
If you book a flight far in advance of your departure date, monitor the price of your exact flight. If the price happens to fall below what you paid prior to your departure, contact the airline and ask for a refund on the difference you paid. My last trip to Hawaii resulted in a $120 refund, which turned into additional spending money!
Miller notes that this trick can also work with hotels. The key to getting these refunds, she says, is to stick to your guns.
Bankrate: People are sometimes embarrassed to speak up and ask for a refund but it’s clearly worth it. How do you get over that?
Brenda: Being embarrassed will cost you a lot of money. You have to be bold and ask. And, I think that’s why a lot of people don’t know about it — it doesn’t hurt to ask.
Sometimes saving money is like dating!
[Bankrate: It never hurts to ask for a refund]
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I’m just starting to learn how to be more assertive. It’s true it doesn’t hurt to ask. Most of the time people are more than willing to give what you want. If they say no, no harm done. I don’t know why I’ve been a wuss for so long.
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Me too, Brett. I’m not sure why I lived in fear for so long. I’ve learned it doesn’t matter if somebody says “no”. Nothing’s lost. I’m just back at the place I was. But people say “yes” so often that asking is like a magic way to get more out of life. I’m serious.
I remember when I first realized this. A friend and I were flying from Portland to Minneapolis. Our plane was delayed. I would have simply sat around the airport and sucked it up. But my friend was assertive and he asked — politely — if they would upgrade us to first class to compensate for our trouble. They did. I was shocked!
That was almost a decade ago. I didn’t start emulating his assertiveness at first, but gradually I’ve become more accustomed to it. Most of us tell ourselves over and over, “I’m not assertive.” I’m simply learned to replace that “script” with one that says, “I am going to act assertive.” Not that I am assertive, but that I’m going to act like it. To the outside world, there’s no difference between the two, and so I’m able to enjoy the rewards of assertiveness without scaring myself.
Remember, too, that there’s a difference between assertive and aggressive. Aggressive is rude…
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I want to echo what JD said about being assertive vs. aggressive. I was a manager at a hotel (in Yosemite Nat’l Park) for 7 years and I can tell you that the real ‘screamers’ didn’t benefit as much as the assertive but polite. The old cliche about catching more flies with honey than with vinegar was never more true than at the hotel front desk.
Norman ‘I was yelled at by Joan Baez’ Bone
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I just thought of some examples, most of which are food-related, though they don’t have to be.
There’s a Baskin-Robbins ice cream shop near our house. I don’t go often (and haven’t been in a while), but often enough to know that they generally won’t give “extra hot fudge” on a sundae (it’s against policy). But I found that if I was friendly, if I smiled and made small talk, and then asked politely, they would give the extra hot fudge.
I also have a weakness for the chinese takeout at Safeway (another vice I’ve given up in the past few months). I always get steamed rice and an entree. But I want *two* entrees. I want half of one item and half of another. I don’t need a lot of either. Official policy is: no way. But I’ve learned that if I’m nice, most employees will do it anyhow. (Back when I was a regular at this, I developed a rapport with certain employees, and they’d always accommodate this request.)
These are small things, I know, but they’re examples of what you can get by asking. They’re things I never would have got before, because I never would have asked…
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I had no idea the airlines would do that…I’ve always assumed that the price you pay is the price you pay, and you can’t change it afterward. In fact I think it’s amazing the airlines would even consider honoring such a request.
My secret to getting extra hot fudge was to go to the ice cream shop 10 minutes before closing; at that point the staff weren’t worried about running out of fudge and having to heat up a new batch. My late-night sundaes ended up being 50 percent hot fudge and 50 percent ice cream, which is just the way I like them.
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I never even knew about Bankrate.com before JD mentioned it on this site. It’s been a real eye-opener. I haven’t explored it as much as I should…I’ll definitely check out the recommendations section.
One thing I always find noteworthy on the site is the rate of ING Direct…several sites refer to them (such as Ramit’s), but there are several banks that beat their rate…perhaps a topic for another article though
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Question about the posted tip:
How do you know when to ask for the refund?
I.e. say you book a hotel @ $500.. it falls to $400. If you ask for a refund (and get $100 back), then it drops to $350, you’re out the extra $50. Do you call back and ask for a second refund?
If you wait though, it might rise back up to $450, then you can’t exactly call in and say “well it was at $400, refund me to that price.”
It’s the exact same dilemma as when to book your flight. Doesn’t seem to be a great tip to me, unless you book your flight and get a refund based on the ending price (right before the flight takes off), which won’t work as it’s almost alway higher. Might work for a hotel, if you booked and they dropped their prices right before you’re staying there, but then it’s just a rate adjustment, it’s not like you pre-pay for most hotels..
Odd tip, in any case.
-arebelspy
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With hotels this works since you usually have the ability to cancel within a certain number of days/hours before your stay begins. It’s really nothing more than canceling your reservation and then rebooking at the lower rate.
This is one of the reasons that, if the price is the same, you should reserve directly with the hotel rather than an on-line booking service (Expedia, etc) because they often have no cancellation policy.
I’m not sure how well its going to work with aitline tickets unless its a refundable ticket.
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I’m curious as to how the lady in the article actual monitors her exact flights to see if it becomes a better deal. I’d like to know that aspect of it..as it seems to be missing from the article. Anyone have any idea as to how she does this?
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I actually tried this with a Carnival Cruise I took. I booked it over a month in advance and called the week of when I noticed the price dropped significantly. The Customer Service rep told me I could get the difference refunded to me or I could move up to a nicer room. I decided to take the refund and boy am I glad I did. I ended up saving over $300 for a 4 day cruise and we ended up with the room that we were offered to upgrade to anyway!
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re: not asking when you deserve better… My brother-in-law just moved and paid a company to install his entertainment system for him. My husband and I stayed at his house this weekend and noticed that the tv hadn’t been set up properly (they weren’t getting the HD signal nor the surround sound) so my husband fixed everything. I suggested that my brother-in-law should call the company and complain that the company had done it wrong, but his response was, “no, we can’t prove it.” I thought that attitude was so strange, letting bad customer service slip by because you couldn’t _prove_ it was bad. Even if you don’t actually get any money back, at least you’ve let them know you’re not satisfied. Politely, of course!
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