I
n just a few short months from now, summer travel will be in full swing. Many of us are already planning and even booking upcoming trips. These days it is more common than ever for us to book our travel online. But not all travel sites are safe. Thirty-five percent of Americans say they’ve been scammed while booking travel online.
So you can protect yourself, here’s a rundown on how most of the scams work:
Internet crooks create fake travel agencies online—often copying the style of legitimate websites like booking.com or Expedia—and lure in potential victims with cheap airfares or “free” vacations. Typically, these phony sites will have fake customer reviews and false Trust Pilot ratings.
Naturally, when you book a trip, you expect you will have to provide personal and financial information which fraudsters will harvest. Then they will send you bogus bookings for flights, resorts, or hotels. Often the fake company pretends to book your tickets, but does not pay the airline, resulting in the tickets being cancelled. They then contact passengers in the days prior to the departure date demanding additional fees to be paid in order to make changes to the booking, which they blame on the airline. There are many online reviews stating that passengers arrived at the airport to check in only to be told that they were not booked onto the flight.
Even if your airline flight is legitimate, the fake agency likely will sell your information online to identity thieves or other scam operators. Crooks will use that information to run up charges on your credit card or empty your bank account. If they get your passport, it can sell for hundreds of dollars on the Dark Web. When you discover that confirmation numbers don’t match flight numbers or the hotel doesn’t have a record of your reservation, you’ll learn that the travel agency’s phone number is disconnected or never existed to begin with.
Summer vacations can get expensive, so it is only natural to look for a “deal”, but the safest way to book your trip is through a real travel agency website or directly with an airline’s website even if it might cost you a bit more. If the trip costs are so low they seem too good to be true, they probably aren’t.
If you’re not 100% sure about a site, conduct a Google search with the name of the agency and add the word scam or fraud to the search to find reviews and warnings from other travelers. Pay for your trip with a credit card because it offers fraud protection, and your maximum liability is limited. If you get an unsolicited call with a travel deal don’t ever divulge personal information over the phone, especially passport information, your Social Security number, or credit card details. Double-check everything—verify your reservations, payments, confirmations and payment receipts,
And finally, have fun on your vacation and don’t forget to pack the sunscreen.
