Who charges what
Prices
Every figure here is the sum of what several separate companies charge, plus nothing at all from this office. This page splits one figure by payee, names what none of them charges, and says which lines move and which cannot.
One figure, split by payee
Rome and Florence, eight nights, three companies.
| Who charges it | What for | Moves? | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| The airline | Seats out and home, bags the fare includes | Daily, and it is the most volatile thing in travel | quoted separately |
| Hotel one, four nights | The room and the city tax | Seasonally | 620 |
| Hotel two, four nights | The room and the city tax | Seasonally | 690 |
| The rail operator | Two reserved seats on the long leg | Rarely, and it sells out rather than rises | 90 |
| This agency | Reading the fare rules, checking the joins, writing the document | Never; there is no line | 0 |
| Government and city taxes | Collected by the hotels, set by others | Not at all. Nobody discounts a government | included above |
| The published figure | from $1,640 |
The gap between the sum and the published figure is the seasonal range: from is the lowest recently arranged, and most weeks sit above it. Showing that gap is more useful than hiding it.
The shape of every figure here
Every price on this site is from a figure, per person, two sharing, land only. Rooms carry a room's price. Put a single person in one and the per head number climbs. The figure is based on two sharing, on every trip, in every tier.
What none of them charges
- Travel insurance
- the insurer. Worth having on every trip, quoted whenever you ask, and never folded into a headline number
- Passports and entry permissions
- whichever authority issues them. Neither selling nor advising on them happens at this desk
- Meals the trip page does not list
- the restaurant
- Gratuities where customary
- the ship's account or the guide, and on a safari they are substantial. We name the usual amount
- Excursions
- the operator's own desk, usually less there than here
- Anything spent once you are there
- your own statement
What moves and what does not
- Airfare
- shifts on the day of the enquiry rather than the day of the flight. Outside everybody's control here, which is why it sits beside each trip and not within it
- Rooms
- follow the season, and follow how much of a property is already taken at the moment of asking
- Rail and internal air
- barely move in price and do move in availability. They sell out rather than rise
- Government, port and park fees
- do not move. Nobody discounts a government
- The company count
- moves everything else. Each extra contract adds a schedule, a join, and a way for the figure to change after you agreed to it
Who takes your payment
Each company, separately, on its own schedule, with its own name on your statement.
Not this office, and this agency adds no booking fee of its own to what they charge. There is no card field on any page, nothing to register for, and no balance sitting anywhere. That is also why no registration number appears anywhere: California, Florida, Hawaii and Washington State keep registers of travel sellers who sit on client money, this company is on none of those lists and holds none of yours, so there is no number to print. Printing one nobody issued is the offence; having none is not.
The two dates, per company
- Deposit date
- set by each company separately. On a four company trip there are four of them, and they are not the same day
- Balance date
- set by each company separately. Missing one is read as your cancellation of that contract, and on a chained trip it usually takes the next contract with it. Every one goes in your document in bold
If you find it for less
Forward the page. You will be told whether the two things are actually equivalent, and that normally comes down to whether transfers, room grade and insurance sit inside both numbers. Where they genuinely match, place it there.