- Australians are being charged thousands of pounds more for hotel stays and car hire that overseas customers, reveals research by cybersecurity company NordVPN
- Consumers booking two weeks of car hire in Cancun on the Australian Europcar.com site paid 127% more – an extra AU$511 – than those using the Mexican version
- Researchers used a Virtual Private Network to find savings from travel sites including Hotels.com, Hertz.com and Booking.com in countries like Italy, Thailand and Indonesia.
Sydney — Holidaymakers are being charged hundreds of dollars more than overseas customers by travel firms presenting higher prices on Australian websites1, according to research commissioned by cybersecurity company NordVPN.
From car hire and cruises to ferries and theme parks, consumers are frequently being presented with wildly different prices depending on where they log on.
Using the Mexican website for Europcar.com resulted in a AU$511 saving for two weeks of car hire in Cancun – meaning that Australian users are paying 127% more.
NordVPN’s researchers used its Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) to make it look to websites like they were not in Australia. They discovered savings across a range of well-known travel sites like Hertz.com, Hotels.com and Booking.com, for a variety of destinations, including Italy, Thailand and Bali.
What is a VPN? A VPN disguises your IP address, while improving privacy and security. You select a country and NordVPN ensures that’s where websites think you are. VPN users are then able to see the differing content — and prices — shown to overseas consumers.
Using a VPN, hiring a Chevrolet Beat 1.2 Sedan in Cancun for two weeks on the Mexican Europcar.com site cost AU$401 – AU$511 (56%) cheaper than the AU$912 quoted for users on the Australian site.
The biggest saving came from booking a trip for a family of four – two adults and children aged eight and ten – to Centara Reserve Samui through the Agoda.com Thailand site. The two-trip cost AU$15,516 – AU$1,763 less than the AU$17,279 price quoted to users of the Australian site.
Hiring a Fiat 500 from the Italian site of Hertz.com cost AU$1,235 – a 24% saving compared with the AU$1,629 quote given by the Australian site.
The research was commissioned by NordVPN and conducted by an external company between 8th to 17th April 2024. Simultaneous searches were made for identical products being sold by the same vendor using numerous country servers. Currencies were exchanged via xe.com. This is the second consecutive year carrying out the vacation pricing research, and Australians are still being shown different prices to people elsewhere in the world.
When conducting the research, there were cases when prices offered to consumers in different countries were similar. However, for illustration purposes, this article and table present some of the deals with the biggest differences in price.
Table: Cost of items booked through Australian versus local websites
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Destination
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AUS price (AUS $)
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VPN Price (AUS $)
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Price Diff (AUS $)
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Europcar.
com |
Two week car hire (Chevrolet Beat 1.2 Sedan) in Cancun
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Aug 14 to Aug 28
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Car hire (Fiat 500 or similar)
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July 11 to July 25
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Two adults and two children (8 and 10) staying at the Arinara Beach Resort Phuket
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June 20 to July 4
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Holidayautos.com
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Car hire (SUV Toyota Avanza or similar) in Bali
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Aug 8 to Aug 22
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Booking.com
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Two adults staying at Hotel Celio in Rome
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July 11 to July 25
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Hotels.com
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Costa Rica
|
Two adults and two children (11 and 9) staying at the Hilton Garden Inn San Jose La Sabana
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June 20 to July 4
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Two adults and two children (8 and 10) staying at the Centara Reserve Samui
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June 20 to July 4
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Booking.com
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Two adults staying at the Major House – Luxury Apartments in Rome
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July 11 to July 25
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Two adults staying at the Sol by Melia Beneoa Bali – All Inclusive
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Aug 8 to Aug 22
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Booking.com
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Two adults staying at 5 Doughty Street (studio apartment in London)
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Sept 12 to Sept 26
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Hotels.com
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Two adults staying at the Hyatt Vivid Grand Island Cancun Adults Only All-Inclusive
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Aug 14 to Aug 28
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Source: NordVPN *includes taxes and other charges
Marijus Briedis, Chief Technology Officer at NordVPN, said: “Millions of us have got used to hunting for a vacation and booking our holiday car hire online, but not all customers are treated equally when it comes to the price.
“Online tracking used by travel websites means that they can tell what holiday we’re looking for before we do, while algorithms can adjust holiday prices to the spending power of different countries.
“Never assume you’re getting the same deal as everyone else. Your location, the number of times you visit a website, and how your search fits in with the school holiday schedule, can all influence the price you’re offered.
“The best way to fight back is to shop around with the same provider using a VPN and see if you can find hidden savings offered to customers overseas. As our research shows, it could save you thousands of dollars on a trip.
“Once you’ve found your perfect hotel, run the site through a local VPN to the country you are visiting and do a side-by-side comparison. You can use an online currency exchange to help in your search.”
ABOUT NORDVPN
NordVPN is the world’s most advanced VPN service provider, used by millions of internet users worldwide. NordVPN provides double VPN encryption and Onion Over VPN and guarantees privacy with zero tracking. One of the key features of the product is Threat Protection, which blocks malicious websites, malware during downloads, trackers, and ads. The latest service by the NordVPN team is Saily — a new global eSIM. NordVPN is very user friendly, offers one of the best prices on the market, and has over 6,200 servers covering 111 countries worldwide. For more information: https://nordvpn.com.
