Originally Posted by
Often1
As to Orbitz. Same thing. Why on earth book through Orbitz when you can book through the carrier? There must be a thousand horror stories on FT alone from people stranded in places around the globe with two air carriers and some OTA all pointing various fingers at each other as to why nobody is responsible for whatever it is that has gone wrong.
I'm not suggesting that there aren't exceptions to this. But, all things being equal or close to equal, nothing beats dealing directly with the service provider.
In many cases all things are NOT equal or close to equal.... For those "thousand" horror stories there are tens of millions of satisfied customers who do not post any stories. I have also had on occasion better service from the third party than from the supplier (when problems did arise).
Most third parties I have dealt with have been reliable - very rarely have I had screw-ups like this happen, which is why I try to publicize them when they do.
The point here I feel is being missed. There may have been an error somewhere along the line, there may have been a miscommunication, but the bottom line is that the third party (Jayride) knew they cold not provide the service and did not communicate this - this is the part that is inexcusable.