The extras travelers pay are climbing fast. This year Edinburgh launched a new visitor levy, Japan tripled its departure tax, and the U.S. hiked park fees for foreigners. Officials say the money is earmarked. But does that make it fair?
Just outside Melbourne, behind a predator-proof fence at Mt. Rothwell, dozens of Southern Brush-tailed Rock-wallabies peek over the granite. They are undeniably cute. But the woman who runs this sanctuary has one rule for visitors: do not call them that.
Paul Clarke’s GE Profile ice maker needs one part. GE Parts has shipped it eight times, and every time the propeller arrived shattered, with the broken blades missing from the sealed bag. Four months on, his $3,000 machine still fails.
The listing called it quiet and peaceful five times. Instead, heavy impact noise from the unit above woke Tatsuyuki Morishita at 4 a.m. almost nightly in Toronto. An Airbnb agent promised a refund in writing. Then he returned the keys.
Zachary Scott, an active-duty servicemember, used his own modem and router for years. So when his internet provider billed him $252 for equipment he never rented, then sent it to collections, he faced one question: how to prove a negative?
The travel industry is quietly redefining what refundable means, and you are not going to like it. It used to mean you got your money back. Now it can mean some of it, minus fees you were never told about.
If you have checked airfares for the holidays, you already know they are brutal. Thanksgiving round trips average $402, Christmas $452, both the highest in a decade. Airlines blame fuel and demand, but one CEO says passengers barely push back.
You feel it at the gate when your flight is delayed a third time and nobody offers an explanation. In the United States, air passenger rights are shrinking. Everywhere else, from Europe to India, governments are moving the other way.
The travel industry will happily charge you to bring your dog along, and its marketing calls that a perk. But an airline calls your pet cargo, a court of law calls it baggage, a hotel calls it a nightly fee.
Your hotel room feels like a sanctuary, and security experts say that is exactly the problem. A cracked balcony door. A cloned key card. A stranger who trailed you from the bar. Travelers drop their guard where they feel safe.
