Home
Samsonite
 

Newsflash

Share A Hotel Room For Half The Price?


With hotel room prices steep and getting higher, especially in the big tourist-trap cities, would you opt to share a room with another traveler?  The drastic idea wasn’t so unusual until just over a century or so ago, before hotels or motels existed. Then roadside inns didn’t rent rooms, just beds. The more fortunate guests got a bed with only two or three other snoozers in it.

A start-up online hotel room-sharing program called Easynest is now booking people willing to share at many hotels and resorts. Potential clients are required to fill out personal data, choices, schedules and other information. Then, matches are offered. So far, the service is totally free, but if the program evolves successfully, a fee is a certainty.

Cruise lines have offered share-your-cabin service for a long time, but this may be the first it's available for hotel rooms. For more information about the new website that identifies itself as "Airbnb for hotels and resorts”, go to www.easynest.com

Make Google Photo Tour Of Your Next Hotel Room PDF Print E-mail


Are you worried that drones and security cameras now follow your every move? Here’s a new spy-on-you service you’ll actually enjoy. Google and several hotel chains now offer travelers advance photoramas of their rooms, to arrive days before check-in. Guests are able to view it all on computers, tablets and smartphones.

Best Western International has launched Google Business Photos for all 2,200 of its North American hotels. Additionally, Carlson Rezidor Hotel Group, parent company of Radisson, Radisson Blu, and Country Inns & Suites, already have their pilot program in place in its hotels in Chicago, Miami and Washington, D.C.

Google Business Photos are 360-degree tours powered by Google Street technology. Many businesses have used the technology for security, repair, construction and other applications since it was introduced several years ago. Of course, it won’t be too long before just about every hotel in the world will offer this room preview service.

For more information, go to www.usatoday.com/story/travel/...google-business-photos/4115185

 
 
Stay in-the-know about the latest Sports, Life, Money, Tech, and Travel stories. You'll get your first 2 months of USA TODAY for $25 (charged monthly). All print subscribers receive the e-Newspaper included with their subscription.