With travel prices soaring, customers might be tempted to pick the cheapest base option they find. But the base price of airfare and hotels represents only a fraction of the total costs. A parade of add-on fees await any traveler trying to navigate the checkout process, ballooning the final price. Experts call it “drip pricing.”
“It’s called ‘drip’ because surcharges and fees drip out throughout the shopping process,” says Vicki Morwitz, a professor of business and marketing at the Columbia Business School.
