Tag: prices

Rented A Car at MCO & Now Returning It? Don’t Fill Your Gas/Petrol Tank Up Here!

Many visitors to Central Florida know that renting a car at Orlando International Airport (MCO) is the ultimate freedom. You have a vehicle at your disposal for the entirety of your trip, and that allows you to not only come and go as you please, but also lets you to go just about anywhere without the hassles and occasional uncertainties of shuttles, buses, taxis and ride sharing.

Of course, you have to return your car at the end of your trip, which leaves you with the question of whether or not to fill up your tank before you return the vehicle (you may want to read this article to help you decide if you should prepay for the gas or not). If you decide to fill up just before you get to MCO, that’s great!

Just don’t fill up at these places.

Continue reading “Rented A Car at MCO & Now Returning It? Don’t Fill Your Gas/Petrol Tank Up Here!”

Advertisements

Understanding Hotel Taxes, Resort Fees & Deposits For Incidentals

When you find a hotel rate, especially in the United States, you will rarely, if ever pay just that amount. Just like when you purchase an item in the U.S., unless it says that tax is included, chances are good that you’ll have to pay tax on top of the advertised price; that’s just how we charge for things in the U.S. The same goes for hotels. Unless an advertised price explicitly says that taxes & fees are included, you can bet that something(s) is/are going to be added on to make your final price. And in recent years, some hotels have added on something sneaky called a “resort fee,” too. Plus you often have to put down a deposit for incidentals. But let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start):

Continue reading “Understanding Hotel Taxes, Resort Fees & Deposits For Incidentals”

How To Find Out How Much A Taxi Will Cost, Ahead of Time, While Traveling

When you’re traveling and need to get from Point A to Point B, it’s sometimes helpful to know ahead of time how much that’s going to cost. That’s especially true with taxis and ridersharing, which don’t have static, printed prices like public transport does, to help ensure you’re not getting ripped off. And when you’re trying to figure out which mode of transportation you should take, price is often an important factor in the pros and cons of each mode of transportation.

Ridesharing companies like Uber & Lyft have price calculators on their respective websites (here’s Uber‘s & here’s Lyft‘s), and you can usually find the price of public transportation in any given city with just a bit of Googling/Binging/Dogpiling/Yahooing, etc. (AltaVista, anyone? Anyone?) But taxis are a little harder because you may not know the name of the local taxi companies to look up, and even if they have a web page, they may not have a price calculator. So finding out how much a taxi will cost has often been a little bit of a surprise.

Until now.

Continue reading “How To Find Out How Much A Taxi Will Cost, Ahead of Time, While Traveling”

Dear SeaWorld: Why Do You Keep Shooting Yourself In The Foot?

As many of you may know, SeaWorld has not had a good few years. There was the Tilikum thing where a SeaWorld trainer was killed by a killer whale  (his stage name was Shamu but his real name was Tilikum). There was the Blackfish movie thing that claimed animals at SeaWorld are not treated well. There was the annual pass “EZ Pay” charging thing, where AP holders who paid for their passes via a monthly plan were automatically renewed and charged without consulting the pass holders. There’s the recent different daily parking charge mystery thing. And now there’s this.

Continue reading “Dear SeaWorld: Why Do You Keep Shooting Yourself In The Foot?”

Did SeaWorld Orlando’s Parking Fee Just Go Up By Nearly 50%? Yes. Sometimes.

Now this is an interesting new spin on pricing.

For a while now, Walt Disney World and Universal Studios have been playing with the price of park passes so they’re more expensive on more popular days; they call it “dynamic” pricing. SeaWorld Orlando has apparently decided to join the dynamic pricing game and pocket a little (or a lot!) extra money and, depending on the day, charge varying amounts for PARKING.

Yep, parking. Here’s what they’re doing.

Continue reading “Did SeaWorld Orlando’s Parking Fee Just Go Up By Nearly 50%? Yes. Sometimes.”