Hotel Price Index - Hotels.com Press Room

20 years and still going strongOur company began life in 1991 when founders David Litmanand Robert Deiner began Hotel Reservations Network,providing discount hotel prices via a toll-free line in theUS. The first move onto the internet was in 1996 when thecompany became one of the early adopters of the newtechnology. The Hotels.com name appeared in 2002, thesame year that the first international site was launched in theUK, and we now have 85 localised sites globally, offering achoice of almost 140,000 hotels around the world rangingfrom five-star luxury properties to B&Bs.Throughout the years, we have continued to innovate to findways to keep improving the service we offer our customers.Here are a few of our latest enhancements.On the moveEarlier this year, we introduced twofree mobile apps for the iPhoneand Android and, since then,more than a million have beendownloaded. Available in more than30 languages, the apps allow usersto search and book our hotelsconveniently while on the moveand are used heavily by last-minutebookers. A similar app for Nokiasmart phones will be availableshortly. Other developments in themobile sector will follow.See the HPI when you searchOne site enhancement currently in development is theaptly-named Hotel Price Index function (see above) whichwill allow customers to see average room prices in a givendestination for accommodation up to 90 days in advance ofthe current date so they can more easily find a time to suittheir budget.It’s good to talkWe have been pioneering improvementsin our multi-lingual call centres, adding yetmore languages, introducing interactiveFAQs to most of our sites and pilotinglive chat in several of our markets to provide active help tocustomers during the booking process.