Can anyone tell me how Hotwire calculates "Tax recovery charges + fees"? For example, I was looking at booking a hotel on their site in Incline Village, NV. I know its the Hyatt because it is the only 4 star property in that specific area. The "retail" rate is $179 and Hyatt confirmed that there is a 13% tax on hotel rooms. So the taxes are $179*0.13 or $23.27. This is what the Hyatt web site says as well as Hotwire's non opaque pricing for this hotel. When I look at their "Hot Rate" opaque listing, the quoted rate is $85 but the "Tax recovery charges + fees" are $20.65 instead of the expected $11 ($85*0.13)! Thats %17.55 of the quoted rate. In addition, the Hotwire site states and Hyatt confirms that the taxes paid should be based on the discounted base rate (the rate hotwire pays for the room), so in theory it should be even lower. I got stonewalled hard when I called Hotwire customer service and asked how their fees work. They told me that the "Tax recovery charges + fees" are given to them by the hotel, and they don't have any influence. They explicitly denied adding booking fees to that number. But clearly that is not the case here. Are they stuffing their booking fee/commission in this "+ fees" part of the price? What accounts for the difference? thanks!
