A Silicon Valley start up by the name Vayama launched today what it says is the industry’s only dedicated international travel Web site. It’s also claiming to offer the largest selection of international airlines, flight and fares.
Vayama, which incorporates Ajax technology, said it offers access to the flight inventory of airlines not previously available online as well as specific fare and route combinations. Examples of this include booking a trip on Iberia from New York to Rome, China Eastern from Los Angeles to Ho Chi Minh or Hawaiian Airlines from San Francisco to Sydney.
Features of Vayama include an interactive world map, 3-D seat maps, the ability to book flights to other cities and countries beyond the original destination, flight comparisons and a narrowing of search results based upon criteria such as total travel time or connecting airports.
Originally posted on June 6, 2007 @ 4:38 pm
Vayama is by far the worst company I have ever worked with. The customer service is horrible. It all looked great, thought I found a cheap flight from Phoenix to Lagos with only one stop. WRONG, there are two stops on the way to lagos they only show one. I thought I found something I could not get anywhere else. God forbid anything go wrong with your flight. They completely rely on emails and their seperate departments do not talk to each other aside from email. So any issue you have takes 24-48 hours to resolve. Oh did I mention they double charged us for the ticket and now say it will take 30-60 days for the credit. All in all you dont save enough on fare to make up for the horrible service you can expect to receive.
That seems odd. I was referred to vayama by a friend who does quite a bit of travelling. He said he was very pysched because he finally found one place to go on the net where you could consistently get good fares going overseas. I decided to give them a try, even though I always book with either Expedia or Orbitz. Sure enough, their fares rocked. I didn’t have any issues when I had to call them. They seem pretty normal and once an agent even called ME to tell me the change I requested went through. Maybe Julia just caught somebody having a bad day… or maybe my friend and I have been lucky. But I’ll defineately try them again (until my luck runs out!).
I would like to say that Vayama does offer good fares. However, their departments do not speak to each other and it is impossible to get things accomplished in a reasonable amount of time. I offer a seconding of the 24-48 hour problem. Had an issue myself, and ended up with a 200 dollar loss due to an error on their end.
If you have URGENT travel needs, this is not the site for you. If you have time to deal with potential issues, then their interface and prices are worth the trouble.
That’s my honest assessment.
Best,
BMH