I Would Like To Name My Own Price & Not Get Trip Insurance Automatically, Priceline

Alli says she’s stumbled upon something she thinks is new on Priceline — when she named her own price for a , $25 worth of trip insurance was included with no opting out screen. Of course, Priceline doesn’t announce clearly that this is going to happen, instead just hiding it in the Terms of Service agreement.

While there is a “no thank you,” box for travel insurance when booking a flight or hotel without going through “Name Your Own Price,” Alli says the $25 add-on is just automatically included with NYOP.

She then had to go through a long phone process with customer service to get the charges removed, which was done without question. And now she just wants to warn her fellow travelers.

I attempted to recreate a new name your own price hotel reservation again just to make sure I hadn’t screwed up, and it did indeed include the $20 insurance fee with no way of opting out. The guy who reversed my charges appeared to be familiar with the issue and when I questioned him as to whether this was a policy change he hemmed and hawed and said maybe it was a computer problem but they’re reversing my charge so why was I worried?

I’m worried about everyone else who didn’t notice that they got hit with this charge! I almost didn’t notice it myself and I’m pretty meticulous about these things. Hope this tip helps some others!

UPDATE: Alli’s wish to warn others is a good one — however, a rep for Priceline commented, saying:

Priceline does not, and never has charged a customer for trip insurance on a flight unless they proactively click that they want it. You can see for yourself on the website that the box is not checked.

As for why a customer service rep would’ve said it was a familiar problem, we’ve reached out to Alli for more details. She also commented on this Fatwallet thread, where others had experienced the same problem.

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