Cashback on a trip sounds simple: you click, you book, and you get part of the money back later. In practice there are weeks or months between the click and the credit, and a few places where things can go wrong. Here is the whole path as it runs between TripPrice and daily cashback, and where you should keep an eye on it yourself.
Who does what
TripPrice compares the costs around a trip and shows you which provider you can book with. The cashback itself comes from daily cashback, where you have a free account that shows your bookings and, later, your balance. You always book and pay with the travel provider directly, never with us.
The process in five steps
- Look at the provider. The provider page says whether cashback is possible, in what form, and which conditions the provider names. Read those lines before you search.
- Go through the button. The button opens the provider's site with a partner link. That is how the provider can tell you came through the portal.
- Search and book in the same window. Stay in the browser on that site until you have paid. Switching to a comparison site or an app halfway can void the click.
- Pending. Shortly after you book, the booking shows in your cashback account as pending. Pending only means the provider has reported it. It is not yet a balance you can use.
- Confirmed. Once the provider closes the booking as valid, the pending entry becomes confirmed. For a trip that normally happens after the trip has ended, because only then is it certain that it took place.
Why it takes so long
A hotel reports the stay after check-out, a car rental company after the return, an airline after the flight. If you book in January for August, half a year lies between click and confirmation. That is not a fault in the portal, it is the provider's timetable. Note the end date of your trip and look at the account again after it.
What happens with cancellations and changes
If the booking is cancelled, the cashback is gone. That includes the free cancellation many hotels offer: you pay nothing, but you get nothing back either. With a change it depends on the provider. Some keep the booking number, others create a new one, and then the link to your click may be lost. Ask before you change whether the number stays, and keep both the old and the new number. If cashback is missing later, support can help most quickly with both numbers in hand.
Voucher conflicts
The most common stumbling block is a discount code from a voucher site. It can tell the provider that the booking did not come from the portal, and then the cashback is not counted. Whether that applies to your provider is in its cashback conditions. Our guide Voucher or cashback shows how to weigh the two routes against each other. Codes that the provider itself puts into your account are usually harmless, but read the conditions on that too.
What the cashback is based on
It is usually calculated on the price of the service itself: the room, the car or the ticket. Taxes, fees at the destination and extras such as insurance often do not count. For your own sums that means: do not take the full amount you pay as the base, take the part the provider lists as the travel price. An example with made-up numbers: if 80 EUR of a 900 EUR total is taxes and fees, at most 820 EUR counts.
A short checklist before you book
- You have read the provider's cashback conditions.
- Your ad blocker is off for the booking site, and you book in a browser rather than an app.
- You have not entered an outside discount code where the conditions rule it out.
- You have saved the confirmation email and the booking number.
- You have noted the end of the trip so you know when to look.
Read more on daily cashback: Travel Cashback: Hotels, Flights and Car Rentals and How Long Cashback Takes and How Payout Works.