Peer to peer accommodation specialist iStopOver isn't going full-throttle into flash sales, but will begin offering Daily Deals with a twist.
iStopOver plans to pick a new Daily Deal city each day beginning Sept. 1 and will offer 50% to 80% off its booking fees for all reservations for that city on that day.
The Toronto-based company, founded in 2009, usually charges 15% booking fees and this can run into substantial monies.
For example, the booking fee for a seven-night stay at this one-bedroom in a Manhattan townhouse might be $129 for a couple in addition to the $861 base rate for the week.
So, if iStopOver decides to offer a 50% discount on its booking fee for reservations booked in New York City that day, then the savings would be around $65 for the one-bedroom above.
An 80% discount on the $129 booking fee would be around $103 off on the booking fee.
(Of course, we'll have to see the fine print on the discounts when the program is unveiled Sept. 1 to see if there are certain caps on discounts in the terms and conditions.)
iStopOver offers accommodations in about 14,500 cities in 92 countries and will be posting its Daily Deals on booking fees from its Facebook page, Twitter account and website, says Anthony Lipschitz, CEO.
Referring to "so much noise" in the daily deals arena, Lipschitz says iStopOver is not jumping on that bandwagon by offering steep discounts on the base rate of accommodations, but wants to gives its "loyal customer base" a "bonus" in the form of a discount on booking fees.
The Daily Deals are designed to boost the company's social media presence, as well.
On other issues, Lipschitz claims negative publicity about competitor Airbnb concerning an incident where a host's apartment got trashed has not impacted iStopOver.
Lipschitz acknowledges that peer to peer sites such as iStopOver and Airbnb present "inherent risks."
To help blunt those risks, iStopOver has offered host and guest insurance since around the time of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa from CSA Travel Protection for hosts in North America only and from World Nomads for guests globally.
iStopOver also offers security systems for hosts from SafeMart.
In addition, iStopOver doesn't transfer guest payments to hosts until 24 hours after check-in and the guest has provided the host with a security code, Lipschitz says.