Roger has been burned three times this year by car rental companies. Then he read our recent article about Budget’s smoking charges and he says he knows what he’ll do if it ever happens to him again.

“Thank you for being an advocate for travelers,” he says. “It is reassuring to see what can be done.”

Roger reads my column in The Everett Herald in Everett, Washington. But the column would not be possible without your support. Thank you for reading, Roger — and for the kind words.

You can help support our cause by participating in our fall fundraiser. We’ve already raised 10% of the funds we need to keep operating for the next three months. Please consider making a tax-deductible donation today.

Catch up on the latest stories from the Elliott Report

Travelers are facing more entry and exit fees than ever. Here’s what you need to know.
New Zealand charged Brian Clark about $70 to enter before he’d booked a room, Britain has raised the price of its entry permit twice since launch and the United States nearly doubled its own fee to $40.27. Fake government portals now outrank the real ones in search results, and the colleague who clicked the first result paid a markup for the same 72-hour wait.

These 7 phrases will doom your consumer complaint
A reader who said she’d been injured on a shopping trip answered our offer of help with a line of profanity, and her case went into the F-Files. Four other phrases turn up weekly in complaint letters, including a demand for pain and suffering that the Supreme Court foreclosed for international passengers in 1991.

Honest pricing works in travel. Just ask Airbnb.
U.S. airlines collected $2.1 billion in checked bag fees in the second quarter alone, and the industry says a fare that includes the bag and the seat would confuse travelers and push prices up. Airbnb moved to all-in pricing in April 2025 and its revenue rose 17% last quarter.

How Queenstown, New Zealand, is creating a greener adventure capital
Shotover Jet has built a prototype electric jet boat and can’t get it light enough to deliver the 360-degree spins its customers pay for. Charging a fleet would draw a megawatt on a river that floods up to 16 times a year, and the Ngāi Tahu iwi that owns the operation has told it to move off fossil fuel anyway.

My GE washer is a heavy metal drummer, but I didn’t buy tickets to the show
Six months after installation, a $1,856 GE Spacemaker washer still bangs into the walls of Laura Bartholomew’s Ventura, Calif., laundry room on every spin cycle. Five technicians ran controlled tests with no water or with four matching towels, reported the machine was working properly, and GE closed her case.

My tour operator promised a price lock — and then broke it
Michael Hughes prepaid a Spain and Portugal tour 10 months early under Overseas Adventure Travel’s Good Buy program, which advertises protection from cost increases. After Air France canceled his flight, OAT billed him $670 more and gave him two conflicting explanations for the charge.

When your Daryl Hall concert is canceled but the refund is out of touch
Robert Logan paid $489 for a pair of StubHub tickets to a Daryl Hall show in Denver, and after Hall canceled it he called six times and got the same promise to escalate the refund in four or five days. His bank turned him down too, saying the Fair Credit Billing Act’s 60-day window had closed because he bought the tickets in June.

Annie Valades is taking her family to Krakow for five days right after Christmas, and the reviews she’s read look promising enough that she’s now trying to fill the days. She’s asking members what deserves a morning in the old town, what to order and which side trips have to be booked ahead. Where would you send her? Here’s our team’s advice on Backchannel.