New Partnership Lets Travelers Book Expedia Hotels with Bitcoin

Crypto payments for travel bookings just got another option as the crypto-friendly travel booking service Travala.com integrated hotels offered by booking giant Expedia on its site.

The site’s users will be able to book hotels and accommodations from Expedia through Travala.com’s platform, using an API offered by Expedia Partner Solutions (EPS), one of the brands of Expedia Group, Travala.com said today.

Today’s news also marks a turnaround for Expedia, which in mid-2018 said it had disabled a bitcoin (BTC) payment option from its website, after having offered it as part of a partnership with Coinbase since 2014.

Now, the selection for travelers reportedly covers more than 700,000 Expedia Group hotels, which through the new partnership can be booked and paid for with more than 30 cryptoassets.

Among the cryptoassets Travala.com allows purchases in are BTC, ethereum (ETH), binance coin (BNB), and Travala.com’s own token AVA.

Commenting on the new partnership with Travala.com, Senior Vice President at Expedia Group, Alfonso Paredes, said that providing more payment choices is of importance to the company, saying “At EPS we are passionate about innovation and recognize that booking and payment choice continues to evolve in a fast-changing world.”

Meanwhile, Travala.com’s CEO and co-founder, Juan Otero, stressed that their own usage data shows that “the desire for travel is returning, with an 81% increase in room nights booked and website traffic up 50% week-on-week.”

The news of the new partnership comes after Travala.com in May this year announced a merger with the Binance-backed flight booking portal TravelbyBit. According to the announcement back then, the two companies will for now continue to operate separate services, but will cross-market one another’s travel offerings, while at a later date fully integrate with each other and create a “large online travel agency.”