Joining CheapAir and Expedia in offering hotel bookings for Bitcoin, Travgenius differs in one significant way: their bookings are for businesses only. Travgenius uses the B2B (business-to-business) moniker to advertise below-average prices for hotel packages that are booked in bulk.
A Travgenius employee attempted to court the Bitcoin subreddit by announcing that their iOS app — which takes BTC for nearly 600,000 hotel options — has been released and is up for improvement suggestions. He also reported that an Android app should be shipped within a month.
Using Travgenius's services is for “members only.” A site representative explains:
“Because of our great prices, we are not allowed to display [prices] ‘openly to the public’. Most of our rates are wholesale only and therefore we need to secure the site against unauthorized access.”
Though their exact rates were unavailable for viewing, Travgenius reports that approximately 80% of their members' price offers are below average due to Travgenius's lack of advertising costs. Their employees based in Sofia, Moscow and Manila are willing to book everything from hostels to luxury resorts.
Of interest will be how much business groups spend their bitcoins versus single travelers. CheapAir reported in summer 2014 that they'd “significantly surpassed initial expectations” by processing over US$1.5 million in BTC bookings. Expedia reported a similar findings, telling CoinDesk:
“We did some estimates based on the size of Overstock and the size of Expedia, and came up with our own estimates of what we could expect, and we're meeting and exceeding those."