About Expedia

Expedia is an online travel agency that allows users to book flights, hotels, car rentals, and other travel-related services. It is one of the largest travel agencies in the world, with over 200 million customers in over 70 countries. Expedia Local Expert (Expedia Activities / Things to do) is a division of Expedia that specializes in tours, activities, and attractions. Expedia brands include Hotels.com, Travelocity, Orbitz, Hotwire and many more.

Connection Capabilities

Expedia supports:
Availability. Availability on Expedia will be synced with Ventrata, however note Expedia will only check availability for tour times created in their system. To offer new tours, you must create them and Expedia and repeat product mapping process.
Booking. Pending Bookings, Bookings, and Cancellations made on Expedia, will be automatically made in Ventrata. Ventrata ticket (QRcode or barcode) will be issued with Expedia customer voucher. Expedia cannot pull PDF vouchers from Ventrata.
Pricing. Your product pricing (retail prices) on Expedia will be synced with Ventrata every 24 hours. To disable this functionality, or inquire about increased frequency, please contact connectivity@ventrata.com and lxapi@expedia.com. Along with the retail prices, Expedia may update product ticket categories and applicable age ranges for each based on data in your Ventrata system.

Expedia doesn't support:
Content. Expedia doesn't pull product content from Ventrata. You need to create your products and manage their content manually via Expedia's Partner Central.
Mapping. Expedia product mapping requires assistance from Expedia team. Allow for additional time. See Mapping Products.
Promotions. Expedia cannot automatically pull applicable promotions from Ventrata. Please see Other: Promotions and Expedia connection.

Setting up the Connection

You must have a supplier account with Expedia with the products your wish them to sell created. Visit https://join.localexpertpartnercentral.com/signup to create a new account or login to Expedia's Partner Central to manage your existing account.

Note Expedia Local Expert is not currently accepting new suppliers into the program, but continues targeted outreach to select key suppliers. Additionally, if you partner with GetYourGuide or Viator, your products may appear on Expedia channels thanks to partnership between the companies.

Create Expedia Reseller in Ventrata. If you haven't yet, create Expedia as a Reseller and configure it's settings (band, commission, products, etc.).
Create a Connection in Ventrata. In your Ventrata Dashboard, go to Connections > Connections, then click + New Connection and select Expedia from the list of available options. Set the connection Name, link the Reseller created in Step 1, and click Create Connection. If necessary, you may also whitelist/blacklist destinations or products you wish this connection to have access to. Proceed to product mapping as described in the section below.

Mapping Products

Note Ventrata cannot automatically pull list of products/listings in your Expedia account. Every time you make changes to your Expedia products, you'll need to repeat the steps below.

Request Mapping CSV file from Expedia. Email lxapi@expedia.com or your Expedia account manager and request the mapping CSV for your Expedia Supplier account (a.k.a. supplier branch).
Map products in Ventrata Connection. In your Ventrata Dashboard, go to Connections > Connections, then select your Expedia connection from the list of created connections (see section above). Using the upload button provided, upload the mapping CSV received from Expedia. Rows highlighted in red indicate the options and times that need to be mapped to a product / option / tour in Ventrata. To map, click on the row, then select Ventrata Product (and, if applicable, Option and Tour) you wish this Expedia listing to be connected to, and click Update Mapping. If mapping was updated successfully, the row will no longer be highlighted in red.
Notify Expedia. Contact lxapi@expedia.com or your Expedia account manager to notify them that you have completed mapping products in Ventrata send them back the same CSV file you received from them in Step 1.

Troubleshooting

Issue	Solution
Cannot find the product I'm looking for on the list of products when mapping.	Make sure the product is whitelisted for the Connection, Reseller and/or Reseller Band linked to it, and check if the Product is made available to Direct API channel.
A specific Expedia listing/product isn't listed in Ventrata connection	Request new mapping CSV from Expedia. Ventrata cannot automatically pull list of products from Expedia
A specific tour time is available in Ventrata, but not on Expedia	Check if you have this tour time created on Expedia. Expedia only checks availability for tour times created in their system
I changed pricing in Ventrata, but Expedia price is incorrect	By default Expedia only syncs pricing from Ventrata every 24 hours. Please wait for 24 hours. Contact Expedia or Ventrata if issue persists

Experiencing other issues? Reach out to Ventrata Support.

Other: Promotions and Expedia connection

Expedia does not support automatically pulling promotions from Ventrata. Even if you configure a promotion applicable to Expedia reseller in Ventrata, non-promotional pricing will be returned to Expedia via API, but any bookings in Ventrata will be recorded with the applicable promotion. To offer a promotion on Expedia and avoid pricing inaccuracies between the systems:
Create Expedia-applicable promotion in Ventrata. See Promotions for more.
Create promotion on Expedia, exactly matching Ventrata promotion. Ensure promotional applies to all visitors. Setting up member-only / multi-item purchasers only promotions will result in booking data inaccuracy as information on member-only / multi-item purchasers bookings isn't shared over API. See Expedia Promotions for more.

Updated on: 03/01/2024