Tui sanctioned by advertising watchdog over £700 Las Vegas holiday cost hike 

The dynamic pricing of a Las Vegas holiday which saw the price rise by more than £700 has led to a Tui advert being banned.

 

The sanction from the advertising watchdog came after a consumer travel guide journalist complained that the price hike occurred during the checkout process online.

 

The holiday at the Caesars Palace hotel in Las Vegas had been advertised for £1,248.13 per person including a discount of £187.74 on the Tui website.

 

But the total price for two people rose from almost £2,500 to £3,216.88 with Tui informing the customer that the increase was due to the trip using flights from a third party airline.

 

The operator said at the time of the holiday listing on July 2 last year: “We receive the latest prices from the airline a few times each day but, the price might change when we come to request the actual seats. Your new total is shown in the holiday summary.”

 

The journalist challenged whether the original price and the associated promotional savings claim were misleading.

 

The Advertising Standards Authority, upholding the compliant, said Tui had been told “to ensure that advertised prices were based on genuine prices available to consumers”. 

 

The ASA added: “We also told them to take steps to reduce the likelihood of consumers being misled, for example, by describing prices that were subject to change as ‘from’ prices and stating when those prices were last updated.”

 

In its ruling, the ASA noted: “We understood that Tui believed an issue with a third-party flight provider caused the price increase between the price seen in the ad and the price on the booking page. 

 

“Nevertheless, they were responsible for taking reasonable steps to ensure their stated prices were genuine and did not mislead. 
 
“We understood that the ‘Inc £187.74 Total Discount’ claim reflected the difference between online and offline (in-store) pricing. 

 

“We considered, however, that the basis of this comparison was not made clear in the ad and it was also unclear how the reference price and associated savings claims featured in both ads had been calculated, given that the prices on Tui’s website were frequently subject to change. 
 
“For the above reasons, we considered that the price claim and associated promotional savings claim were misleading.”  

 

Tui said it could not retain or retrieve specific pricing data for July 2, 2025 “because of the volume of dynamic combinations and associated costs”. 

 

However, when reviewing its data, the operator identified a fare filing issue with a particular airline concerning the booking in question.

 

This was believed to have led to a discrepancy between the advertised price and the rate shown at booking stage to the complainant. Tui removed that airline from sale as part of its holiday packages until the issue was fixed. 

 

Referring to the advertised discount, the company explained that the online ‘discount’ reflected the difference between online and offline prices across all holidays on the Tui UK website. 

 

While it did not store data for July 2, 2025, Tui provided a screenshot to the ASA that showed the same Las Vegas holiday on October 20, 2025 with a higher offline price and a lower online price, which it believed reflected the discount. 

 

Tui pointed out that the wording “Price may update at checkout based on availability” to its hotel deals and summary pages had been included since 2023 to make it clearer to customers that prices may be subject to change. 

 

The company said that it offered both static and dynamic prices for holidays online. Where price changes occurred on Tui’s website, this would be because that holiday was priced dynamically. 

 

Many Tui holidays combined flights and accommodation sourced via a variety of third-party operators. Those prices were controlled by suppliers and updated at different times of day. Tui stored those prices to return search results and refreshed prices for dynamic holidays at least four times a day, with some flight components updated hourly and some once a day, the ASA was told.

 

This allowed consumers visiting the Tui website to generate holiday price and availability search results in a timely manner. 

 

“When customers moved through the booking journey the system checked the latest live prices, which meant the total could go down or up before booking,” Tui explained.
 
“In response to the specific ad in question, Tui said a notification would alert consumers that the price of a holiday had gone up or down since Tui last updated their system and it would appear before a customer completed their booking, which allowed consumers to decide whether or not to make a booking for that particular holiday,” the operator told the ASA.