Ratepunk Review
Ratepunk Hotel Rates/Prices Compared Chrome Extension Review – If you’re like us, you’re always on the lookout for the best travel deals when booking hotels. But how can you make the search for these hotel deals less cumbersome? Install Ratepunk – a FREE browser extension scanning algorithms & comparing hotel prices live.
RATEPUNK Newest Feature, Dec 2022 :
Released December 2022, RatePunk’s users will have the possibility to try out a free rewards program that earns reward points towards cashback on eligible hotel bookings. “When you book at participating providers with the RatePunk browser extension, you can get a chance to earn points on your purchase.”
What does this mean? Every time you book with Cashback activated, you will get awarded RatePunk coins, and the amount of it will depend on the complete booking value,” said one of the Ratepunk CEOs, Justin Albertynas.
Every user will get 10 free coins just for joining the RatePunk cashback: 5 for creating an account and another 5 for activating it. When a benchmark of 100 coins is reached, the $10 cashback can be redeemed. “This upgrade will allow our users to earn money by using a free tool, and that’s something the travel industry hasn’t seen before,” added Justin. The CEO also mentioned even more news, such as rebooking and review aggregation available on the extension coming in 2023.
Creating your Ratepunk account adds 10 RatePunk Coins to your account and you gain extra coins each time you book a hotel.
The amount of coins you receive depends on the total value of the booking.
Earn RatePunk coins and exchange them with real money!
What is Ratepunk?
Ratepunk is a new browser extension in the market that actually helps solve the problem of looking for travel accommodation deals in the easiest way possible. It can be downloaded on all top internet browsers: Google Chrome, Safari, and even Firefox. It’s also available on your iPhone: you can install it from the App Store.
Let’s take a look at how Ratepunk works. Basically, you search for travel accommodation directly on your favorite travel booking site, and Ratepunk works in the background to search for the best hotel deals for you, comparing the rates across all the major & most popular hotel booking websites. Booking.com, Expedia, Agoda, Priceline, Hotels.com, Trip.com, Orbitz, Seathustler, Trivago, Travelocity – Ratepunk compares the prices from them all.
And to make it even better, taxes are also included in their computation, so the price you see is the FINAL PRICE. That way, you don’t need to worry about surprising top-ups on the price later on during your booking process.
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How to use Ratepunk on your Computer Browser
Step 1:
Search for Ratepunk in Chrome Web Store, Safari Store, Firefox Store, or get it for your iPhone in the App Store. You will already see how the extension gets a lot of views, installs & positive reviews in the Chrome Web Store – a good sign! Install the extension.
Step 2:
Once Ratepunk has been activated in your chosen browser or your iPhone, you can go to your favorite hotel booking site and start searching for your next hotel accommodation.
From the hotel search results, you can either click the Ratepunk compare button or click your hotel of choice.
Step 3:
Let Ratepunk work its own magic & show you the cheapest option. The Ratepunk Web Extension will appear while on the hotel page to show you prices for that specific property across various hotel booking sites. From there, you can find the best site to book the property you like, getting the best deal / lowest price for your stay!
The only thing left for you to do is choose the best deal for your chosen accommodation! It will lead you to the same hotel & the same dates, just on another booking website, so you can finish your booking in seconds.
Looking at another example below, let’s open the Sur Beach Hotel Boracay. You’ll see Ratepunk loading the FINAL BOOKING PRICES of the property across various hotel booking sites.
On the next image, we confirm that Seathustler shows the correct final price shown in Ratepunk app.
How to use Ratepunk on your Mobile (Currently Available for iOS Devices)
Ratepunk is available on iOS devices at the moment, working directly with the Safari browser (hopefully on Android one day).
See screenshots before on how to use it on mobile.
Step 1:
Get the Ratepunk App from Appstore. Install it, enable it for Safari, and in Safari Settings (click the double aA on the top of the browser), set it to Always Allow.
Step 2:
Now you’re ready to use Ratepunk. Just search for a hotel on your favorite booking site (we chose Booking in this example).
Step 3:
Once you are in the property of your choice, Ratepunk will automatically work in the background, and let you know if the property is available on other booking sites for a better deal.
In this example, our chosen hotel is cheaper in Agoda.
Once inside Agoda, we can confirm the prices.
Ratepunk in Action: Ratepunk found the BEST Hotel deals
We tested Ratepunk to see if they can really find the CHEAPEST deals when it comes to hotels we wanted to stay in.
In the next two examples below, we originally used Booking for our hotel search. Ratepunk found CHEAPER deals for two hotels, saving us not only the time to search these deals but significant money.
EXAMPLE 1:
In this example, you’ll see Ratepunk showing that prices from Agoda and Seathustler were cheaper.
We then go to Agoda (the best rate in the example) to confirm if the prices showed by Ratepunk are guaranteed. Not only was Ratepunk able to show us the cheapest deal for this property on the dates of our choice, loading Agoda gave us even cheaper prices – best steal ever! 44% savings on hotels in this example.
EXAMPLE 2:
In this image above, you can see that Ratepunk computed the final booking price, INCLUDING 12% on taxes. This means Ratepunk shows the final booking price, no surprises when you’re about to pay the booking. This helps you make the best choice among all these prices.
Is Comparing Prices All That Ratepunk does?
Even though it might seem like that’s all, Ratepunk makes sure you’re getting the cheapest hotel price by more than checking different booking websites. It also checks their algorithms, scans IP addresses (because price often depends on the location you’re booking from) & double-checks the prices with loyalty programs. It leaves almost no place for the booking websites to scam you.
Ratepunk: Browser Safety
One of the most important aspects on installing browser extensions (well basically downloading and installing anything from the internet), is safety. Will Ratepunk collect any private information from you, like your credit card information?
While we cannot secure you 100% about internet safety, we did our best to investigate and see how you can protect yourself and make sure any browser extension you’re installing is safe. And to see if Ratepunk is safe to install and use.
Luckily, Google Chrome gives you a rating for its Chrome extensions. Google Chrome gives badges to Extensions that can secure your safety.
In the image above, you can see that Ratepunk has 2 badges from Google Chrome Extensions: the Established Publisher Badge and the Featured Badge.
Established Publisher Badge – Google Chrome Extension
This badge means that Ratepunk is deemed by Google as an established publisher, following all of its developer policies, and has gone through identity verification with Google. This badge is awarded by Google with a checkmark next to its website, under the Extension name.
Featured Badge
The Chrome Featured Badge, shown as a blue ribbon icon under the Extension name, next to the title Featured is given by Google to extensions that follow Google’s technical best practices and meet a high standard of user experience and design. This also means that Google itself has reviewed the application, not just any third-party software.
So does this mean Ratepunk is safe to use?
We’re really glad that Google puts a huge effort into making sure they have guarantees on safe browsing and extension usage.
If you want to learn more about what Ratepunk collects from you, you’ll find their privacy information here.
Ratepunk, despite being new to the market is already used by 8000+ users just for Google Chrome, is very highly rated, and a quick search on the company shows public information about Ratepunk’s CEO with a public company profile on Linkedin.
Ratepunk Pros
Ratepunk definitely screams all pros for us. It’s just amazing how you can book on one site and get updated prices on all other booking sites at the same time, basically removing all the research time for you. Efficient and easier to get those top hotel deals!
Also, Ratepunk uses different languages: English, Spanish, German, Italian and French – so if you’re booking and using a different language, you’ll find the extension very easy to use and understand!
Ratepunk also supports multiple currencies, which automatically adapt to your location.
An important note regarding browser search safety: While people tend to think browser extensions aren’t safe and will be tracking everything and hacking users’ laptops – it’s a common myth. Ratepunk extension doesn’t collect any sensitive user data, including credit card info, email address, name & surname, etc. It’s simply a technology to expand your possibility of getting the lowest price on the market – making your hotel research fast and a favorable experience for you.
We all know how tedious it can be to compare hotel prices among several booking sites, and the surprise you often get when you choose a property and see added taxes. Ratepunk removes all that trouble for you.
Ratepunk Cons
So far, the only con we see is if you’re not using Google Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or your mobile system is Android. We definitely suggest considering getting access to one of these, even just for this purpose – again, only if you’re open to that option!
Trying Ratepunk for your next hotel deals search? Share your most significant saving with us, we’re curious! Safe travels everyone