Before You Buy a Vacation Package in 2026: Hotels Must Show the Total Price. Airlines' Bag-Fee Rule Got Rolled Back.

On July 2, 2026, the FTC announced a $35 million proposed settlement with the travel app Hopper.

Here's what it says Hopper did. The booking screen showed a total price and a Swipe to Book button. It pre-selected Tip and VIP Support fees that you could only see by scrolling.

Many VIP buyers couldn't reach an agent at all, or waited a long time. The Price Freeze fee wasn't applied to the booking as promised.

And the FTC says an employee wrote: we're tricking users.

It also alleged violations of the lodging fees rule for bookings since May 12, 2025. That looks like the first lodging-rule violation in an FTC release we found. Hopper agreed to a proposed order. A court has to approve it.

The total price used to be a number sellers chose to show. For hotels, it's now the law.

Here's the rule. The FTC's total-price rule for short-term lodging took effect May 12, 2025. It covers hotels, motels, inns and vacation rentals.

What it requires:

• Mandatory charges must be in the total price shown.
• Optional charges, government charges and shipping can be left out, but must be disclosed before you agree to pay.
• The rule doesn't cap, ban or prohibit the charging of any fees.

The FTC says a hotel fee isn't optional if the hotel will charge it unless the guest challenges it.

So a resort fee can still exist. It just can't hide.

How big is it? The only dollar figure we could retrieve was a national average of $42.41 a night, about 11 percent of the nightly cost. That's from Forbes in February 2023, as cited by Wikipedia. It's stale.

States moved on resort fees first. Per Wikipedia's summary:

• November 2021: a Pennsylvania settlement with Marriott
• May 2023: a Texas settlement with Marriott
• August 2023: a Texas suit against Booking Holdings
• September 2023: a multistate settlement with Choice Hotels
• July 2024: California's law, SB 478, took effect

A package is a prepaid bet on dates, a carrier and a hotel, sold as one price.

Here's the same trip on the calculator above. Two travelers at an advertised $1,000 each:

That's 27.1 percent more than the ad. Add Cancel For Any Reason and it's about $2,617, or 30.9 percent more. The $1,000 is a placeholder, not a market average.

Prices are moving too. The September 2026 consumer price index, released October 14, shows these changes from a year earlier:

• Airline fares: up 22.4 percent
• Public transportation: up 15.6 percent
• Car and truck rental: up 9.1 percent
• Lodging away from home: up 4.4 percent
• Motor fuel: up 34.9 percent
• All items: up 3.7 percent

Bag fees:

Southwest's Choice Extra fares check two bags free. It lists a $0 change fee for Choice fares.

Travelers with only carry-on bags skip $180 in bag fees on a round trip for two. That's 2 x $45 x 2, our math.

How do you save? Price the pieces yourself and compare all-in totals. We found no verified figure for how much a package saves against separate booking. A package wins when its all-in total is lower and its refund terms are no worse. Doing it yourself wins when the package hides the hotel or the fare class.

Basic Economy rules vary by airline, and the summaries we found were partly dated, from April 2019. Read each airline's current page.

Two federal rules moved in opposite directions this year.

Refunds held. The Department of Transportation's automatic refund rule is in force. An airline that is the merchant of record must automatically refund airfare, taxes and ancillary fees when it cancels or significantly changes a flight and you decline the alternative.

Significant means:

• 3 hours or more on a domestic flight
• 6 hours or more on an international flight
• A different airport
• More connections
• A downgrade

Refunds are due within 7 business days for credit card purchases and 20 calendar days for cash, check, debit or other payments. The carrier can't keep a processing fee.

You also get a refund of a checked-bag fee if the bag is lost or significantly delayed and you file a mishandled baggage report. The delay thresholds are 12 hours domestic and 15 hours international, up to 30 hours on longer segments.

Two limits matter:

• It covers airline-caused cancellations, not your own change of plans.
• A voucher can replace a refund only if the carrier states your right to a refund and the voucher stays valid at least 5 years. Silence isn't acceptance.

A July 7, 2026 notice pauses enforcement through July 7, 2027 when a flight is only renumbered. DOT is working on a rule defining cancellation.

There's also a 24-hour rule. For a booking made a week or more before departure, carriers must allow a hold or cancellation without penalty for 24 hours. The text names carriers, not ticket agents.

Fee display didn't. On February 3, 2026, the full Fifth Circuit vacated DOT's 2024 fee-transparency rule in Airlines for America v. DOT. On July 2, DOT's final rule removed the 2024 requirements, which included early display of bag fees in search results. It restored the 2011 standard. That says to tell shoppers on the first fare screen that extra bag fees may apply, and where to find them, and to list optional fees on the airline's site.

A July 1 proposal would go further. It would let fare components be shown as prominently as the total price, which could weaken the full-fare rule. The comment deadline was extended to August 21. DOT's final action isn't known.

Two more facts. There's no federal cash compensation for delays. DOT withdrew its December 2024 proposal on November 17, 2025. And an April 24, 2026 rule requires a one-page passenger rights document.

A nonrefundable ticket sounds safe until the airline stops flying.

Spirit Airlines stopped flying on May 2, 2026, according to Wikipedia's summary of CNN, AP and The New York Times reports. All scheduled flights were canceled. It blamed higher fuel costs.

CBS reported that bondholders had rejected a $500 million federal aid package, and that experts expected higher fares. Other airlines offered discounted rescue fares.

Where you bought the ticket decides who owes you the refund.

Here's the part that matters to you. Tickets bought directly from Spirit were to be refunded automatically. Tickets bought through third-party sites followed separate refund processes.

That tracks DOT's rules. When an agent is the merchant of record, the airline has to tell the agent whether you qualify and send the funds. But the agent still handles your refund.

We couldn't open DOT's own release on Spirit. It returned an access error.

So book direct if you may change plans. An agency can win on price or bundles. Confirm how it handles refunds first.

There are record problems at agencies. Wikipedia reports Expedia's pandemic refund delays and hold times led to many lawsuits, and a 2016 hotel class action over false sold-out labels settled in April 2021.

And your card is the backstop:

• File a billing error notice within 60 days of the first bill with the error.
• The issuer must acknowledge within 30 days and resolve within 90.
• Liability for unauthorized charges is capped at $50.

Check the merchant of record on your card statement. Refunds run through that name.

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners says travel insurance usually costs about 5 to 10 percent of the trip price.

Cancel For Any Reason adds close to 50 percent to the insurance cost. It reimburses 50 to 75 percent of the trip, not all of it.

What the NAIC lists as common exclusions:

• Pre-existing conditions
• Pandemics
• Civil unrest
• Risky activities

The conditions to qualify for Cancel For Any Reason: buy within a set time, insure the full trip cost, and cancel at least 48 hours before departure.

Some cancellation fee waivers sold alongside aren't insurance, and states don't oversee them.

Here's some scale. Trip cancellation, interruption and delay made up 94.7 percent of products bought. Americans spent nearly $5.56 billion on travel protection in 2022 to 2024, up 46 percent from 2019. And 38 states had enacted the NAIC's Travel Insurance Model Act as of April 2026.

On a $2,000 trip, insurance at 5 to 10 percent is $100 to $200. Cancel For Any Reason brings it to roughly $150 to $300. That's our estimate.

Pay it when the trip is large, nonrefundable and tied to dates you can't move. Skip it when lodging is refundable and the airline's refund rights cover what you fear.

We couldn't verify airline failure coverage. Ask any insurer in writing about scheduled airline financial default.

And regular health plans and Medicare may not cover care overseas, according to the NAIC. See the health insurance guide, and the insurance guide for the rest.

On rental cars, the damage waiver is not technically an insurance product, according to the Insurance Information Institute. Your personal auto policy may already cover a rental. Credit card coverage is usually secondary.

A free hotel night can come with a sales presentation.

The FTC describes the pattern. A gift or a free meal, then pressure to buy right then and there. Ask about annual fees, booking limits and resale.

The cost of getting out can be worse. A federal court ordered Christopher Carroll on March 30, 2026 to pay $140 million, a $95 million refund to consumers plus a $45 million civil penalty. The FTC announced it on April 20 and said his timeshare-exit scheme took more than $90 million, mostly from older adults, through mail and in-person pitches.

For the deeper dive, read the timeshare guide.

Then the scams that follow disruption:

• Fake customer service. The FTC warned on July 25, 2024 that scammers watch social media for travelers posting about delays and pose as airline customer service to steal data. Use the airline's own app, website or phone.
• Fake rental listings. The FTC counts about $65 million lost across nearly 65,000 reports since 2020. About half of the reports in the 12 months to June 2025 traced to a fake Facebook ad.
• The big picture. Reported fraud losses in 2025 were about $16 billion, 25 percent above 2024. Imposter scams were $3.5 billion.
• The FBI's count. For 2025, real estate fraud, which includes rental and timeshare fraud, was 12,368 complaints and $275,110,419 in losses. Non-payment and non-delivery was $503,373,587.

The FTC's Impersonation Rule has been in effect since April 1, 2024. We found no FBI or FTC figures for fake hotel or booking sites alone.

One state check. California requires sellers of travel to register. It says registration does not constitute approval. We verified only California.

A rental car is where a small charge turns into a big one.

Here's the case people cite. After a 2022 court order forced disclosure, Wikipedia reports Hertz had reported about 3,365 customers a year to police as thieves. That's 0.014 percent of 25 million U.S. transactions. Hertz settled 364 claims for about $168 million by December 2022. That's secondary reporting.

Typical charges when a car comes back damaged: repair cost, administrative fees, loss of use and diminished value.

So before you rent:

• Check what your auto policy and your card cover.
• Photograph the car at pickup.
• Ask about fuel plans, tolls and supplemental coverage.

We found no verified waiver prices, so we won't print any.

Rental car prices rose 9.1 percent from a year earlier in September.

We found no dated booking-window data for flights or hotels. Treat anyone who sounds sure as someone to check.

What we do know:

• Fares are up 22.4 percent from a year ago.
• The Atlantic hurricane season runs June 1 to November 30, peaking around September 10. On October 19, the National Hurricane Center listed no active Atlantic cyclone, and NOAA kept a below-normal outlook.
• The 24-hour rule gives you a free reversal on a flight booked a week or more ahead.

For cruises, we couldn't retrieve current gratuity, service-charge or drink-package prices from a primary page. Add the extras yourself: onboard gratuities, drinks, excursions and flights. Then compare.

And on the fine print of any package, the FTC's lodging rule defines total price but we couldn't confirm how it treats bundles. Ask for the itemization.

Six rules. Each one comes from the cases above.

We read the Federal Register, the FTC's and DOT's releases, the NAIC's travel insurance page, the airlines' fee pages and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. We checked them on October 19, 2026. Several items come from Wikipedia summaries or news reports, and we say so where we use them.

The pages we used:

• The FTC's lodging fees rule
• The FTC on the Hopper settlement
• DOT's airline fee disclosure rule
• DOT's airline refunds notice
• DOT's fare advertising proposal
• The refund regulation, 14 CFR 260
• The NAIC on travel insurance
• The Insurance Information Institute on rental car insurance
• The FTC on disputing credit card charges
• The FTC on the timeshare-exit case
• The FTC's alert on airline impersonators
• The Bureau of Labor Statistics' CPI table
• Delta's baggage fees and Southwest's travel fees

What we couldn't confirm:

• Cruise onboard costs, gratuities and drink packages
• Booking windows and seasonal discounts
• Package-against-separate-booking savings
• Rental car waiver and fuel plan prices
• Whether the lodging fee rule reaches packages or cruise cabins
• Airline-failure coverage in travel insurance
• DOT's final action on fare advertising
• Whether a court approves the Hopper order

This guide is one of 25 in our series on what people research before they buy.