Expedia Inc., the world’s leading online travel service and fourth largest
travel agency in the U.S., and La Quinta Corporation today announced they
have launched direct connections from the Expedia Web site to the
central reservations system (CRS) of La Quinta Corporation.
Expedia’s direct connection to hotelier reservation systems makes it
easier and more cost-effective for hotel property owners to process
reservations provided to the more than 12 million travelers looking for
accommodations monthly on Expedia.com(R). With direct connection,
reservation requests made by Expedia.com customers at any of La Quinta’s
more than 370 hotels located in 33 states are now automatically confirmed
in the respective system of each hotel.

“We are excited about the additional control that Expedia’s direct
connection will bring to our properties,” said Sandy Heilman, vice
president of electronic distribution and marketing for La Quinta. “We
fully expect our properties to benefit from the increased efficiency.”

Expedia’s initiative to link directly with hoteliers’ reservations systems
is one of the industry’s most advanced and fastest growing direct connect
programs. In the next 24 months, Expedia is planning to implement direct
connections with more than 10,000 hotel properties.

Expedia’s direct connect program makes it easy for hoteliers to provide
Expedia.com customers with accurate, up-to-the-minute room availability
data. The first set of search results for all hotels that consumers see on
Expedia reflects the most current hotel room information available from
the hotelier. Additionally, Expedia’s direct connection eliminates the
cost of fax-based confirmations.

“Our hoteliers can both cut costs and improve efficiencies in their
systems used for processing reservations and managing their inventory,”
said Lloyd Frink, senior vice president of lodging at Expedia, Inc. “Our
direct connect solution delivers both benefits to hoteliers.”
——-