Fellow blogger and editor of ‘In & Around Mysore’ magazine Mr Suresh Yerapathi put me wise on www.hotelsinmysore.com., by way of an e-mail alert on this hotels website. I wanted to phone him and say, “Come now, Mr Yerapathi, tell me something new”. I didn’t know this was new and that no one had thought of such a site earlier. Mysore should have had it years ago, considering the tom-toming on tourism we have been doing for some time now. Anyway, we must credit the idea of centralizing online hotel bookings to Mr  B S Prashanth, secretary of Mysore Travel Agents Association. The site has been sponsored by his travel agency – www.safewheelsonline.com.

There is no need for us to describe here the features of this site. Why waste words when you can access it  at the click of a mouse. So, I’d focus on what I believe is missing in this hotels site. I wish they insist that every hotel listed on the site gives its tariff. Someone on an online checkout of hotels in Mysore is entitled to all details, notably its tariff. One finds a few hotels on this website conveniently leaving the column blank or saying ‘Tariff on request’ (which is worse). Whatever might be the compulsions for a hotel management to withhold info. on tariff, providing incomplete data hurts  the image of a website. It is not in the best business interest of a hotel to shy away from disclosing its tariff, and worse still, expect costumers to call in for tariff details when they have umpteen other options listed on the same website. 

The ‘Eatouts’ list could do with more details. Some of us prefer to phone a restaurant to book a table or check out that evening’s special on the menu.The website, I believe, ought to include a restaurant’s phone, contact person, and closing time etc. Conspicuously, there is no reference to entertainment on the site. Maybe Mysore isn’t much of a fun town. But then, phone numbers of decent cinema houses in town could be listed. There are some old fashioned tourists traveling with family whose idea of an evening out may well be the 6.30 p m show, followed by a restaurant dinner.