It may be a bit confusing for consumers at first but, within months, seeing the same price for a hotel across all platforms could be a thing of the past

April Fool! Okay so that got you reading, but every year on April 1^st, companies try to engage, confuse or humour customers, and the travel industry is no exception.

Canadian Airline low-cost carrier WestJet, for one, has built a whole marketing campaign around April Fools Day. In 2012 it announced that it was launching childfree flights, and then last year that it was easing restrictions on pets in the cabin.

Also last year, US airline Southwest announced free hot-air balloon travel and Virgin said its engineering team had been secretly working on the design and production of the world’s first-ever glass-bottomed plane!

Airlines weren’t the only tricksters; online travel agent Orbitz gave its customers the chance to time travel but fictional hotels in the past and future were, it said, “subject to the creation of an actual time machine”.  

Probably one of the most successful April Fools Day campaigns was 2009’s hotelicopter which has been viewed nearly a million times on YouTube and led people to that the world’s first luxury hotel/helicopter was a reality.

Now we want to hear from you. Tell us about the funniest, weirdest, cleverest or craziest April Fool’s prank you’ve spotted this year in the comments box below and you stand to WIN a free full EyeforTravel conference pass in a destination of your choice. The winner will be announced on April 30^th.