18 Travel Scams to Watch Out For

Travel scams can cost you money and ruin your vacation, but the results could wind up being a lot worse than that. A hacker or thief who accesses your personal information could steal your identity without you even knowing, in which case you could spend thousands of dollars and several years getting back on your feet.

According to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), many travel scams start out with you receiving a call, a text or a flyer in the mail. In any of these communications, you may be promised a free vacation or a luxury cruise at a drastically discounted rate. The catch? They need your credit card to secure the reservation, but that's just the tip of the iceberg.

"You may end up paying hidden fees - or worse: after you pay, you might find out it's all a scam," writes the FTC.

Other common travel scams come in different forms, from broken or missing taxi meters to vacation home scams and fraudulent offers for chartered flights. Either way, you need to know what these scams are and how they work if you want to avoid them.

Booking a vacation rental is typically pretty safe, especially if you're booking through a major platform or an established rental company with a travel advisor. However, scammers have been known to sneak through fake or duplicate rental listings in order to try to collect rental fees for nonexistent properties.

Generally speaking, you can avoid these scams by only paying directly through the platform, and by only booking rentals with plenty of reviews.

It's easy to assume your taxi driver automatically turns the meter on when you get in, but you should always check ahead of time. The broken taxi meter scam takes place when a driver doesn't turn the meter on or tells you it's broken, only to demand an exorbitant fare after the ride has taken place.

Our advice? Don't ride with a taxi driver who tells you the meter is broken or refuses to turn it on. Instead, get out of the taxi and get a different ride altogether. Better yet, order an Uber or Lyft so you know your fare upfront.

ATMs in crowded spaces are often armed with skimmers - a tool thieves use to "skim" your credit card information when you insert your card in a terminal.

While skimmers can be difficult to spot, you should look for anything out of the ordinary on a payment terminal before you swipe your card. Better yet, use a credit card with EMV chip technology, and "tap to pay" instead of inserting your card whenever you can.

Arriving home from vacation can be stressful already, mostly due to the piles of laundry and unpacking ahead of you. However, getting home can be even more stressful if a thief got ahold of your credit card details while you were gone.

Credit card fraud happens all the time, yet you don't have to despair if you see unauthorized charges on your credit card after a trip. Credit cards come with zero liability for fraud, so calling the number on the back of your card to report the theft is your best course of action. Most likely, your card issuer will credit you for the unauthorized charges then send you a new card to use in place of your old one.

Fake hotel booking platforms pop up on the internet all the time, and their main goal is getting your credit card information so they can rack up other charges. Also note that many of these sites feature incredibly low prices and stellar "deals" that are too good to be true.

Make sure to check the legitimacy of a company before you use an unknown website to book hotels or other travel. You can check for legitimacy and reviews using websites like the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and Trustpilot.

Plenty of legitimate companies have begun offering private and shared jet charters over the past few years. Unfortunately, many private jet scams have come about as a result, including ones where fraudsters create fake websites promising private charters at rock bottom rates.

While booking a private jet or shared charter may not be as expensive as it used to be, you can avoid scams by speaking to brokers before booking, seeking references and reviews and checking the background of a company before taking flight or giving your payment information.

Your luggage can easily be stolen, either during transit or right before your own eyes. Unfortunately, luggage theft happens far too often, either due to organized theft or one-off random incidents.

Your best bet to combat luggage theft is keeping an eye on your bags at all times, except when you check them with an airline or another common carrier. You can also pay for travel insurance that includes lost baggage reimbursement, which will kick in to replace your luggage and your belongings if your bags are lost in transit by an airline or a cruise line.

Resort fees may be incredibly common in destinations like Las Vegas and New York City, but they're still a scam. After all, you shouldn't have to pay an extra $20 to $50 per night for things like internet access or entry to your hotel's gym, and especially not on top of the nightly room rate.

When it comes to resort fees, your best bet is booking hotels that don't charge them altogether. That said, you'll want to read the fine print on your hotel booking so you know for sure. If you can't tell whether a hotel charges a resort fee, you can also call the front desk and ask.

If you get a phone call, an email or a piece of snail mail stating you've won a free vacation, you should take this announcement with a grain of salt. The fact is, many scammers send out mailers promising free vacations to Disney World and elsewhere with the goal of getting some kind of payment or your credit card information.

While there are some vacation offers that are legitimate, keep in mind that you should never pay a fee to win a "prize." Also make sure you only give your information to legitimate companies and be wary of anything that seems too good to be true.

The travel pizza scam takes place when someone shoves a flyer for a local pizza place under the door of your hotel room. The problem? The pizza place doesn't actually exist, yet someone will happily take your order and your credit card information over the phone.

To avoid falling victim to the pizza delivery scam, check to make sure any pizza place you order from is legitimate beforehand. You can do so by confirming their contact information in the phone book or online.

If you get a robocall from someone promising to tell you about vacation deals, go ahead and hang up. Chances are good that the "deal" they're offering is nothing of the sort, and that it's actually a phishing scam meant to procure your personal information or credit card details.

If you really want to find travel deals, there are plenty of places to look online. Read here for a list of the best travel offers, deals and discounts available today.

The traffic ticket scam is common within the tourist regions of many countries, and particularly in Mexico. However, this scam can look differently and may work out differently depending on where you're traveling and who takes part.

Basically, you'll get pulled over for no reason at all, yet the police officer who conducts the traffic stop will say you were speeding or point to another infraction. Either way, you'll be asked to pay cash to get out of a ticket - or to avoid going to jail.

Some fraudsters have been known to set up fake websites that sell international driving permits. Not only are the documents they offer worthless, but you'll waste money and time if you fall for this scam.

The fact is, you can get an international driver's license (IDP) online for only $20 through AAA. You can buy a legitimate IDP elsewhere, but this is the lowest cost and most convenient option out there.

Sitting through a timeshare presentation to score a discounted vacation package is fairly common, but what happens when the presentation is actually a high-pressure sales scam? Some timeshare salespeople may refuse to accept "no" as an answer, or they'll draw out what should have been a 90-minute presentation for five or six hours, all the while pressuring you into investing in a timeshare or buying into their travel club.

Either way, the best thing you can do is get up and walk out of the room.

The turkey drop scam takes place when a scammer drops a wallet in a popular tourist area in public view. They wait for an unassuming tourist to pick it up, at which point another tourist (who is also a scammer) comes forward and accuses the original tourist of stealing their wallet.

Of course, the solution to this conundrum is for the tourist to hand over some cash in order to keep the others from reporting the theft. To avoid this scam, don't pick up anything that is not yours - especially in a public place or a bustling tourist area.

You'll need to share a certain amount of personal information to book various types of travel, whether that's a scan of your passport, a copy of your driver's license or your credit card details. Either way, sharing this information can inevitably lead to fraud if it winds up in the wrong hands.

To protect against identity theft, you should diligently check your credit reports with all three bureaus throughout the year. Fortunately, you can do this for free with the website AnnualCreditReport.com.

Fraudsters will do anything to make a buck, and that includes creating fake travel insurance websites. Once they begin marketing their policies, their goal is pocketing your premiums and leaving you with worthless coverage.

To avoid travel insurance scams, make sure you only buy travel insurance from a reputable company. Some of the best travel insurance providers to consider include Allianz and World Nomads.

Pickpocketing may be the oldest travel scam of all time, yet it's just as prevalent as ever. You think your money and travel documents are secure in your pocket or your purse, but professional thieves know exactly how to separate you from your hard-earned cash and your passport in the blink of an eye.

To avoid falling victim to this scam, consider getting a money belt that fits close against your body and even under your clothes. If you want to carry a larger bag for sightseeing, you can also consider a slash-proof cross-body purse with zipper locks.