This is a mediocre place to work, and it'll never be more. However much they preach the importance of the EES (employee engagement survey), the company will not change in order to boost morale. The company gets very mediocre scores on the survey each year (employees on average rate it a 7/10 or so, but when it comes to compensation, the company gets murdered, as it should. Management will act surprised, and send out an email stating they're going to do market research to determine "the average" that someone with the title "account manager" makes, and then you may get a $200 per year raise (wow nice!) or you'll never hear about it again. Despite Darren Huston (now the former CEO) claiming we have millions of dollars in the bank, and also having enough for countless acquisitions, somehow the company can't afford to pay a decent wage in some of the most expensive cities in the US.
Year after year you'll hear outlandish claims like "booking.com wants to be the best place in the world to work." The problem is that becoming the best in anything (school, sports, any profession, etc.) takes investment. It takes time, money, effort, etc. Booking.com literally changes nothing, despite claiming this every year. It's offensive and sad.
The pay is disastrous and quite embarrassing actually. A market manager at Booking.com's biggest competitor (Expedia) makes more than an Area Manager at Booking.com, and an area manager manages a team of people managers, who manage market managers.
Each year Forbes releases a list of the average starting salary for recent college grads in major US cities - it's very sad, but this list often times proves that NEW COLLEGE GRADS - 21, 22 year olds, make more than an Account Manager at Booking.com after 5 years. An AM of 5 years gets an annual merit increase of about $500-1k per year - that's 1-2%, and doesn't quite cover the cost of inflation - for you Econ majors.
Lastly - despite what a recruiter might tell you, the bonus potential is absolutely poor. If you hit 110% to target EVERY SINGLE QUARTER, your total bonus amount will equal close to $6,000 - that's annual - not every 3 months. I know this, because it's happened. $6,000 might actually be generous too.
