Price Line

[rainbird]

I here alot about getting hotel rooms on priceline. How far ahead of time can you bid on rooms? Do you pay for the room at time of bid? I here about the bids that are taken, but how many have not had winning bids?

 

Thanks for all the help, Rainbird

[LARGIN]

Go here.. Lots more info on the CC Hotel Board..

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=92

[bstrayer]

I booked last week for 7/1 and 7/2 in Vancouver. Got Westin Bayshore, 2 rooms for $60 each. Alaska message boards has good info about booking per Priceline in Vancouver.

[Riley13]

I have been bidding for a room in Anchorage for early August, and have had no luck. It's probably too early for the summer; however, the rooms book quickly in Anchorage during cruise times, so it is difficult to know when/if a bid might be accepted.

 

We secured a room in Ft Lauderdale for our pre-cruise stay last year, and booked it about a month in advance.

 

Your bidding success will depend upon the location and dates you are bidding for. It can't hurt to try bidding early, just gives you more time in the event your bids fail. (You have to wait 72 hours to re-bid the same date and location at a higher bid.) To answer your other question, if your bid is accepted, you will pay for the room at that time.

[tweetybird]

We've had great luck bidding 3-5 days before we are to arrive. Many of the hotels clear out their excess inventory at the last minute so you can get some very nice places for about 25% of their going rate.:D

 

Laura

[sacway]

I use PL all the time to book hotels for vacations and business in several countries. The PL website now has two basic styles, one of which is like Expedia or other discount-type hotel search engines, the other its original bid for a room, process just as Riley13 describes. If you want to bid, you will name a price, provide your credit info, and basically press "go". If your price is accepted, your credit card is charged immediately and too bad if you made a mistake on location or day of week, or your plans change later. If it is not accepted, you can wait three days to rebid or rebid immediately, by changing some part of your original bid and your original offer price. There are several websites with extensive information on how to be strategic in your bidding, one is biddingfortravel.com but there are others. One nice thing about BFT is there are profiles of hotels that have been reported as winning bids, so you have some idea of where you might end up. I often will bid several times before "winning". If you are skittish, you might make a regular reservation and then you'll have a fallback in case you can't get a cheap room at all. I haven't see much difference in how low the prices can get based on how close/far from the date the bidding is, but every city has its own bid profile which also varies depending on what else is going on at that time.

 

Overall, I think it's a great service, I end up staying in a nicer place most of the time than I would pay for normally, and spend less money to boot.

[VikingRob]

I use Priceline for most all my hotels and get great rates, for example we are spending a post cruise night in Beverly Hills at the Hyatt, the best price I got online was about $299, I got it for $121 on Priceline. There are a couple of websites that can really help you bid, the are BetterBidding.com and Biddingfortravel.com. The will list, by areas, what people are getting rooms for and what hotels fall into each class so you have an idea of which hotels you may get.

 

Enjoy

Rob