The Hotel Booking Game

With a short riding season around here and lots of tourists, i usually book rooms well in advance. I've played the game over the years trying to find the best deals.

I used to use Hotels.com a lot but lately their rates don't seem that great unless you go with the no cancellation policy.

I usually call a hotel after i find the best rate on priceline, hotels.com, etc. and see if they'll match the online rate over the phone. Trivago is another good search site, and Roomkey. There's another smart phone app called "hotel tonight" that supposed to score great same-day rates (I've yet to try it).

As google takes over the world, they may be doing it with hotels now too. Where i used to use google to find hotels, then book through other sites, google now has their own booking.

I just booked a room at a hotel where their online direct rate at their own website was $84, and it was $84 everywhere else. I booked it through google, it sent me back to that hotel's website and had a "google direct rate" listed on the hotel website: $63 with free 24 hour cancellation.

That's a big discount.

Any other good tips?

I usually call the hotel directly and ask for a VA discount. I've had as much as 50% discount. The booking services work on commission so the discounts aren't as friendly. YMMV

No tips, sorry, but a tip of the hat for the heads up on those smartphone apps. I'll download one or two before heading cross country in a month. No booking ahead, cuz I'll be camping all I can, but a great fallback option. Googled this subject and found some ratings of these apps, and "Hotel Tonight" got good marks. Thanks.

A group of us went to the Virginia's and Tennessee in June 2011 and we used Room Saver or Hotel Saver coupons from a booklet found in rest stops and saved on Hotels that way. They give out a few rooms at the coupon rate and you need to get there early. We were stopping between 4 and 5 pm for the day. We only had 1 night where we had to try more than 1 hotel. We were using mid range hotels and getting rates between $40 and $60. The biggest drawback was they wouldn't give their club points on this rate. I have used them on vacations in New England as well with much success.

Spud said:

With a short riding season around here and lots of tourists, i usually book rooms well in advance. I've played the game over the years trying to find the best deals.
I used to use Hotels.com a lot but lately their rates don't seem that great unless you go with the no cancellation policy.

I usually call a hotel after i find the best rate on priceline, hotels.com, etc. and see if they'll match the online rate over the phone. Trivago is another good search site, and Roomkey. There's another smart phone app called "hotel tonight" that supposed to score great same-day rates (I've yet to try it).

As google takes over the world, they may be doing it with hotels now too. Where i used to use google to find hotels, then book through other sites, google now has their own booking.

I just booked a room at a hotel where their online direct rate at their own website was $84, and it was $84 everywhere else. I booked it through google, it sent me back to that hotel's website and had a "google direct rate" listed on the hotel website: $63 with free 24 hour cancellation.

That's a big discount.

Any other good tips?

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As someone who just finished a 10,000 mile road trip through the States, I learned a few pointers myself:

- Best western has a great rewards program. Just signing up (and especially getting one of their credit cards) can earn enough for one free stay. There is presently a "Stay 3, get 1 Free" promo on. The nice thing about their rewards system is that is isn't based on the value dollar of the room of any specific hotel but rather the apparent rating of that hotel based on its surrounding competitors. This benefits a rewards member by being able to accumulate points at the same rate (and putting it towards a Stay 3 get one free entry) at an $80/night hotel in Nowhereville, Iowa and cashing in at a 5 star location in Beverly Hills. For example, a local BW hotel I stay at frequently for work is one of the best in town. They charge 28,000 points for one free stay and a room typically goes for $90 for my government rate. I recently stayed at a BW in San Francisco near Pier 39 and was only charged 28,000 points but the cash value was $379/night. The same follows if you have a free stay coupon.

- I've used an app called Hotel Coupons (they often have flyers outside of fast food restaurants) when travelling through the US and in towns that have high competition and low rates, this visible coupon works really well.

- I've used booking.com and found more than once that the rate they offer is $10 more than the walk-in-off-the-street rate and this has been verified by front desk clerks. However, booking.com does offer a general breakdown of what you can expect.

- Trip Advisor is better than booking.com for info but definately does not have the best rates

- I started using Trivago on the last few days of my trip and thought it worked well.

Agree also on the free hotel coupon magazines you can find at restaurants along interstates. I used one once and got a nice room for $55 in Spokane and watched a guy booking right next to me $89 and they wouldn't go any lower. He overheard my rate and got pissed and walked out. She said the simply couldn't do it if he didn't have the paper coupon.

I've tried a new tactic that seems to work really well if the conditions are right. Note, this is not about reserving a room, this is a walk in tactic.

It costs a hotel $40 to flip a room after a stay. If it's mid-week and after the dinner hour, the hotel likely won't book many more rooms.

I've been quoted $129, then asked for a AAA/CAA discount, they'll knock off $20. I point out the conditions (getting late, empty lot) and offer them $60.

This seems to work about half the time. You need to be prepared to walk away however.

That being said, I just got f'n hosed at local Inn for $169/ni because they were the only game in town and they had some big event going on.

Win some, lose some.

Back before cell phones, a buddy of mine traveled alot..... he would literally walk in the hotel - go right to the pay phones and call the front desk and get a better rate then walking up to the desk..... he learned not to walk to the desk if the lot was pretty full as they would usually tell them they were booked except for the one spendy room.....

It was kind of comical to watch....

Timely post. I too have noticed that a lot (maybe all?) of the web sites that use to give you the lowest rates no longer seem capable of actually doing that anymore. I booked a room in Niagara Falls, NY through Booking.com for our first night on the road next Tuesday. It was the same rate at all the other booking web sites (I checked with Triago). Then I happened to look at the hotel's own web site and the standard "Best available" rate was $10 lower plus the reduced tax of that lower rate.

Called Booking.com since they advertise "lowest rates guaranteed." Agent said I had to send a screen shot of the lower rate, and it had to be like-for-like rooms, amenities, etc. It was. I did. I get an email back that now after my stay I can get a rebate from Booking.com to match the lower rate. I'll do it, this once, but I won't be booking through them again. If I have to do all the homework of establishing the lowest rate, what the hell I am I using them for?

Instead, I've now found a new angle. I am an AMA member. As a member we can get a 15% discount at all Choice Brand hotels, and the discounted stays still accumulate points in the Choice Rewards program, so without too many stays you're good for a free one. 15% off the room rate is pretty good, because it also impacts the taxes charged by an equal amount. And if you use their web site and do some searching you can get some decent rooms at around $70 a night.

The cheapest way is using those welcome center coupon books, but those all only apply to walk-ins. So, depending on how many hotels are in the immediate area, and what is going on at the time of your visit, you may or may not be able to score that great deal.

Interesting subject, as we are near retirement and plan on doing some traveling. The wife is not a camping person, so we need motels.

A spur of the moment trip to St. Louis earlier this month taught us that the walk-in strategy can backfire. We were wanting to stop in Prior, OK (I know, I know) and came on a string of like 4 motels, a HEI, a Day's Inn, and a couple of others. No way. All 4 were filled.

Kept going and found an America's Best Value place. Nothing fancy, but clean, with a cold AC. $45 before taxes. Not too bad.

I'll keep in mind the phone-ahead trick. I don't trust the booking apps. They are all marketing ploys. But I'm a pessimistic, grouchy, and cheap old SOB.

The PNW crew knows my track record for getting good deals on hotels, but agree that the usual practices are not working as much as they did in the past.

I use three sites: hotwire.com (to see the lowest advertised price), TripAdvisor.com (to see how the hotel actually is rated), and the hotel's website itself. Typically Hotwire gives me the best rate, and using TripAdvisor (or Hotels.com), I can usually determine which hotel is the one with the Hotwire rate (since Hotwire won't tell you the name of the hotel until after you're committed).

Nine times out of ten, Hotwire wins by wide margin. Where it doesn't work is in small rural towns, where they don't usually get good rates. Recently, I stayed at Canyonville OR and there are only three hotels; the best rate was by going to the hotel website directly.

I've stayed at 4 and 5 star hotels for under $100, and recently had a great Vegas hotel room for $149 that was a suite which normally would go for $300. The higher price the room, the better the deal, and I can't say Hotwire has panned out for cheaper rooms (under $75) as much.

Be careful when booking online that you clearly understand that many of these aggregators have a no refund policy if your plans change. I have had some battles on the phone in the past year when making changes and it's not fun. Read the fine print! The best cancellation policies are with the hotels directly.

bikerskier said:

Be careful when booking online that you clearly understand that many of these aggregators have a no refund policy if your plans change. I have had some battles on the phone in the past year when making changes and it's not fun. Read the fine print! The best cancellation policies are with the hotels directly.

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This. I've been burnt in the past. I'm heading down to SE Ohio tomorrow after work, planned on spending the night at the HI in Burlington On. All the discount sites had it listed for the same price. No refund. I went on the HI site. Same price, refundable with 24hr notice.

Now that being said, in SE Ohio Ramble this past May, I had to get tires put on at Iron Pony in Columbus (great place!) on the Sunday. It just didn't make any sense to ride up to Columbus, get the tire put on, then ride all the way back. Spend the night, then leave in the morning. A better plan was leave directly from Columbus and begin our way home. I had booked the hotel through Hotels.com.

So I asked the manager if it would be possible to get a refund for the unused day (check out Sunday morning instead of Monday morning). He said "No problem", then he realized I had booked through Hotels.com. I'd have to take it up with them.

"Unless it's a murder scene, good luck getting a refund from them" he said.

With nothing to lose, I called Hotels.com. 15 minutes later, after being on hold while they called the hotel manager, I had my day refunded and was able to execute the alternative plan.

When checking out, I thanked the manager for his help.

"I've NEVER, EVER, seen Hotels.com give a refund. EVER" and he shrugged his shoulders.

Go figure.

For what is worth, I just found out hotels.com is owned/managed by Expedia. In fact the hotel I was just staying at, said I got my room through Expedia when I knew I booked it through hotels.com

Bungie said:

"I've NEVER, EVER, seen Hotels.com give a refund. EVER" and he shrugged his shoulders.
Go figure.

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Bungie, I've gotten several refunds from Hotels.com. It took several calls to different people but, I have all the time in the world to become a pain in their ass. Eventually, they see I'm not going to give up so they cave.

majicmaker said:

Bungie said:

"I've NEVER, EVER, seen Hotels.com give a refund. EVER" and he shrugged his shoulders.
Go figure.

Click to expand...

Bungie, I've gotten several refunds from Hotels.com. It took several calls to different people but, I have all the time in the world to become a pain in their ass. Eventually, they see I'm not going to give up so they cave.

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Well there you go.

Anybody have any refund experiences from any of the other suppliers (Hotwire/Trivago etc?)

I try to book thru my Choice Hotels acct. first, or Wyndham.

Never a problem with cancels or refunds. On the Choice Hotels (Comfort, Clarion, Quality Inns) if you choose lowest price pre-pay, it states "non-refundable".

Spud said:

With a short riding season around here and lots of tourists, i usually book rooms well in advance. I've played the game over the years trying to find the best deals.
I used to use Hotels.com a lot but lately their rates don't seem that great unless you go with the no cancellation policy.

I usually call a hotel after i find the best rate on priceline, hotels.com, etc. and see if they'll match the online rate over the phone. Trivago is another good search site, and Roomkey. There's another smart phone app called "hotel tonight" that supposed to score great same-day rates (I've yet to try it).

As google takes over the world, they may be doing it with hotels now too. Where i used to use google to find hotels, then book through other sites, google now has their own booking.

I just booked a room at a hotel where their online direct rate at their own website was $84, and it was $84 everywhere else. I booked it through google, it sent me back to that hotel's website and had a "google direct rate" listed on the hotel website: $63 with free 24 hour cancellation.

That's a big discount.

Any other good tips?

Click to expand...

How did you book it through google?

Thanks.

Just google the name of the city where you want to stay w/the word "hotels" and it will pull up selections and a map. You can then choose and book directly through google w/credit card.