Report your Priceline successes discusion area.

blindman

mrdeepee wrote: »

Destination: London
Accommodation Type: 4 Star
Bids: £45, £50, £53, £55

I got the Hilton London Kensignton with a £55 winning bid and a total price of £69.74

This would be the highest price I've ever paid per night for a hotel room through PL, so I'm not sure whether to regard it as a brilliant success or not. One my first day of searching I got up to £60, which wasn't accepted. So I suppose I should be pleased with the price I finally got it for on my second day of searching. The room was going for £109 on the hotel's website.

This would be the first time I'm bidding for London Hotels, so I'll thank someone to tell me if my winning bid is reasonable compared to average winning bids for a 4 start hotel in London.

Read the guide for how to's

mrdeepee

Thanks Mardrew and Blindman. Some very useful info.

It looks like I did okay with my winning bid because the winning bids I found on bidfortravel and betterbidding for the hotel I got were higher.

Mardrew

I just thought I would post my recent Priceline stories.

We are going to Hong Kong for 10 days in April. As always, when I am going away I always check if Priceline is a viable option by referring to Betterbidding & Bidding for Travel.

I noticed that the 5* Conrad (in WHKI) had been won on several occasions so on 31.12.09 I made my first bids. My first bid was for the full 10 days - I knew this would be highly unlikely but had nothing to lose by giving it a go. (I think I had seen one 10 day success.) I then tried for 7, 6, 5 & 4 nights and each time increasing my bid from £75 - £90. (This was roughly equal to the winning bids of $110 - $152 on BB.) No success. I then tried for a 5* in the TST area for the first 3 nights of our holiday. I based my bid on one that had been previously won in that area. Anyway, I was successful with this first bid but got a totally different hotel than had been previously mentioned. I got the 5* Royal Garden for 3 nights for £84 + taxes, totalling £288.75. On looking further, I don't actually think I saved that much. (I think there is also some debate on TA as to whether this is actually a 5* hotel but I'm sure it will be fine for us.) I suppose the lesson I have learnt is always start low!

Anyway, on 9/1/09, 28/1/10 & yesterday I repeated my bidding process i.e bidding for 6/7 nights, using WHKI & free rebid zone EHKI, bidding from £70-£95, with the hope of getting the Conrad. (There were other rebid zones I could have used but didn't as I had reached the maximum that I wanted to bid.) I know you stand less chance of winning your bids for bidding for long periods but I didn't particularly want to break my bid up into smaller chunks on the off-chance that I wouldn't win the full period as I know DH would not like to be in more than 3 hotels during our 10 night stay. (We are going to an island off HK for our 4th night. This is not booked yet which gave me some leeway with bidding for 6 & 7 nights.) In all honesty, as there hasn't been many successes reported for HK recently, I wasn't really expecting to win these bids and spent yesterday researching hotel prices through the 'normal' channels.

I always keep an eye on this thread so now I need to offer my thanks to Glennthebaker for reminding me about the ICH Friends & Family offer in his link above. I had completely forgotten about this and it was only by reading the thread last night that I realised that that could be an option for me. I have now duly booked the Crowne Plaza in HK using this. The hotel gets really good reviews on TA and sounds like it will suit me to a T! (As you have probably gathered, I like 'nice' hotels at good prices!)

Blindman, I will post this info on BB as I know how important it is to report both successes and fails. I know I should have done my first win before now but just haven't got around to it.

10_scientist

Mardrew wrote: »

I just thought I would post my recent Priceline stories.

We are going to Hong Kong for 10 days in April. As always, when I am going away I always check if Priceline is a viable option by referring to Betterbidding & Bidding for Travel.

I noticed that the 5* Conrad (in WHKI) had been won on several occasions so on 31.12.09 I made my first bids. My first bid was for the full 10 days - I knew this would be highly unlikely but had nothing to lose by giving it a go. (I think I had seen one 10 day success.) I then tried for 7, 6, 5 & 4 nights and each time increasing my bid from £75 - £90. (This was roughly equal to the winning bids of $110 - $152 on BB.) No success. I then tried for a 5* in the TST area for the first 3 nights of our holiday. I based my bid on one that had been previously won in that area. Anyway, I was successful with this first bid but got a totally different hotel than had been previously mentioned. I got the 5* Royal Garden for 3 nights for £84 + taxes, totalling £288.75. On looking further, I don't actually think I saved that much. (I think there is also some debate on TA as to whether this is actually a 5* hotel but I'm sure it will be fine for us.) I suppose the lesson I have learnt is always start low!

Anyway, on 9/1/09, 28/1/10 & yesterday I repeated my bidding process i.e bidding for 6/7 nights, using WHKI & free rebid zone EHKI, bidding from £70-£95, with the hope of getting the Conrad. (There were other rebid zones I could have used but didn't as I had reached the maximum that I wanted to bid.) I know you stand less chance of winning your bids for bidding for long periods but I didn't particularly want to break my bid up into smaller chunks on the off-chance that I wouldn't win the full period as I know DH would not like to be in more than 3 hotels during our 10 night stay. (We are going to an island off HK for our 4th night. This is not booked yet which gave me some leeway with bidding for 6 & 7 nights.) In all honesty, as there hasn't been many successes reported for HK recently, I wasn't really expecting to win these bids and spent yesterday researching hotel prices through the 'normal' channels.

I always keep an eye on this thread so now I need to offer my thanks to Glennthebaker for reminding me about the ICH Friends & Family offer in his link above. I had completely forgotten about this and it was only by reading the thread last night that I realised that that could be an option for me. I have now duly booked the Crowne Plaza in HK using this. The hotel gets really good reviews on TA and sounds like it will suit me to a T! (As you have probably gathered, I like 'nice' hotels at good prices!)

Blindman, I will post this info on BB as I know how important it is to report both successes and fails. I know I should have done my first win before now but just haven't got around to it.

congrats on your win! Conrad in HK is a really great hotel, and the Pacific Place is a good shopping mall (not the best, but it's in admiralty and next to the MTR!) PM me if you want any more info of HK, hope you and your husband will enjoy your stay in HK :j

dmg24

A big cheer for Priceline - they have allowed me to cancel my bookings which are affected by the BA strike. I am very impressed!

n1cn1c

4* London

4 Nights 7th May - 11th May 2010

Bloomsbury/Marble Arch

Holiday Inn Regents Park

Winning Bid £62 per night
Total including taxes £299

:beer:

Had been going up £1 per day 4* Mayfair/Soho & Bloomsbury/Marble Arch.
Started at £47.

Received one early counter offer when at £51 of £71 per night (refused) so knew would probably be successful around the £60 mark.

Have had better deals in the past & was borderline using the Holiday inn links in the other thread.:T

karma_police_2

4* London

Bloomsbury/Marble Arch

2 nights 22 - 24 August

Novotel London St Pancras

Started bid at 50 GBP and accepted straight away! Total price incl VAT for 2 nights GBP 123.24, so works out to be GBP 61/night.

Listed price on Novotel's website is 110/night so it's almost half price!! Thanks MSE for the great tip!!!

dmg24

I have got a great deal for New York, however I think I could have done better! It is a bit of a long story, but may help someone else ...

I find hotel ratings in New York very hit and miss, and with the exception of the Downtown zone, there are no zones where I would stay in all of the possible 4* or 3.5* properties. However I identified that I was happy to stay in any of the 3* MSG hotels.

I eliminated the chance of getting a higher rating by bidding £71 on the 4* and 3.5* with a card number with incorrect expiry date (I'll elaborate on that if anybody would like me to). I got declined, so knew I would not win them. Then I bid the same amount on 3* MSG and got the 'Still trying to find a hotel' screen, and then the 'We cannot process your transaction screen', so I knew the amount would be a win.

To make sure I was getting the best deal I reopened PL and added Coney Island, and went to £61. I got the same screens showing that price would be accepted. Because I had used up my rebids I then cleared my cookies and opened my mum's account. This is where I slipped up ...

I knew I had two options left - another go at 3* MSG and then adding Coney Island. I had intended to bid £54 then £47. However, on this account I use an AmEx card, and didn't realise they will allow transactions with the incorrect expiry date! So I got a win, but there was the potential for an even lower price (though I am certainly not moaning!).

Four Points by Sheraton Midtown Times Square
£54 (approx $80) + taxes = £67.21 per night (approx $100)

Best available rate from the hotel $305 + tax = $350
A saving of $500 in two nights!

The hotel is exactly where I wanted, and a brand I like. Priceline (and perseverance) never lets me down!

mountain_girl

I am spending two stints in NYC this Summer, took the plunge and tried pricewise.co.uk for the second, shorter stint. Was qutie exciting and am v happy with lovley hotel they chose, Radission Upper E Side, but on checking not sure how much of bargain it really was. US$180 inc. taxes instead of US$225 +taxes. The real problem is that on my first stint I just want one big room for me and 3 small kids and there doesnt seem to be anyway on the site to say how many of you there are or what type of room you need..........any suggestions.

Many thanks
Mountain Girl:o

blindman

mountain_girl wrote: »

tried pricewise.co.uk for the second, shorter stint.

I just want one big room for me and 3 small kids and there doesnt seem to be anyway on the site to say how many of you there are or what type of room you need..........any suggestions.

Many thanks
Mountain Girl:o

Try Priceline next time

Read my guide and research possible outcomes

Priceline only guarantees hotel occupancy for TWO.
If you need more (especially in NY) the use Hotwire.

You can specify number of adults + kids on that site.