maitaimaven

oh well, i screwed the pooch on this one! i bid 104 for the millenium park area, and re-bid using lincoln park, hyde park, ohare north, and skokie, and was rejected. today i luckily looked at priceline's area list, and some hotel in lincoln park had upgraded to 3.5, so i knew not to include that as a re-bid zone after waiting the prequiste time for rebids. also, i got the message that i could rebid without changing anything if i upped to $131, which surprised me. so i went back in and decided to test the waters at $115, and my bid was accepted! only problem was i somehow missed that club quarters central loop was 3.5 stars! or perhaps like my lincoln park perameter, it changed overnight? so we are stuck there! i would have been VERY pleased with club quarters wacker, and i thought that's what i was getting, until it finally dawned on me, and i feel really bad. so i wasn't careful enough. i guess i can call priceline and or club quarters and see if by chance they'll let me change properties since they're both club quarters for a fee, but that seems unlikely to me since i understood the risk (just missed one or more hotels that were sneaking into my zone).

thanks for the speedy reply! as a max budget, $250. as to zones, south of the river (called millennium/loop/grant) is my first choice, and the north michigan would be second. so if i make a bid on more than one zone, i'd at least get to choose between two hotels--one in each zone? further, if it's hotwire, then i get the amenties, which are hints about which hotels they might be? i haven't really seen examples of what sucessful bids with multiple choices on it looks like. i'm really tempted to try it the way you folks do-- less attachment to the specific hotels, but super savings. however, it's hard to give up my love of the funkier hotels, or the great placement right on the river. our friends will be staying in the trump hotel, and i like the thought of looking out of Hotel 71 at them right across the river. i would be sad if i was stuck in the Hard Rock. so PL and HW will offer hotels based on random availability, right? not necessarily put the low bids in the less expensive hotels? and isn't club quarters a members only joint? but i guess PL & HW grant you one-time membership or something?

disclaimer: i've never used priceline/hotmail before, but i have just today been reading up on some of the tips. i need advice on getting a nice river-view room for 2 adults. on the priceline map, i see that the Millenium Park- Loop-Grant Park for 3.5 stars includes 3 of 6 hotels that i liked when reading thru tripadvisor. priceline has river view rooms at hotel 71 for appx $221/nite and i was tempted to just book that for the guarantee of hotel and view. however, i was curious if i give a high-ish bid like $150 instead of 40% off, will i be given more than one option? do the amenities for hotel 71 or river hotel make them obvious that i could tell if it's them? if the bids aren't view-specific, are the hotels likely to put me in the cheapest (worst rooms?) and honestly, if my wishes are too specific to be using a tool like this, feel free to tell me so! however, this is one vacaction where we might well be able to gamble the low price since our needs are more like preferences. will our vacation be ruined if we don't have a river view? probably not, esp if we're saving $150 bucks!