GM Mike

You're right; I think I've just been spoiled in the past. Website rate is $124 or $117.80 AAA so I saved about 63%. That's a really good discount. Guess I was just hoping for the $35 deals others had reported for SLC. Will post an update tonight on the other two nights of this trip. Thanks for your help.

thereuare, this was a really tough win. It never occurred to me that this would be right before the 4th of July weekend. (There are two other nights on this trip I'm still struggling with. Bids way above the usual. There are rooms, but priceline doesn't seem to have them yet.) Thanks to the info here, I knew the Courtyard was a likely result so I was willing to pay a premium to get a hotel with free parking and without the hassles of being downtown. Using free rebids (and low danger additions of zones that are not free rebids) bids were made in these amounts on the noted dates: 6/23/06: Airport 2.5* $36/37/38 6/24/06: [i wouldn't recommend trying to duplicate this. A lot of bidding along several not-entirely-safe strategies.] Airport 3* $35 Airport 2.5* $39/40/41 Downtown 3* $27/29/30/31/32/33/34/35 Downtown 2.5* $27/29/31/32/33/34 West Valley 2.5* $25/29/32/33/34 Cottonwood 2.5* $33/34 6/25/06: Downtown 2.5* $35/36/37 West Valley 2.5* $35/36/37 Airport 2.5* $42 (counter-offer for $54)/43/44 Won at $44 for Airport 2.5* -- the original goal, but more $ than I wanted. Note how this is $10 less than the counteroffer. :) ALL BIDS USING THE LINK AT SAVINGSBARN.COM Courtyard By Marriott Salt Lake City Salt Lake City Airport (SLC) 4843 W Douglas Corrigan Way Salt Lake City, Utah 84116 801-532-4085 Check-In Date: Thu, Jun 29, 2006 Check-In Time: After 03:00 PM Check-Out Date: Fri, Jun 30, 2006 Check-Out Time: 12:00 PM Your Offer Price: $44.00 Number of Rooms: 1 Number of Nights: 1 Subtotal: $44.00 Taxes & Service Fees: $13.03 Total Charges: $57.03

I don't have time to do it right this second, but I'd suggest you bring up hotwire's current downtown map and carefully compare the street address locations of the hotels you're seeing listed in other zones here. Hotwire may have widened the downtown zone recently. If that's the case, please do let us know specifically what you found so it can be adjusted.

How are you arriving? Flying in? Driving? Train? From where, approximately? I have become a lone voice in the wilderness pushing Norwalk, CT, as a viable option for people going to NYC. Check out this thread about my last trip to the city, especially posts #8 and #11. We paid $46+tax/fees for a solid 2.5* plus $7 parking at the train station and ~$25 round trip each for the train into the city. So for two of us, it was about $110 per night. Only annoyance is the train trip is about an hour each way. That's no big deal for me but it might be for you.

I swear, not ten minutes ago, it wasn't there! Well ok then. Game on! :)

Yeah, if you can swing a Sunday night stay instead, you'll generally find much cheaper rates.

In addition to using the savingsbarn.com links for bidding, I just ordered an actual Entertainment Book thru the links here. It's really not at all difficult to support this site. Remember, not only your bids, but your rack rate purchases and backup reservations should be booked using the links here, too! thereuare, can we get a Best Western link? Since I'm mandated to stay about 40 nights this year in one for work, I've decided to go for the 60-nights-to-lifetime-diamond challenge in the Gold Crown Club using my discretionary stays. Lots and lots of Best Western nights coming up.

MSN is Madison, right? O'Hare would be closer than MSP. 2-3 hour drive, as I recall. I'm seeing direct flights SEA-ORD as low as $312 (United, 5/13-5/20). Cheapest I'm seeing SEA-MSN (with one stop) is $464 (Delta 5/14-5/21). Southwest to the other Chicago airport SEA-MDW (non-stop out, 1 stop back) as low as $270 (leave any day 5/9-5/14, return 5/23). That adds up to an hour of driving tho. You could also run either of the first two scenarios through hotwire and see what offers pop up. Also, you could then use that as a guideline and bid significantly lower on priceline. Just make sure you understand how flexible hotwire and priceline require you to be about times/flights. Good luck. Let us know what you do.

These dates are different than what you list at the beginning of your thread. Did I miss something?

thereuare is right. In most hotels, especially 3* and up, a call to the front desk in advance will solve this problem. The general policy is, anyone who doesn't show up is considered a "no show" -- generally around 2am if the hotel isn't full, as early as midnight if it IS full, but as early as 6pm at less reputable establishments if they think they can get away with it. When a reservation is "no showed", it is entirely forfeited. In general, for reservations that are NOT prepaid, this results in a charge of one night room and tax to the credit card used to guarantee the room. For prepaid reservations, this generally results in the ENTIRE prepayment being forfeited. Most hotels will allow you to check in "to protect", as it's generally called. This means that, due to some unforseen circumstance, you can not arrive as expected, but you agree to pay for the first night in order to have your room available at, say, 6am. The clerk will check in your reservation as if you were there and hold keys for you, perhaps requiring you to actually present your credit card when you claim the keys. Technically, the hotel was within its rights to take your full prepayment when you didn't show up. Because you called, ALMOST ALL hotels would have checked you in "to protect" at that point, as a courtesy to you. In the future, you may want to explicitly request that you be "checked in to protect" your reservation, to make sure. As far as Priceline crediting money back to you, a clerk associate of mine has successfully called Priceline on behalf of a customer he had to "walk" to another hotel and secured a refund of that night of the reservation. (For the record, he also secured a room at no charge at another hotel acceptable to the guest, who essentially stayed at a 3* hotel instead of 2.5* for free.) So at least in the case of a HOTEL making a mistake, Priceline will credit back to the guest. It's quite possible you'll get a refund, but I'd stay on top of that. It's up to the hotel to make it happen. Note that in the hotel world, most places would NOT refund that first night (i.e. the hotel is being generous to you).

Clear up all your confusion about re-bidding right now! Read this article about PRICELINE RE-BIDDING EXPLAINED! As far as bidding higher to get a different hotel, it's been a topic of considerable debate here, and there's no consensus about it. It's quite possible that, at $36, you would have still gotten the Nikki Bird, and just paid an extra dollar for it. Don't beat yourself up.

You doubted thereuare's predictive abilities??? :)

Based on your itinerary and budget, the O'Hare Airport area is probably your best choice. Your hotel will probably have free or cheap parking (unless you happen to get the Hilton within the airport) and maybe a shuttle to the airport. You can catch the train into the city from the airport. The O'Hare area is very safe (fairly wealthy suburbs). Unfortunately I don't have time right now to suggest a strategy, but I'm sure someone else can. Good luck!

That changes things. Have you considered bidding on 4 rooms for june 30-july 3, and just not using the last night on 2 of the rooms? What bid amount would make that a cost-effective strategy for you? Perhaps you should create a mock bid in priceline for 4 rooms june 30-july 3, but do NOT submit it. On the last screen, before you submit, is the total cost with taxes and fees. Then compare that to other options you have available, including: 1) Booking the Whitehall directly 2) Booking some other place directly you like better 3) Running Hotwire searches for the two sets of dates and seeing if you have a good chance of getting the same hotel -- this can be difficult in Chicago, as many hotels look alike on hotwire 4) Bidding for 2 rooms first then buying 2 more at full price - do this by looking at the full price rate at each of the known hotels in your * category and zone, based on our lists and also other hotels you know to fit in that category/zone that haven't been reported here. Make a big chart. Then go with the option that makes the most financial sense, based on TOTAL cost. If it's bidding, we can help with a strategy, after you determine what maximum bid makes $ sense. (For the record, the hotwire hotels you listed above are most likely: 4* NMA: Could be Ambassador East, Westin, Drake 4* Loop: W City Center, but could be Hilton Chicago or Hard Rock 3.5* Loop: Probably Palmer House - sometimes shows up without Pool tho, so might not be This information is directly from the ILLINOIS HOTWIRE LIST on this site.)

Here is the key concept you're missing: Not all hotels listed in "Choose Your Own" are available in the bidding section. The inventory is separate and determined by each hotel. Sorry. :)

Youre bidding on priceline? You do realize you're not in any way guaranteed the Sheraton, right? Did you try comparing a hotwire search to the hotwire hotel lists here?

Maybe you're answering your own question. If it's so popular, why would the 3* hotels need to offer discounted rooms? :) What are the actual dates of your stay? Budget? Backup plan? Are there other areas you would consider?

There's no way you're going to guarantee an airport shuttle using priceline. There's also no way to guarantee you don't get the Hilton at the airport. Have you considered using hotwire and looking for the "shuttle" icon? Rather than suggesting a bid minimum, please tell us a maximum you're willing to bid. This should be a function of the fully refundable backup reservation you've booked somewhere. (Have you booked one yet?) Then we can suggest a strategy bidding up to your maximum.

Are you open to the high risk of getting two different hotels? If yes, I'd go book a fully cancellable backup for all four rooms at the Whitehall now. Then let us know you've done that, and we can put together a strategy for two sets of bids. Whitehall is in the NMA zone, so we'll focus on getting you rooms exclusively in NMA. Worst case is they'd be about 15-20 blocks apart. If nothing pans out, you've still got rooms at the Whitehall, which is decent but not overwhelming. What do you think?

What is your actual budget? What is your cancellable backup plan? There's virtually no way to guarantee you get the same hotel for both pairs of rooms on priceline. However, depending on what you have for a backup, it may make sense to go ahead and bid for them anyway. If you can get both pairs in the same zone, they'll almost certainly be walking distance to each other. At the worst, you could all congregate at one hotel and then split up for sleeping. Do you plan to spend a lot of time in your room? You may be able to do better with hotwire. If you run searches for both pairs and can identify the hotel in advance, perhaps using the hotwire hotel lists here, you have SOME chance they'll be at the same property. However, that's still a long shot. So, again, what is your actual budget? Backup plan? Then you can determine the highest bid that gives you savings sufficient to risk not having the same hotels.

Did you check hotwire? When I search for your dates I see 3* in your price range and 4* just outside. Also consider SPLITTING YOUR PRICELINE BID... Hotwire drops to $64 for 4* for the weekend only! What is your actual budget? Backup plan?

The link I provided above explains how to get into Manhattan from the various New Jersey zones. The most popular is the Jersey City zone. If you go to the New Jersey Priceline forum on this site, you can see the wins people have had in those zones. If you decide which zones will work for you, we can suggest a bidding strategy, if you'd like. But you need to decide which commuting options work for you. Another potential is Connecticut. I just stayed in the Norwalk zone for $46 and it's 45-55 minutes on the train into Manhattan. See this thread for details of my trip. You have to look at the total cost of your trip tho, including all parking and train charges, then decide how much you're willing to bid. Let us know your zones, quality levels, and $ maximum bid, and we can help you with a strategy.

You're not going to find any hotel in New York for that, except maybe one where your roommates have six+ legs. Have you considered staying in New Jersey and taking the train?

So this worked out pretty darned well! The South Norwalk station has a ton of parking, $7 for the day. Train to subway connection was easy and fast. I worked from the Barns and Noble 3 short blocks from the Borough Hall stop on the 4 line. GF took a cab from that stop to her appointment ($4.50 up, $6.50 back). You were right tho, it was pretty tough getting a cab. Took about 10 minutes and we had to walk up to a main street. On her way back, someone just happened to be getting dropped off at the building right then, otherwise she would have had to do quite a bit of walking. I ended up getting done early so we could take an earlier train back. It's a darned good thing too. Neither the BN in Brooklyn nor the McDonald's I planned to use in Norwalk had any power plugs! My phone died! Luckily there was a Starbucks nearby and I could work from there, but I was a little late because of that. The hotel was fine. They're renovating the lobby and have new staff. They lost my reservation. I called priceline and had priceline call them and then they found it. Turns out someone had checked us in early because we were prepaid, and the new clerk didn't yet know how to see that in the computer. But it worked out fine. I think I'd go so far as to say that the Norwalk area could be a viable alternative to staying in NYC if the NJ hotels are full. The Metro North ride was 46-56 minutes, depending on local vs. express, to Grand Central. We probably saved $100 -- that's worth the minor inconvenience to me. thereuare, you can change the title of this thread if you'd like, to reflect the hotel win. Thanks again for your help.

Don't know the answer to that but did you see the rates the Tropicana's charging directly for your nights??? 4/28 $219.95 :) 4/29 $229.95 :) 4/30 $49.95 5/1 $59.95