Romelle

Wyndham New Yorker Hotel 481 8Th Avenue New York, NY 10001 Room Cost $140.00 /per room night Rooms 1 Nights 2 Taxes and Fees $67.38 Total Charges $347.38 I'm going to NYC to visit a granddaughter living in the Chelsea area. I was bidding Chelsea, and also three nearby zones - TS, MSG and MTW. I'd initially bid 3/15/15-3/18/15 (three nights) up to $137 for both 4* and 3.5* with no success. Plan B was to get an airport hotel (EWR) for my late arrival 3/15, and then just bid two nights downtown. The airport hotel would be less expensive, so I upped the budget a bit for the downtown nights - $140. I was working through my plan at the 4* level, including some free rebid zones, in increments of $3. Nothing at $137. I really wasn't expecting success at $140 4*, so was quite surprised to read my bid had been accepted. I'd already resigned myself to the fact that I'd have to work the 3.5* level, and even that might not work. The list for this hotel on my dates is $266, so very nice savings. It looks to be very convenient too, just blocks from both Penn Station and my granddaughter's apartment. Romelle

To help get you started, I find at the moment three rebid zones for the 4.5* level, and none for the 4* level. But one ALWAYS needs to check just before bidding, as things can change anytime. For a general idea of where to start, you can take a look at both PRICELINE EXPRESS and Hot.wire, and then start somewhat below those. You are going at high season, so the discount will be small ...1 -10%?? If indeed there is a discount. If you find your bidding getting too close to the Priceline Express and Hotwire offers, you might consider those. But do mentally adjust them a little as Hotwire can be more generous with stars than Priceline. Maybe 1/2 a star. As an example, within Hotwire's 4*s, a hotel Priceline only considers a 3.5* might creep in. Romelle

A $96 bid was successful for the 3* HI San Juan Condado 12/11/14-12/13/14. Taxi rides to/from the airport have flat rates. To the HI was about $20. The room was spacious, very clean, quiet and well equipped. A comfortable king-sized bed. Good light-blocking drapes. Large screen TV. An outdoor swimming pool. Very nice toiletries. Hot breakfast in the morning with generous 6:30 to 9:30 hours. Good variety. Free in-room wi-fi. The front desk was staffed with very helpful agreeable people. Quick with maps, directions and suggestions. The location is excellent. A half block to main drag Ashford, and then across that to a pretty plaza. Through the plaza to a sandy beach and beautiful sea. Down Ashford runs a couple public buses - 53 and 21. I know 53 in one direction goes to the Convention Center and Old San Juan. I'm not sure about 21. A Gucci and another high-end store on the two corners of the turn from Ashford. A big variety of restaurants in the area from Subway to Cuban to ?? A Walgreens. Romelle

Looking night by night, your first night seems to be the most expensive. And Union Square East seems to be slightly less expensive. Do you have any options in your schedule, or could you consider an adjacent area (even only for the first night)? Booking a cancelable back-up reservation might be a good idea. Then you could keep trying, but be assured of a place if rates stay high or even go higher. You could use "Rate Drop" up above to get a notification when there are lower rates. It is rare, but sometimes Priceline will give bonus money. This can be found in "My Rewards" when you are signed onto the site. Finally, sometimes the only options left are to raise one's budget or consider a lower star level. Romelle

Regarding bid timing, you can see a good discussion in the PRICELINE FAQ. There also is a wonderful feature up in the Tool Box called MAPS and HOTELS.com. You can get a really good idea of prices using that. Romelle

There haven't been any member reports of Upper Napa Valley Priceline wins. If there had been, you would find them in the Hotel Lists Priceline - California - Napa. Anther way to sleuth out the possibilities is to use MAPS and HOTELS.com in the Tool Box (in the header above). First I looked at the Upper Napa Valley zone map in Priceline. A small town called Oakville was approximately in the center of that zone map. Then in Maps and Hotels I searched Oakville, CA using the 5 mile radius . A number of hotels showed up, although they were actually in Yountville. The Harvest Inn was amongst them. Yountville is at the southeast end of the zone. Romelle

You've got quite a bit of time yet. When I've been closely watching Hotwire offers, sometimes they almost "blink" on and off. If you check regularly for a while, the offer may well come back. (Or you could see one you like even better.) But when you see one you like, best not to hesitate very long. Romelle

You might like the "RateDrop" feature to catch any decrease in prices. You can see more about it up in the header. Regarding merged threads - many people hop back and forth between PRICELINE and HOTWIRE. When a booking is finally made, the thread is moved to the appropriate area. But meanwhile, the whole story is kept together. Romelle

The Wyndham is one of five MSG Priceline bidding 4*s reported by members. And of course there is always the possibility of an as yet unreported hotel (slim in well reported places like NYC, but possible). In the recent past it does look like the Wyndham is won fairly frequently, but ?? You get to decide the value of the $ saved vs the risk of a different hotel.... Romelle

I checked the retail area on Priceline, and the Westin Crystal City is a 4* now. It was reported as a 3.5* by another member, and is on the Hotel Lists that way. So that is one possibility for the 4* you are seeing. Of course, there may well be others. Romelle

For starters, it could be one of the previous 3.5* hotels that got upgraded recently. What are the amenities you are seeing (using the Bidding Helper), and what are your dates? Romelle

If you click on Priceline Hotel List Canada directly below here on the bottom of this page, you will be taken to that page. Then click on Toronto and Downtown Southwest. You can see the seven 4* hotels members have reported here as getting via Price.line bidding. If you want to pursue it further, you can check both the Hotel Reviews area at the very end of this site, and www.tripadvisor.com to get more information on those hotels. I'd guess all the hotels will have reviews on TripAdvisor, but it is possible not all of them will have reviews on this site. It is worth looking in both areas, as the perspective of people getting a bargain rate via Priceline bidding can be quite different from people paying more. Of course it is always possible to get a different hotel as yet not reported, but this process will give you a good general idea of the range of products. Romelle

No, you do not bid on HOTWIRE. There are offers at different star levels and different zones. It is simply take-it-or-leave-it. Besides the bidding on PRICELINE with which you are already familiar, there is a feature new since the last time you posted here - PRICELINE EXPRESS or "PE". It is quite similar to HW - offers with prices listed, and you either accept or not. For both HOTWIRE and PRICELINE EXPRESS, the amenities are shown so you can check for ones with an airport shuttle. Also, as thereuare mentioned, if you post here with the amenities it often is possible to make a good guess as to which hotel you might receive. Price.line bidding can be a little less expensive, but the advanced knowledge of PE and HW can be worth the difference. And sometimes PE and/or HW are actually less. Romelle

I'm wondering if you ended up in the Venice hostel? One of the nicer ones, IMO. Romelle

I'm curious as to what you actually did? I ran into a similar problem earlier that same year. Heimtextil. I was actually going to it, so couldn't shift dates. I seriously considered Mainz. A sweet smaller town with good train transportation to Messe where the event was. But some kind person on another web site mentioned Holiday Inn just happened to have their super low point rate for the airport HI. I didn't have enough points, but this same kind person explained how I could buy more. It cost me roughly $60 a night, and the downtown similar hotels were between $200 and $400. If you found some creative solution, I'd love to add it to my arsenal. On the other hand, maybe you bit the bullet and paid that "pretty penny". Romelle

If you post more about your plans - what you are planning to do in NYC, will you be using public transportation, are you willing to walk a bit to it, etc. you will get more specific advice. If all your interests are located in a small area, you might want to be very near that. But if they are scattered about the city, more areas (zones) could be considered. Is "Aus." Australia or Austria? If you look at Hot.wire and PRICELINE EXPRESS rates, you can get at least a general idea as to what rates might be achievable in the various areas. With Price.line bidding you may be able to do a little bit better. You are wise to start your planning well in advance. Romelle PS - I'm always recommending guide books too. You can start with your local library and take home an armload. Then consider purchasing the one(s) you prefer. I like the Lonely Planet series for their maps and detailed directions, but there are lots of other good ones.

One more clue as to what level bid it might have taken take is Hotwire. For tonight they have a 3.5* at $106. No 4* or higher. I've also had to go to some direct purchase occasionally, but far more often I've been able to score a fine deal via bidding. Always a good thing to try first, IMHO. Romelle

Have you looked at the bidding zones on Priceline yet? Only Waltham has 4* availability. Newton West-Needham only goes up to 3.5*s. Regarding getting only one bid, there are 9 additional zones you can use at the 4* level - "free rebidding". There is a discussion of this technique in the Priceline Tips area - the very first thread. If you click on the "Priceline NYC" in thereuare's post, it will take you to your previous thread so you can supply the end of that story. Romelle

I knew I was missing something on the report. The ONLY amenity shown was Pets Allowed. One more thing that made me nervous about the transaction. I figured that wasn't enough of a clue to guess what the hotel might be. I did investigate adding the second night, but found another hotel with which I was more comfortable. Romelle

This PRICELINE EXPRESS deal was driving me crazy. Seemed too inexpensive. And I didn't like the 7.0+ review score. Still - how bad could a 4* be? I only needed two nights pre-cruise. I didn't want to commit to both nights here in case I got really unlucky, so just put in for one of them. I tried Price.line bidding first, up to the level of this rate after taxes and fees. I could actually bid the base rate quite a bit higher, since Priceline bidding fees were lower than PRICELINE EXPRESS fees. Nada. I argued with myself for a while, and finally just pushed the button. The results: Hotel Latinum Piazza Di Portamaggiore 11 Rome, Italy 00185 It looks like a continental breakfast might be included. The pictures show refrigerators in the rooms. It is right by bus and tram stops, close to a metro stop, and maybe a 20 minute walk from Termini. The neighborhood may be a little seedy. The reviews on Tripadvisor are actually a little better than those on PRICELINE EXPRESS. I'm hopeful. I'll post a review after my stay. I'm guessing I might save a few people who are curious about the deal ... and give a few others enough info to feel safe proceeding? Romelle

I've only had one short flight on Aeroflot - Moscow to St. Petersburg - but didn't have any problems. Once you buy on Priceline, your ticket looks exactly like any other issued from an airline or a travel agency. The big issue is getting a visa for Russia. (I'm assuming you are either from the US or some other country for which a visa is necessary.) Allow lots of time for that process. And consider using one of those companies that does the job for you. I used a professional company to do it, as I had learned a hard lesson trying to do it myself for a different country. Romelle PS - I'm a member, not anybody official here, so not speaking for BetterBidding.

You might consider Hot.wire and trying for 3 people. That will get you the second bed, although it might be a pull-out sofa or roll-away or such. Romelle

Dividing days - "splitting your bid" - helps you deal with unusual rate peaks (holidays, events, weddings, conventions, etc.). For longer stays it also helps you deal with the issue of a specific hotel just not giving inventory to Priceline bidding for your full span of time. You can use Priceline Express and or Hotwire to help determine what needs to be done. Check each day individually, noting the rates in your desired zones and star level. If the rates are essentially flat there probably isn't a peaking issue. If you see much higher (or lower) rates for any shorter span within your stay, that would suggest bidding it separately. Even if the rates are flat all the way, you can experiment with bidding different ranges since there still might be an inventory issue. Assuming you are working M-F, one choice might be to separate off that last weekend and the final Monday - bidding Nov 1-8 and 8-11. That would let you move on the Saturday. Or just split things right in the middle with 1-6 and 6-11. It depends upon your plans and needs. One beauty of splitting your bid is that the new range of days allows you to keep bidding in the same 24 hour time period. Another is it lets you try different star levels and zones for the different splits. Romelle PS - Although I see Alpharetta North in Hotwire, I'm not seeing it in Priceline? Only Alpharetta and Alpharetta South.

I know it is the holidays and you are trying to maximize time with family and friends, but you might consider flights right on the holidays. Actually fly on Chrismas Eve or even Christmas day, and/or New Year's Eve or New Year's Day. There can be an interesting rate dip on those days. Besides, sometimes the flight crews who are stuck working decide to make the best of it and the flights can actually be fun. Romelle

Yes, I was confusing the one you wanted with the Seaworld one. The Seaworld one's address said "Orlando, FL (International Drive - Sea World)" and I figured the "International Drive" part was definitive. Sorry. Romelle PS - I'm a member, not a board official. Just thought I was being helpful.