Senoreit

Downtown is my preferred zone, NW is plan B. Conventional rates for downtown are very high for these dates, thus availability seems tight. Hotwire is offering a whopping $175/night (!) for 4* downtown (which I'm almost positive is either the Omni Severin or the Westin, and I'm leaning towards the Omni), so I was probably just wasting my time only bidding up to $80. Hotwire shows much better prices if the nights are searched separately, so splitting the bid would probably yield better results, but is something I'd rather not do at this point. Rates in the NW zone seem average as far as I can tell (maybe I'm not correct about this), but again, no dice all the way up to $80 for a 3*. This would be for a leisure trip, so I'll probably end up just scrapping it and going a different weekend if the Priceline situation doesn't improve. For whatever reason, whenever I want to go to Indianapolis, rates are absurdly higher than they are during seemingly everyone other time of year.

Glad to hear you received a definitive answer to your question. I guess this somewhat debunks my theory about Budget being one of the companies that doesn't have a car class that could be considered equivalent to Priceline's "Standard." I do find it odd that you can reserve a two-door full-size from Budget through Priceline, but not through Budget itself. As you previously mentioned, Budget's website does list a "full-size" category, but doesn't allow for specification of two-door or four-door. Oh well, I guess it's just one of life's mysteries.

If I can go off on another one of my rants here, I do have a bit of a problem with the Priceline rental car class "Standard," as I don't think it represents even a semi-uniform class among the participating car rental companies. In fact, I've done a quick bit of research to make sure I'm right about this, and as best as I can tell only two of the five companies offer a class of car that could conceivably be considered equivalent to Priceline's "Standard" class. Avis differentiates between two-door Full-size and four-door Full-size, and the example they give for a two-door Full-size is a Monte Carlo, which is one of the two example cars Priceline cites as "Standard." Hertz has a class they call "Special Sporty," for which they list a Ford Mustang Coupe (two door) as an example. This, incidentally, is the other car that Priceline lists as an example of a "Standard." As I said, the other three companies literally have no listed car class that could be considered equivalent to Priceline's "Standard." I don't understand why Priceline would maintain this class when it only really applies to two car companies, and I also think it's somewhat misleading, or at least illogical, to put this "Standard" car class between Mid-size and Full-size. Maybe it's just me, but I don't see a natural progression from a Grand Am to a Mustang Coupe to a Buick Regal. I can only assume that thereuare's suggestion, that Priceline may just automatically upgrade winning "Standard" bids to Full-size cars for the companies that don't have an appropriate/equivalent class, is correct. After all, how could Priceline promise a "Standard" reservation for the rental companies for which such a class is nonexistent? I had never thought about rental car bids being upgraded before, but it brings up a question in my head. How would it be determined what an upgrade really is? It can't simply be the next-highest car class on the list... That could theoretically result in a convertible bid being upgraded to a minivan, which would obviously be insane. Has it been positively established that Priceline does upgrade car bids? If so, does anyone know if there are guidelines for the upgrades? To get back to the poster's original question, I have two suggestions. First, I've only had one Priceline rental car bid accepted, but I know that in my case, on the confirmation page it listed an example of a car that was considered to be in the class I had successfully bid for. I would assume your confirmation page is similar, so that should give you some idea of what type of car to expect. If not, perhaps you could look up your reservation on Budget's website by plugging in your last name and confirmation number and see what your reservation is listed as. My winning bid for a "Standard" car was accepted by Hertz, so on my confirmation page it listed a Mustang Coupe as an example of a car I could expect to receive. When I arrived at MDW to pick up the car, I heard the agent call or radio for someone in the garage to get a "mid-size" car ready. I was prepared to gripe, but after finding out that the car we were getting was a four-door Hyundai Sonata, I figured it would actually be better for our ten-day trip with lots of luggage than a two-door Mustang Coupe, so we just took it (it ended up being great, by the way :) ). A mid-size car was my first choice anyway, and I had only bumped up to Standard after my bid for a mid-size was rejected.

Bid this the same day as stay. Rejected at $36, added rebid and was accepted at $38. I believe the conventional rate was $99. :) Congratulations, you got your price of $38 for a 3-star hotel room. Doubletree Guest Suites And Conference Ctr., Downers Grove Oakbrook - Downer's Grove 2111 Butterfield Road Downers Grove, Illinois 60515 630-971-2000 Check-In Date: Sat, Oct 2, 2004 Check-In Time: After 03:00 PM Check-Out Date: Sun, Oct 3, 2004 Check-Out Time: 12:00 PM Your Offer Price: $38.00 Number of Rooms: 1 Number of Nights: 1 Subtotal: $38.00 Taxes & Service Fees: $10.69 Total Charges: $48.69

Interestingly enough, I read a recent thread over there in which she stated, "...I'm sure Priceline would prefer that their customers don't know about free re-bidding...." So she has no problem openly advertising and promoting a "work around" that she herself thinks Priceline would prefer their customers didn't know about, yet she inexexplicably feels the need to enforce a self-created ban on any mention of two people teaming up and both bidding for a hotel when they are planning a stay together. It's a blatant double standard. Obviously the people at Priceline aren't so naive that they haven't considered the possibility of two people both bidding for a hotel for a stay they are planning together, and yet they don't forbid such activity in their "Terms and Conditions." So why would she feel a need to prohibit the mention of such behavior? Who knows. She seems to have a demigod complex and feel that her judgement is so obviously and inherently correct that others don't even have a right to ask for an explanation. Take this line from a post in the "Posting Guidelines" section: "Questioning an Administrator or Moderator action on the board when the action is outlined in our Posting Guidelines may result in termination of your posting privileges." She's like the "Soup ****" of the internet. My other problem with TOBB is that the administrator is clearly more interested in having people bid through their link than she is in helping people become well-informed bidders, which is the stated purpose of the site. My evidence of this is the fact that nowhere in the canonical "Hotel F.A.Q." is there any information about how to formulate a bidding strategy. There is a section of the F.A.Q. entitled "How much should I bid for a hotel", but the section does virtually nothing to answer that question. It tells readers to check conventional rates before bidding, but it doesn't tell them anything at all about how to interpret the conventional rates when it comes time to formulate a bidding strategy. It also outlines the minimum bid amounts for each quality level, which while interesting, is only one small bit of knowledge required to formulate a bidding strategy. Buried in the "Bidding Tips" forum is a thread in which she explains "...if it appears to be a low occupancy time of year in my bidding area, I start at about 35% of the lowest available rate...when bidding on a high level occupancy area for my dates, my strategy is quite different. While my travelers don't have a set in stone per night rate they are allowed to spend, they are to be reasonable in what they pay based on the city...I recommend to these people (for leisure travel) that they not go any higher than 80% of the lowest available rate of a hotel that is acceptable to them to book directly, even if it is a lower quality level than what they are bidding." (that post is over four years old, by the way, and in the interest of length I've just quoted some key portions) Why would she not include such information, as well as other information about how to formulate a bidding strategy, in the F.A.Q.? In my opinion, it's obvious. Such information would truly lead to well-informed, more self-sufficient bidders...more well-informed, self-sufficient bidders would in turn lead to less requests for bidding assistance...and less requests for bidding assistance would lead to less opportunities to directly send the affiliate link to people she knows will be bidding soon. I also like how she disingenuously mentions that she would simply "appreciate" if people bid through the link, when in reality those who don't bid through the link can sure as hell bet they'll receive a message containing a guilt trip for not using it.

Just for the record, I think the Nevada>>Las Vegas>>Venetian>>picture files hierarchy would be better than Nevada>>Las Vegas Venetian>>picture files. Under the former format, you'd be able to list the actual names of the hotels within the folder for the city in question. Under the latter format, one has to type the city before every hotel name whether it is actually part of the hotel name or not, which could result in redundancy and confusion. For example, under the latter format (no city folders within the state folders), you could end up with listings for "Chicago Hyatt Regency Chicago" and "Chicago Hyatt Regency McCormick Place" in the "Illinois" folder, which to me would appear odd. If you create a "Chicago" folder within the "Illinois" folder, you could just have listings for "Hyatt Regency Chicago" and "Hyatt Regency McCormick Place." Plus, I believe that having city folders within the state folders would be organizationally better anyway. I'd happily click one extra time for the sake of not having every single hotel in a given state in the same folder. Incidentally, perhaps this would be better suited for a new thread, but I also think that some more hierarchical organization would be of benefit in the existing hotel reviews category. Although the listings are alphabetized, since every hotel in the world is listed in one directory, as more reviews are added, it's getting to the point where it's taking more and more clicks to get to the pages with the listings that are toward the center of the alphabet. I do realize, though, that at this point a major reformatting of that section might be a major pain in the neck. Luckily there are ways around this "problem," such as accessing specific hotel review pages by clicking on the "REVIEW" link next to the desired hotel in the "Priceline/Hotwire Hotel Lists and Tips" section for the appropriate state, or doing a search for the hotel you desire reviews of. As far as whether there should be a United States folder on the first page of the photos site, I am inclined to say yes. It does seem odd to have American states listed amongst foreign countries. Of course, the United States comes pretty late alphabetically, and if some day there are dozens of countries listed, one would have to scroll all the way down to find it. Since presumably this site will be used primarily by Americans, at least early on, I think it would be wise to keep the United States folder, if one is created, in a prominent place. For the time being, since there are so few countries listed, I guess this isn't a problem (there isn't much scrolling required when there are only eleven countries on the list), but it could be in the future. On many order forms on American websites, there is a drop-down list of countries with the United States listed at the top and all other countries alphabetized below. Unfortunately, as you've stated, with this bulletin board format the front page of directories is alphabetical, so maybe there is no easy way to incorporate that idea (having a US folder at the top, and all other country folders alphabetized below).

Just to address your point about not being sure what purpose posting hotel photos would serve since it's not possible to bid for a specific hotel... While it's obviously not possible to choose your hotel (except for those frequently-bid zones in which there is only one known hotel [like 5* Strip-area in Vegas], in which case your risk of getting something different is very small), it is possible to choose what zone and star level to bid for, and hotel reviews are often a big factor in making that decision (for me anyway). Hotel photos would supplement the existing reviews. While it's true that some user photos may end up being just as misleading as hotel website photos, as I previously stated, the more information, the merrier, as far as I'm concerned. Also, like I mentioned, if betterbidding.com becomes unique in building a large database of hotel room photos, it could attract users who weren't previously familiar with Priceline/Hotwire, introduce them to the potential benefits of those sites, and lead some of them to become contributing, information-sharing members of this board who post bids and/or hotel reviews. One more note, while it's true that we're all looking to be informed as best we can about travel-related topics, I'm not sure that actively steering users towards other similar sites by way of permanent, thumbtacked links would be good for business, but I dunno, I've never run a website before.

One more thought... Whether or not either of these proposed ideas would take betterbidding.com too far away from its core seems like it would ultimately be up to you, thereuare. I do think the hotel photos could easily supplement the existing hotel reviews without really diverting from the original concept of the board. In fact, in addition to it being a great new resource for current users of the board, perhaps people who are unfamiliar with this site or even Priceline and Hotwire would be drawn here by this unique resource (the hotel photos) and then start participating in Hotwire and Priceline information sharing, or at the very least posting hotel reviews. Now that I think about it a little more, while I like the idea of trip reviews, it would be opening up a BIG new can of worms on this site. Like I said, whether or not that's something you think is a problem is obviously up to you.

Just to add my two cents, I too support both ideas. I've always thought about how nice it would be to have a website featuring real photos of hotel rooms, as opposed to the best case scenarios always posted on hotel websites. In fact, I already have a few past photos that I would be able to contribute if the idea comes to fruition. As far as the best way to accomplish this, it's probably not my area of expertise. BEAV's idea about posting links seems feasible, of course the only downside is that I'm sure as the years went on some links would not be kept up and become broken/useless. This would not happen if it was done "in house" (on this existing site), I just don't know how much the extra bandwidth would cost to do that and how much extra time thereuare would have to oversee it. The "trip reviews" idea is something that I think is already available to a certain extent on the internet (epinions.com, etc.), but I certainly wouldn't be opposed to having a similar section here. The more information, the merrier, as far as I'm concerned.

Stayed here for the second time on 8/8. Entrance to parking garage is located just south of the hotel on 5th St. Cost is a rather ridiculous $18/day with unlimited in/out, but if you don't want to leave your car on the street, it's certainly the most convenient option as it is connected to the hotel via an interior corridor accessable from level three. On our previous stay (which we thought was great, btw), we were assigned a corner room on the 7th floor (Room 702), which was very spacious and had views to the north and east. This time, we checked in at 4:15 p.m. with only one person in line ahead of us. I requested a king, non-smoking room, mentioned how much we liked our corner room last time, and said if they had any left it would be great if we could get one (although if not, we'd certainly understand). The clerk was nice, but said that there was a convention at the hotel and that many of the corner rooms had been assigned to VIPs. She said she had a king, non-smoking room that was "a little bit larger" [than an average room], but it was next to the elevators. She said we may hear cables rattling, but that the elevator closest to the room is shut off between 9:00 p.m. and 8:00 a.m. We decided to take the room, knowing that we could always switch later. As it turned out, I only heard the cables once or twice over the sound of the television. The room was 1218, and upon seeing it I can't imagine that it was that much larger than the average room, with the exception of a weird, useless alcove in the corner of the room between the wall the windows are in and the wall closest to the elevators. Room seemed clean except for a crumpled tissue on one of the tables, and in pretty good condition despite the "historic" nature of the hotel. The only thing in obvious need of repair was a relatively small section of the bathroom ceiling which was peeling. As far as room layout, the area of the bathroom containing the sink/countertop/mirror is not separated from the rest of the room by a door. Adjoining that area, through a door, is the room which contains the toilet and shower. (I kind of prefer the set-up where all the bathroom stuff is in one room behind one door, sometimes people want privacy getting ready at the sink/mirror). Size-wise, I thought the bathroom was fine, although I've read other reviews characterizing them as small. One other thing about the setup of the room: The cabinet the television was in was not located on the wall opposite the bed, as one might expect, it was located against the side wall to the left, approximately in line with the foot of the bed. Pretty bad layout if you ask me, but luckily the pull-out shelf the television was on pivoted enough so that the screen could be seen while lying in bed. Apparently there is only one vending machine room in the whole hotel, located on the 6th floor. Unfortunately all of the drink machines were out of order, and the dollar bill slot was broken on the snack machine. There is a gift shop on the lower level that sells some Coke products and water. On our last stay we briefly checked out the Paradise Landing indoor water park. Since you must pay admission (I believe $10/day for adults, don't quote me on that, and I don't know how much for children) to use it unless you've booked a special "waterpark rate," we didn't have a chance to fully explore it, but from the glance we got it seemed like the only reason to go there would be if you have kids, which basically how it's advertised from what I can gather...I wouldn't consider it a substitute for a pool that adults could use. One last thing, the channel selection is truly pathetic. I think we had about 10 channels. We didn't even have the Weather Channel, which I thought came on even the most basic of cable systems. Luckily watching TV is not usually a crucial activity to me while on vacation. Bottom line, to me the hotel is fine for $45 a night, and I wouldn't be at all upset if I received it on a PL bid again, but I don't think I'd want to pay rack (although truthfully, I wouldn't want to pay rack anywhere). Perhaps the bad channel selection, broken vending machines, and exorbitant parking rate would have been more of an annoyance had we been staying for longer than one night. I would definitely recommend asking for a corner room, as I think the difference between those rooms and the non-corner rooms might be a big enough factor to make a difference in the overall impression of your stay.

Bid this on 8/5, unfortunately wasn't able to post it before stay was completed. First bid was accepted. Congratulations, you got your price of $45 for a 3-star hotel room. Hilton Milwaukee City Center Downtown Milwaukee 509 W Wisconsin Ave Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53203 414-271-7250 Check-In Date: Sun, Aug 8, 2004 Check-In Time: After 04:00 PM Check-Out Date: Mon, Aug 9, 2004 Check-Out Time: 11:00 AM Your Offer Price: $45.00 Number of Rooms: 1 Number of Nights: 1 Subtotal: $45.00 Taxes & Service Fees: $12.84 Total Charges: $57.84 As always, thanks Betterbidding.com!

Bid this on 8/5. Was rejected at $26, $28, $30 (was offered +$8 rebid), and $32 (was offered +$8 rebid). Had originally hoped for the Hyatt based on its good reviews and neat location, but everything I've read about the Sheraton indicates it's a great place too. :) Lowest rate on Sheraton.com for these dates is $139/night. :) Congratulations, you got your price of $33 for a 3-star hotel room. Sheraton Cleveland City Centre Downtown Cleveland 777 St Clair Ave Cleveland, Ohio 44114 216-771-7600 Check-In Date: Fri, Sep 24, 2004 Check-In Time: After 03:00 PM Check-Out Date: Mon, Sep 27, 2004 Check-Out Time: 12:00 PM Your Offer Price: $33.00 Number of Rooms: 1 Number of Nights: 3 Subtotal: $99.00 Taxes & Service Fees: $22.65 Total Charges: $121.65 As always, thanks Betterbidding.com!

First bid $21 for compact, rejected. Then went to bid $23 for mid-size, Priceline gave me the "good chance at $28, great chance at $29" message...can't remember if I upped my bid to $24 or kept it at $23, but either way it was rejected. Then bid $25 for standard, and was surprisingly accepted by Hertz. Your Offer Price: $25.00 Total Rental Days: 10 Subtotal: $250.00 Taxes & Fees: $60.05 Total Charges: $310.05 Standard car from Hertz for these dates is $393 on Orbitz/Travelocity and $378 on Hertz.com without any coupon or discount code. Standard car on Hotwire for these dates is $363. Enterprise had the cheapest conventional price overall (at least among the companies that Orbitz lists) at $316. I'm thinking perhaps I could have gotten a full-size for my same $25 bid, as there is a <$10 difference in conventional rates between standard and full-size, but since there will only be two of us in the car it's not a huge deal.

Just wanted to add my congratulations! :)

Good idea thereuare, thanks. That's actually what happened to me on the second day of my stay at the Hyatt in Milwaukee, when attempting to switch from a room with two doubles to a king room. I went down to the desk at about 10:00 a.m. and the clerk told me that there would be king rooms available but they still needed to be cleaned. He said he could put the room on hold for us and we could check our bags with the bellmen, who would bring them up to our new room when it was available (we were about to leave and not planning to get back to the hotel until about 7:00 that night). All we needed to do was stop back at the desk that night to formally check in and pick up our keys, which we did without a problem. Of course in that case the clerk volunteered the information that there were king rooms that weren't spoken for but still needed to be cleaned. I never thought to ask on my own if that was the case on the occasions I mentioned when I was told that my desired room type wasn't available. I always assumed that not "available" meant that they were all already occupied, which as you point out, might not have been the case. Now that I think about it, even on a sold-out night, it does seem odd that a 900+ room hotel like the Renaissance Grand would be completely out of king, non-smoking rooms by 1:30 in the afternoon.

Well, I just got back from my trip to St. Louis this past weekend during which my girlfriend and I stayed at the Renaissance Grand and Hyatt Regency downtown. I had called ahead to both places to request a king, non-smoking room, and then looked up my reservations online to confirm that my requests were actually noted, which they were. We arrived at both hotels no later than 1:30 p.m. on the days we checked in. At the Renaissance Grand, the clerk not only made no mention of the preferences associated with my reservation, she didn't ask me if I had any room preferences either. As she was about to hand me the room keycards, I asked her if it was a king, non-smoking room. She told me that there were no more king, non-smoking rooms available (I do know that the hotel was sold out that night, so it's not entirely surprising that this was the case) and that the room she had given us was a non-smoking room with two doubles. At the Hyatt, the clerk at least noted that I had requested a king, non-smoking room, but said that there were no more available. She did offer us a handicapped-accessable king, non-smoking room, or a standard non-smoking room with two doubles. After she told us that the only difference between a standard room and a handicapped-accessable room was that there was no bathtub in the accessable room, we decided that wasn't a big deal to us and took it instead of the standard room with two doubles. Two more examples of calling in room preferences ahead of time doing no good. I hate to belabor that point, but I must say I'm slightly surprised that not one person has posted to agree with me in any way when all of my experiences suggest that my feelings on this subject are true. I think some people who have never happened to have an experience where a hotel was unable to fulfill their room requests after they've called them in ahead of time mistakenly assume a cause-and-effect relationship between them calling in their room preferences and receiving their desired room type, when in reality, had the hotel run out of whatever type of room they were requesting, having their requests on file would have been of no help; and since their desired room types have always been available, they could could have been equally successful in receiving them by making their requests at check-in instead of over the phone in advance. One possible exception that I acknowledge is the one WillTravel brought up, where a hotel charges different rates for rooms depending on the number of beds. As far as the Gold Passport issue, cakobau, I did actually talk to two different reservations people on the phone at the Hyatt St. Louis who told me that I couldn't add my GP # to my reservation in advance. Whether this is a policy of that individual hotel or the people I talked to were just incompetent, I don't know. I didn't want to push the issue and ask for a manager simply because it wasn't a huge deal to me. I did end having my GP number added after I checked in. By the way, it is possible to view Hyatt reservations (Priceline or otherwise) online whether or not your GP number is in your reservation, all you need is your confirmation number. bbbb, in the future I will take your advice and call customer service via the 1-800 number if I an unsuccessful having my GP number added by the hotel itself. Thanks for the tip!

Yes, the 1-800-CHECK-IN capability seems great, although I haven't been able to use it yet. The Hyatt Regency St. Louis has acknowledged that I can receive GP points for incidentals, but they still won't add my GP number to my reservation (they say I have to wait until I check in), which I assume precludes me from using 1-800-CHECK-IN. The ability to check in over the phone early in the morning would do away with having to worry about whether or not the hotel will have adequate availability to accomodate your room requests, especially if you don't plan on arriving until the evening.

My point wasn't really about Priceline/Hotwire guests being treated differently or having less of a chance of their room requests being accomodated. I have no doubt that most hotels will accept and honor, whenever possible, requests for specific room types no matter how the room was booked. My point was that requests seem to have no more chance of being honored when they are phoned in ahead of time than if they are simply stated at check in. Again, my understanding is hotels generally don't guarantee smoking/bedding preferences no matter what booking channel is used, and thus even if you've phoned in a request ahead of time, it will be of no help if all of the type of room you desire are occupied by the time you check in. That's why I asked if any hotels or chains were known to block out/hold rooms based on room preference requests in their reservation files (everything I've ever heard and common sense leads me to believe that this is not done). If this actually happens anywhere, then I could see where phoning ahead could make a difference. As I said, it certainly doesn't do any harm to phone requests in ahead of time, I was just curious as to whether or not most people would agree with my theory that it doesn't do much good either as it is not a guarantee of anything, and that waiting to state your preferences at the time of check-in is equally effective. Getting the type of room you want all depends on whether or not there are any more left by the time you check in. WillTravel brings up an interesting example though. It seems to me that hotels would have more of an obligation to ensure you get your requested bedding type if there is a price difference between rooms with different bedding arrangements and you have agreed to pay a certain amount with the understanding that you will get a specific bedding arrangment, although I don't know if even that guarantees anything.

I mentioned in my recent review of the Hyatt Regency Milwaukee that upon check-in, the clerk asked if my girlfriend and I would prefer a smoking or non-smoking room, despite the fact that I had called a few days before and asked that my preference for a non-smoking room with a king bed be input into my reservation. I know that my preferences were input into my reservation after I called because I pulled up my reservation on hyatt.com and saw with my own eyes that they were there. This means that either the clerk didn't bother to check whether or not there were any room preferences associated with my reservation, or she simply wanted to double-check that my preferences hadn't changed. Anyway, I repeated my requests to her for a non-smoking room with a king bed, but since the hotel was sold out that night there were no such rooms available, and we ended up being put in a non-smoking room with two double beds (no big deal). My question is, considering the fact that hotels generally don't guarantee that they will be able to fulfill room-type requests, as illustrated by what happened to me (not to say that I'm the first one this has ever happened to or that I didn't know it could happen), and in my case it's quite possible that the clerk didn't even look at the preferences in my reservation, isn't calling ahead to request smoking, bedding, view, etc. preferences a waste of time? Isn't it just as likely that you will get your preferred type of room by making your requests at the time of check-in instead of over the phone in advance of your stay? Of course calling in your preferences/requests does no harm (other than possibly wasting a couple minutes of time), but does it ever do any good? Do any hotels/chains actually block out rooms in advance based on preferences listed in their reservation system, or are there any special circumstances in which people have found that phoning in a request has been beneficial?

Stayed here on the nights of July 3rd and 4th, 2004. Arrived at about 3:30 p.m. (stated check-in time is 3:00 p.m., though I know that these times are rarely strictly enforced) to find only maybe one or two groups in line ahead of us at the front desk, despite the fact that the hotel was sold out that night. Clerk was very nice and asked for our smoking preference despite the fact that I had phoned ahead and requested a non-smoking king room. I repeated my requests to her, as she either didn't check the preferences in our reservation or wanted to double check that our preferences hadn't changed. She told us that there were no more non-smoking king rooms available and gave us three room options: #1 smoking king #2 non-smoking with two doubles #3 non-smoking "Parlor Room" with what sounded like a Murphy Bed which she said was a little smaller than a queen (she also said this room would be a little smaller than the others). We opted for the non-smoking doubles room and were assigned 1702 on what I believe was a Gold Passport floor based on the signs. Before giving us our keys she mentioned that our reservation was prepaid and suggested that we check back in the morning if we were interested in switching to a king room, which we did end up successfully doing. I can't add a whole lot to the description of the rooms in the previous post, although our rooms *did* have a coffeemaker in the bathroom and a few different packages of coffee (didn't pay a whole lot of attention to this, as I don't drink coffee). They also had the desk and swivel chair as previously mentioned, and I think this hotel now offers wireless high speed internet access for $9.95/day. Overall, the rooms were fine; nice and clean, showing no signs of wear. If I had to nitpick, I wish they had a taller piece of furniture on/in which to place the television. Although this isn't totally uncommon in my experience, the TV was just set on top of a dresser and about at eye level when lying in bed. When the blankets can partially block your view of the TV, I think it's too low. The bathrooms are not large but certainly adequate. We got a free newspaper delivered to our first room the first night, but didn't get one the second night at our new room. The hotel does have a skywalk on the 2nd floor in which you can go to the Grand Avenue Mall, but between the hotel and the mall is a federal building which you must go through on your way. Of course, this means having to have your bags inspected and going through a metal detector. What's even more odd is that on the way into the federal building from the hotel, they have an airport-style x-ray machine and walk-through metal detector. On the way into the federal building coming back from the mall, there is just a table with a security guard, who must hand-inspect all your bags and use a metal-detecting wand. Bottom line, unless it's raining or extremely cold, it's probably easier to just go outside and walk to the mall, especially if you're going to bring back bags of merchandise. Apparently you can also go to the convention center via skywalk, which doesn't require passing through the federal building. We actually ate at three of the hotel's restaurants, Knuckles sports bar, Polaris (the revolving restaurant on top of the hotel), and Pilsner Palace. I don't consider myself much of a connoisseur, but I thought the food was okay, if not great, at all three locations. I had the breakfast buffet at Pilsner Palace, which featured french toast, sausage, bacon, potatoes, cereal, made-to-order eggs/omelettes, and milk/juice/coffee. I would consider the food to be of standard "buffet quality," which was good enough for me, and for $9-$10 I wasn't expecting a gourmet meal. I think Polaris is worth visiting, especially if you've never been to a revolving rooftop restaurant, for although Milwaukee's skyline may not be up there with the best in the country, Polaris affords an excellent view of what there is. The atmosphere is classy yet very relaxed, which I enjoyed, and the staff was polite and attentive. Again, the food was probably just average, but to me it was a nice experience. Knuckles is a sports bar with a very limited selection of entrees. I had a cheeseburger and fries, which again, were pretty much average. The hotel is in a "good" downtown location, although downtown Milwaukee, in my experience, is eerily empty (at least on weekends) and without a whole lot to do except for during special events like Summerfest. There is no pool but there is a fitness room, which I did not visit. Self-parking is available for $10.50 for 24 hours (this is the discounted rate for hotels guests) at an adjoining parking garage which is not owned or operated by the hotel. I don't know about the valet parking situation. Overall I had a very pleasant experience here and wouldn't at all be disappointed to win this hotel again on a future Priceline bid.

No, I'm far from Diamond. I'm just plain old Gold. Like I said, I just signed up for the card once I won a Hyatt on Priceline, and since then I've won another Hyatt for a separate trip. Both stays are coming up...

Anybody have experience with Hyatt's Gold Passport program on Priceline stays? I'll be staying at a couple Hyatts in the near future and was trying to decide whether or not it would even be worth trying to present the Gold Passport card I signed up for after my first Priceline Hyatt win. As per their "terms and conditions," I understand that I am not eligible for points from the room rates I obtained on Priceline ("You will not receive Gold Passport points for discounted rates, including, but not limited to, Internet wholesale rates [such as priceline.com, Hotels.com, etc.], airline crew rates, airline employee rates, or net rates and travel agency employee rates"), but I'm not completely clear as to whether or not I am entitled to: #1 points for any incidental charges I may accrue, or #2 (and potentially more important to me) a room on the Gold Passport Floor. The points for incidentals don't really mean much to me, as I don't think I could pile up enough points in my lifetime to earn any rewards, but I am intrigued by the whole Gold Passport floor thing. Does anyone have any knowledge or reason to believe that rooms on Gold Passport floors are noticeably different from all the other ones? The website for the Hyatt Regency St. Louis mentions that rooms on Gold Passport floors include such additional features as candy dishes, daily newspaper delivery, and a coffee maker (ooOo) ! Other than that, I haven't found any information about what the typical difference is between a room on a GP floor and a room on any other floor. Most Hyatt websites just mention the existence of Gold Passport rooms but don't say anything about what's different about them. Figuring I had nothing to lose, I did call the Hyatt St. Louis and ask if they would input my Gold Passport number into my reservation, and the woman told me that since it was a Priceline reservation, I would not be entitled to any points. I said I knew that I wouldn't be entitled to any points, but I was wondering if I could still get a room on a Gold Passport floor. She told me to inquire at the time of check-in, and she never did input the number. Well, any feedback anyone has would be appreciated...

In searching for reviews on a particular hotel, I happened to stumble upon http://travel.yahoo.com/p-hotel-191500002-...2-hotel_guide-i, Yahoo's Hotel Guide. You can search by city, price range, hotel type, and/or hotel name, or browse by continent/country/city. When you click on any hotel name on the "results" page, it will take you to a page full of information about the hotel you've selected. If you scroll down to the section of the page labeled "Property Info," it should list what year the building that houses the hotel was built (I can't guarantee they have this information for every hotel on the planet, but it was listed for all the hotels I spot checked - even one in Monrovia, Liberia :) ). It's important to emphasize that I believe what is listed is the year the building that houses the hotel was built, not the year that the current hotel chain began occupying the building or even the year the building started being used as a hotel. For example, the listing for the Hyatt Regency St. Louis states that it was built in 1894, as it is located in the old Union Station! The hotel actually opened in 1985 along with a shopping mall after a major renovation of the then-unused station.

Was rejected at $42 and $45, waited 72 hours and was accepted at $50. Lowest rate on hyatt.com for these dates is $129/night. :) Congratulations, you got your price of $50 for a 3-star hotel room. Hyatt Regency Milwaukee Downtown Milwaukee 333 West Kilbourn Avenue Milwaukee, Wisconsin 53203 414-276-1234 Check-In Date: Sat, Jul 3, 2004 Check-In Time: After 03:00 PM Check-Out Date: Mon, Jul 5, 2004 Check-Out Time: 12:00 PM Your Offer Price: $50.00 Number of Rooms: 1 Number of Nights: 2 Subtotal: $100.00 Taxes & Service Fees: $21.62 Total Charges: $121.62

I realized after it was too late to edit the above post that one of the sentences is unclear. It should read "Trying to figure out a way to avoid paying over twice as much as a 3* DT SL hotel normally goes for on Priceline, I searched the first night of my stay separately from the second two nights on a few sites and found that availability was better."