crazymonkey

A few thoughts... 1) "Best Price Guarantees" are marketing tools that usually come with many strings attached. The point is that it sounds good, but the company rarely has to honor it. So you don't want to trust such a guarantee, no matter who gave it. 2) At a 2.5* rating, I'd be wary of using Priceline because the quality of the hotels in this category can vary quite a bit. At a minimum, I'd check this site's Priceline hotel list for the zones you are bidding on and make sure that ALL the hotels you might end up in are of acceptable quality and in a good and safe enough location. 3) If quality varies, you might be better off using Hotwire because you can usually narrow down which hotel you are going to get. So the risk decreases. 4) Regardless of whether you use Priceline or Hotwire, you want to get rates for all hotels that you might end up in as well as comparable hotels (e.g. from Expedia) and make sure not to bid more (or accept a higher price) than the lowest price for any of the eligible hotels on Expedia (after taking taxes and fees into account). 5) Due to the uncertainty about where you end up with PL or HW (you could always be the first to get a hotel not yet reported to this board) and because in case of trouble it is easier to deal with the hotel itself than with PL or HW, I would only use PL / HW if I can get a significantly lower price there than for any eligible hotel on Expedia. If you can't get a significantly lower price using an opaque product, might as well know what you get before you buy. There is more room for large discounts (dollar wise as opposed to percentage wise) at higher rated hotels, so PL / HW seem more attractive to me for these higher rated properties. 6) Although Expedia is my benchmark, I hardly ever book through them because you usually get the same rate when booking through the hotel's website directly. Again, in case of trouble a resolution is easier when less parties are involved. So bottom line: don't trust best price guarantees and do your own homework. I hope your future experiences with opaque products will be more pleasant.

Gamescom, the world's largest video games trade fair, is hosted in Cologne on those dates. If you check Expedia, you will see that hotels charge between 50% and 1000% (no kidding!) more on these dates.

Bidding for 5-star hotels in Orchard Road and City Hall zones. Started at $70 for 8/14/10-8/17/10. Used re-bid zones East coast, financial district, and Riverside in various combinations with the two target zones to increase offer at increments of $5. After increasing to $90, still no luck. Figured that few people ever won three night stays in Singapore and another poster claimed it was easier to win stays on weekends, rather than weekdays. Changed the dates to 8/14/10-8/16/10 and re-started bidding at $70, following the same strategy as above. Got the Hilton for $80, exact same rate that I got it for the weekend before this one. Then tried bidding for 8/17/10 by itself, but no luck up to $95. I need to fly out early morning on 8/17/10, so might just book a hotel closer to the airport by traditional means. Another option would be to go for 4* hotels in PL's East coast zone (which should be closer to the airport), but looking at BB's hotel list, this forum seems to have no knowledge about what hotel might turn up there. I used the forum's PRICELINE link to start bidding.

Bidding for 5-star hotels in Orchard Road and City Hall zones. Started very low at $50. Used re-bid zones East coast, financial district, and Riverside in various combinations with the two target zones to increase offer at increments of $5. Got the Hilton for $80. Great central location at a steal. :) I used the forum's PRICELINE link to start bidding. Going to bid for three more nights in Singapore after a trip to Malaysia. I'll let you guys know how that goes.

I was looking for hotels in downtown Chicago (Magnificent Mile and Loop areas). Started bidding for 4* hotels at $40. Bid up to $60 in $5 increments using re-bid zones Lincoln Park and Evanston. No acceptance. Moved down to 3.5* hotels, again starting at $40 for Magnificent Mile. Added Loop, bid $45. Added Lincoln Park, bid $50 and accepted by Ambassador East. It's just at the north end of the River North-NMA zone, so a bit of a walk to downtown, but crazy cheap. Before discovering Priceline, I used to stay at a hostel when going to Chicago, and that is 20 bucks more (and a lot further out).

This forum has been a great help, so just trying to give back with some info. First bid $55 French Quarter only, got rejected. Second bid included Downtown with the same price and got accepted by the Sheraton. So one might be able to save a few more bucks for staying in downtown. But since I was this close to booking a private room in a hostel far away from the French Quarter for the same price, I'm pretty happy, especially since the Sheraton is right on the edge between French Quarter and Downtown. Online rate for this hotel is $162 for those dates.