Priceline Hotel: 3* Ashville (East) Holiday Inn Biltmore East

[oldmanbob]

I have been playing the PRICELINE game 3 days consecutively now and finally have a room after great pateince and analysis.

I had selected the Ashville East, West, Downtown and Biltmore areas . I always first try to get the Comfort Suites Biltmore, but have ended up getting similar properties.

Of Note: the property I ended up with is NOT included on the Pinned up list of Hotels in the Asheville Area, so the moderators should consider adding it as a listed property.

The property I bid (using the PRICELINE link from this forum) and "won" on is :

Holiday Inn Biltmore East

1450 Tunnel Road

Asheville, NC 28805

With a bid of $91, and with fees ect., the overall total was $112.50

It was a bit further East than I had hoped and does not include breakfast, but the bid price was $30 less per night than the current non refundable rate available on PRICELINE or

other online hotel websites. Given that the date I chose is smack dab prime leaf viewing seson in this immediate area, thus the price is certainly fair. The leaves are a little slow this year due to extended warn season, and we ought to have high prime colors on the last weekend of October.

For the past three days, I had tried to get two consecutive nights reservations without success but had only bid $92 at my highest point, all without success. I changed it to one night and still had no success until today.

Overall pretty Ok bid... not great, but not bad.

[thereuare]

Congratulations on your success!

Can you please add a reply to this thread confirming the zone that this property is located in... you can confirm this by looking at your winning bid confirmation page and the PRICELINE zone will be indicated below the hotel name but above the hotel's address. It appears to me that this hotel is actually outside of PRICELINE's Ashville (East) zone (at least according to the plot on the map i'm viewing)

Thank you for using the PRICELINE links on the board to begin your bidding and for sharing your results, helping us add this property to the Priceline Hotel List.

Enjoy your stay.

[oldmanbob]

here is a copy of the confirm page. If I understand your description, then it is Asheville East

Your Hotel Information

Happy with your hotel Click here to extend your stay.

Holiday Inn Biltmore East (There were also three star symbols immediately after the Hotel name, but the stars did not copy to this post)

Asheville East

1450 Tunnel Road

Asheville, North Carolina 28805

[oldmanbob]

thereuare...

your map interpretation is right on target. I went back to Priceline maps and they "place" (the hotel pin icon) this hotel 9/10 of a mile closer to the Blue Ridge Parkway than Google maps does... To verify further, google maps also have street view which verify that the google map placement is correct and exact... Priclines is incorrect and the map circle for Asheville East does not extend to the actual location of this hotel.. more correctly, Google maps place this hotel a full 5/10 of a mile outside of and east of the Priceline Ashville East detail map circle. My guess is that it is a new property they have added and have yet to update thier map detail for Asheville East.

I previously trusted Priceline maps to be accurate... I guess I learned a lesson not tobe so trusting.

[thereuare]

Thanks for the follow-up!

If you're not happy with the hotel you may want to contact PRICELINE and let them know that this property is outside of the zone, but you'll have to first explain to them that their plot is incorrect.

If you do contact them let us know how it goes.

[oldmanbob]

I too had thought about the same concern and thought about notifying them but I have to balance that against the fact that other hotels in that area may be more expesiove given it s the prime weekend of fall colors in the area and all hotels will likely have no vacancy.

On another entirely different issue, Priceline alos has a different Holiday Inn in Ashville West. Better Bidding has it listed in the pinned list as a 2 1/2 star. When one checks Pricelines list, that exact hotel and address on ( 435 Smokey Park Highway in Asheville, NC 28806) is listed as a 3 start on Priceline but a 2 1/2 star on the pinned up list. The pinned up list needs to be updated for this property as well.

thanks for all your help, and I will check other properties to see if I should raise a concern about winning a property that is located almost a mile outside of their detail map zone.

Oldmanbob

[AaronJB]

If you write PRICELINE to let them know about the issue with this property, you could possibly say that you do not want to cancel because of the reason given above, but that you could ask for a bonus cash coupon or other reward for an upcoming stay.

Thank you for letting us know about the change in star rating for the other Holiday Inn property so that we can update the site's Priceline Hotel List for the state.