Hotwire Hotel: WDW Hotel

[jayoung]

OK hotwire people, need your help.

Looking to book WDW in late August. A 4* hotel shows up on certain dates for $69 and says "Customer Favorite". At one time, a comment said it is across from Downtown Disney. So I'm thinking Wyndham or Hilton. Not sure any of the others could be considered 4*. Royal Plaza?

Now, here's the dig. On other dates (in the same time period) a 4* hotel shows up for $68, but this time there is no "Customer Favorite" icon. Both hotels have identical icons...rest, pool, gym, business, etc. Either this rules out the Wyndham, or it's hotwire playing with us, since that hotel has tennis and a spa.

SO...are they two different hotels or the same? I tried deleting cookies and get the same thing. Anyone care to comment on what's going on?

[thereuare]

What are the actual icons (please list them all, don't just put 'etc', as the amenities are key to helping identify properties). If you give us the exact date, some people familiar with the area could probably pull it up and read the Customer Comments themselves and pick up some other clues to help identify it.

What sub-zone of Orlando is this hotel in, 'Walt Disneyworld Area'?

Off the cuff, i would think that they're 2 different hotels, but i should probably hold back that comment until i know the full amenity list.... if the amenities are 'common' for the area, then i'd be more certain that they're different, but if any of the amenities are rare for the area, then i'd lean toward the probability that they're the same (although i've yet to see Hotwire operate this way).

[jayoung]

Sorry, I should have not said "etc". The icons for both the 4* customer favorite hotel at $68 and 4* hotel at $69 both have the same four icons: rest, pool, gym, business services. And the zone is WDW.

Looking for clues in the packages doesn't help. The Royal Plaza shows up at 3.5*, so let's assume they're consistent with the star rating and eliminate that hotel. Other 4* hotels in the WDW zone under packages include Celebration Hotel and Swan. Celebration hotel is a possibilty I guess...although at one point there was a comment about the customer favorite hotel being across from downtown disney, which rules out Celebration, which is on the other side of I-4. Let's assume that comment could still be applied to our mystery customer favorite. Also, the amenities don't match up either. The Swan is also not downtown disney and also lists more amenities...the Swan at those prices would be a steal anyway...

My two cents would be that either the hotels offered under hotel only are not the same offered in the packages, or else hotwire is inconsistent with the amenities list. I still suspect the hotels are Hilton and/or Wyndham just because they show up frequently on priceline. But until someone actually books one of these hotels...there's not enough clues for me to figure out what they are.

[thereuare]

It has already been discussed elsewhere on this site that not all hotels that participate in the "Blind Hotel Product" also participate in the Vacation Package product.

I think the hotel you are looking at is the Hilton WDW Resort. Based upon the info i have, it matches the amenities. I still haven't been able to read the customer favorite comments myself, so based upon what i know, i'm guesing it's the Hilton WDW Resort.

[jayoung]

I agree, I think that the customer favorite probably is the Hilton - which is very nice hotel and very convenient to downtown disney. Although...it's interesting to note that the Hilton is not shown as a package.

A hotwire rep says that the customer favorite tag will always show up with an associated hotel. If that is true, then there are two 4* hotels, one at a rate of $68 that is a customer favorite, and one at a rate of $69 that is not. They have the same four amenity icons...

Now if there are two hotels, why can't I get both of them to show up on the same date? Hotwire says they don't alternate and tried to say the hotels must have different availability. This is not true - one is available for a week...the other for specific days within that week. Somewhere along the line, what hotline is saying about their programming doesn't add up. The only thing they can tell me for sure is that it may or may not be a different hotel. That much I knew.

[thereuare]

You have to take what Hotwire reps say about their operations with a grain of salt... most of them aren't that knowledgable about the real ins/outs of the system. They can answer 'basic' questions quite well (ie- your purchase is non-refundable, the hotel will be within the shaded region of the map, etc), but ask them something intricate and out of the ordinary, and they won't likely be much help.

With the above said, the rep confirms my suspicions that it is indeed a different hotel. The amenity icons aren't that unique for this area, so there are likely quite a few hotels that meet this description (although not all of them may be 4* rated by Hotwire.... this is why i wanted i thought it would be helpful if you enabled others to pull the hotel up themselves, so that they can read the comments and add some insight).

I'm sure some hotels (the Hilton in this case) have their reasons for not wanting to participate in the Package program, it's really not surprising or unusual. They may feel the margins in the Package product aren't great enough, maybe they think it will canibalize their traditional business too much, or a variety of other scenarios.

You can't get both hotels to show up on the same date because in the 'blind' hotel product, Hotwire will only show you a maximum of one property per zone at the same star level.