What if the hotel goes bankrupt?

[WillTravel]

I know some people have posted wanting to know what happens if Priceline goes bankrupt. I don't think that is going to happen soon, but I was personally curious about the case where a hotel or hotel chain goes bankrupt. Le Meridien's current situation got me to thinking about this - although I'm sure with that large a chain some sort of deal is going to be worked out. In any event, I decided to write another email to Priceline's customer service and see what they said. Here it is:

Thank you for taking the time to send us an e-mail. We understand that

you would like to know you would like to know what will happen to the

request if the hotel goes out of business.

[name ] , all reservations made though priceline are completely

secure. Upon the acceptance of your request, priceline has already

purchased your hotel nights, so there is absolutely no risk that you

will not receive them.

However, in situations such as these, we will evaluate requests on a

case by case basis.

We hope this information is helpful to you, and look forward to serving

your future travel needs.

Sincerely,

Neelam M.

The priceline.com Customer Service Team

Note that CS does not say precisely what they will do if the hotel goes bankrupt, but they do state you are completely secure. Maybe Priceline does not want to commit to a specific course of action.

[thereuare]

That's business these days... nobody wants to commit to anything in writing.

I know that it's always been said that Priceline pays for your room once it's accepted, but i seem to recall something in their financial documents that the rooms are actually paid for after your stay. I'll have to go back and see if i can find it and make sure i remember it correctly.

I wouldn't be too concerned with this as most of the hotels Priceline deals with are large, nationwide chains. One could take this further and ask, "what if there is a fire", or any other variety of catastrophies. In all cases, you've paid for a product/service that you didn't receive (due to circumstances beyond your control, this is different than not receiving the service because you didn't show up) and i think it would be fairly easy to get a refund. If i'm correct on their SEC documents stating that the room is paid for after your stay, then it would be even easier.

[part-timetravel]

Priceline(and hotwire) both pay with one time use credit cards that are charged once a guest leaves or no shows.

[WillTravel]

Le Meridien has been rescued, it appears.

http://www.quicken.com/investments/news_ce...ar&column=P0DFP

I can't see that this new regime should make any difference at all to Priceline customers, except I suppose there's always the general problem of merging two or more administration systems.