Priceline Hotel: 3.5* Philadelphia (University Area) Sheraton University City Hotel

[Plebian]

Hi, would like to stay in Philadelphia, University Area, on the night of Wed March 27.

After studying the maps and past bids, I began with a bid of $75 for 3.5 stars.

Rejected. Went to $80 and 3.0 stars.

Rejected. Went to $85 and 2.5 stars.

Note: A little surprised there was a 2.5 because I have yet to see it listed. I presume it is the Homewood Suites although most other sites list the Homewood as a 3 star.

I had researched the hotels in this zone, Hilton Inn and Penn ($39 parking) and Sheraton ($25 parking) and Homewood ($39 parking) and am mentally factoring that into my budget as we have a car.

Would like to pay $140 or less including the parking, at which point I either want to add a zone or jump to HOTWIRE. I noticed HOTWIRE included hotels farther from the university, which is our destination, so I avoided that at first.

Thanks so much.

[thereuare]

After studying the maps and past bids, I began with a bid of $75 for 3.5 stars.

Rejected. Went to $80 and 3.0 stars.

Rejected. Went to $85 and 2.5 stars.

You don't want to lower your star rating and increase your price at the same time as you have done above, as this can easily lead to an overbid. See this Priceline Bidding Tip thread for a further explanation.

Also, are you familiar with re-bidding as explained here: Priceline Re-Bidding Explained

How high do you want to bid (up to your limit or some lower amount?) for a 3.5* before lowering your star rating to 3*... and how high for a 3* before lowing your star rating to 2.5*?

Also, please confirm your maximum bid price (not including taxes, fees, or parking charges)

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

Let us know the information above and we'll take it from there.

[Plebian]

Hello, I don't understand how I overbid, as all of these attempts failed. My conclusion was that I did not bid enough. I was more concerned that I was only adding $5 increments. I did not find a strategy explained on bidding increments. I don't know how much more I should pay for the increments. When the past history said that $67-$85 were regularly accepted bids, I just started with $75 figuring I was in the ballpark.

I did read all 5-6 pages of the rebidding explained, and primarily the focus is how to add zones and various cool venn diagrams. Frankly, I spent so long reading it, I felt I needed to get my bids going if I were going to do it, and I figured that people need time to post back to me if I asked how to rebid. Also, one of the hotels admitted that they were getting pretty low on inventory for our travel date.

I was willing to take any of the hotels in the zone. I started at the highest level hotels, a 3.5, and it failed. I did not want to go further away and the zones nearby I saw all had 3.5s too, so there were no other options than to lower my star level. I did not find an answer that helped me in the thread for this particular instance.

Max bid for room itself is $110. I did not register on PL. I can bid again in about 12 hours, depending on what Daylight savings time did to my bid. I am pacific so it was before the clocks flipped, but no idea if PL is on East Coast time.

Thanks for your help.

[Romelle]

Daylight savings: Once you get past today all you have to worry about is a full 24 hours between bidding sessions. Makes no difference what time zone you are in.

For today, because of the daylight savings issue, maybe just assume worst case and do a full 25 clock hours or 24 actual.

Overbidding: There weren't any hotels available so you didn't overbid. You are right that you did not bid enough, at least right now (things change).

However if the situation were:

3* available at $86

2.5* available at $72

Your first bid of 3*/$80 wouldn't win anything

However, your second bid of 2.5*/$85 would get you that $72 hotel. An overbid of $13.

When you lower your star rating, you want to start with a lower bid to check for such a situation. If you'd even lowered it to $75 you would have had only a $3 overbid if the availability were like my example.

"Free Rebidding": You noticed the other nearby zones only had hotels lower than 3.5*s. Priceline will let you check them when you've already been bidding at the 3.5* level. This lets you continue the bidding session and raise your bid. Once for each of those zones that don't have the star level you are bidding, or a higher star level.

I'd suggest you post a list of the zones you think are OK for the rebidding at your chosen star level, and somebody will double check it for you.

Further questions: By all means, ask back.

Romelle

[Plebian]

Okay, so that was pretty helpful. So it appears that I could go two routes: If I want to stay with the 3.5 Star minimum, I could add Zone 1, or Zone 2, or Zone 11 because none of these three zones have a 3.5 star hotel at all.

If I want to lower my level to a 3.0 star minimum, I could add Zone 4, 7, or 10 because these zones are either 1 star or 2.5 star.

Question: Do you start with the 3.5? IF I add zone 1, and it is rejected, do I get to then REMOVE Zone 1 when adding Zone 2? Or am I just adding more and more zones when I bid?

Question 2: If the 3.5 zone doesn't work, and I lower it to a 3.0, I HAVE to remove zones 1, 2, or 11. Otherwise I could end up with a 3.0 in one of those areas instead. So, can these extraneous zones be removed? Otherwise, I should not lower it a half-star and wait 24 hours to start again, correct?

Question 3: Should I officially register with Priceline? Does that help this process or make it worse?

Thank you again.

[Romelle]

Question 1:

If you stay with the 3.5*, there are actually six free rebid zones - the three you listed plus three more. This is really nice for bidding because it lets you move up in small increments. Not so important when just bidding one night, but it really helps when bidding a week or 10 days or so.

While it takes longer to type, it is best to communicate with zone names instead of numbers. If Priceline happens to add or delete a zone, all the numbers further down the list change.

So - if you make your 3.5* University zone bid and it gets rejected, you add Cherry Hill. If that combo gets rejected, you add City Line. Etc. (The order in which you add the free zones doesn't make any difference, but it is a bit easier to keep track if you do them alphabetically in the order of the list.)

Question 2:

If, unfortunately, nothing works at 3.5*, you need to get clear out of Priceline and then come back in again, linking through betterbidding. This is the only way to get all the zones un-checked so you can go to work on 3*s. In responses to other members, this is usually referred to as "close your browser".

Gloucester, Museum and Runnemed are the correct 3* rebid zones (the ones you listed by number).

Question 3:

I don't know as it makes a difference? I'd guess not.

For the record, I'm a member rather than an official moderator or administrator or such. I've done a lot of bidding, but did want to alert you to my amateur status.

Romelle

PS - if you get in to this bidding thing again and are bidding a city with Resorts, be aware there are some odd differences and ask for specific help. Places like Florida, Phoenix and Las Vegas have Resorts.

[thereuare]

How high do you want to bid (up to your limit or some lower amount?) for a 3.5* before lowering your star rating to 3*... and how high for a 3* before lowing your star rating to 2.5*?

Also, please confirm your maximum bid price (not including taxes, fees, or parking charges)

If you let us know the above we will outline a suggested bidding strategy for you to follow.

Your maximum bid price should be based upon a combination of:

1) how much your budget will allow

2) retail rates for your dates using our sister site MAPS and HOTELS.com... find the best deal for a hotel at the star rating you're bidding within the zone(s) you're bidding. Then take some percentage discount from that room rate to 'compensate' for the unknown factor of buying an 'opaque' hotel.

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

[Plebian]

Romelle, thanks so much for all of your help. I did get back in and worked through your email advice point by point. Unfortunately, I got up to $120 and still did not get a hotel and ran out of choices. I do however, now understand the workings of Priceline much more clearly than I did. I can see how people were buying the wrong thing before finding this website. I appreciate your mentioning your status on the board; I was paying attention to the post levels, and you clearly have been at this a while.

Status update for now: Will check out Hotwire, although they zone cities differently, so that may not work out for me. Will keep trying PL in 24 hours again, but am not sure my luck is going to turn. I did a test, and the hotels' own websites are not offering advanced-purchase for these locations whereas their other locations still have AP available.

[Plebian]

2) retail rates for your dates using our sister site MAPS and HOTELS.com... find the best deal for a hotel at the star rating you're bidding within the zone(s) you're bidding. Then take some percentage discount from that room rate to 'compensate' for the unknown factor of buying an 'opaque' hotel.

ThereUare, thank you for your response. I'm sorry I didn't address it in the prior reply. Yes,that percentage discount is the key. I had looked at some Travelocity and Expedia prices for the properties so I have a fairly good idea what they offered, and also "full price" because I called them all. I'm not confident there are any PL rooms to be had in this particular zone at the moment, as I mentioned.

[thereuare]

I'm not confident there are any PL rooms to be had in this particular zone at the moment, as I mentioned.

I'd bet that there are rooms... just not at the prices you're bidding. ;)

Using MAPS and HOTELS.com (or whatever source you'd like, but we created MAPS and HOTELS.com so that you can easily find see the information we're asking above, as you can easily only select ONE ZONE and either 1) sort by price or 2) zoom in on the map, focus your eyes to the PRICELINE zone boundaries, and see the lowest price available).

What is the best rate you're able to find at an acceptable hotel at each star level in the zone(s) that you're bidding??

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

[Plebian]

$132 per room, recommended 90 percent Hotwire reviews

Reg price $229

4-star Hotel in Center City West / University City

This Hotel features the following amenities:

Smoke Free Rooms

Fitness Center

Restaurant(s)

Business Center

High-Speed Internet Access

Accessible for the blind

Accessible for the deaf

Accessible path of travel

In-room accessibility

Wheelchair accessible

Accessible bathroom

Handicapped parking

Roll-in shower

I am wondering how likely this is the Hilton Inn at Penn, which I would like to get. I saw this post: Hotwire Hotel Philadelphia

Someone thought it might be Westin, Sofitel or Le Meridien. Do these also match as well in your opinions? I noticed this hotel does NOT have free Internet, a kitchenette or a pool which helped me to narrow it down some.

Thank you!

[thereuare]

I assume that your most recent post above is for the same dates as your previous Philadelphia request and have merged the threads... please keep all posts for the same stay in the same thread. When you ultimately win a hotel use the EDIT TO REPORT WIN button on the lower right of this page (only visible to the OP) and the thread will automatically be moved to the correct section of the board, if necessary.

Note that the amenities of the 4* hotel you posted above are different then the amenities in the thread that you linked to where the Hilton was won. While this could be a new amenity set for the Hilton (as i don't see anything offered in the amenities that would exclude it from being the Hilton), the Le Meridien has been seen with this amenity set so that would be my best guess for this one.

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

Let us know how it goes or if we can be of further help.

[Plebian]

Yes, the Hotwire question is for the same dates. I didn't know I should post them together. I don't know that I will pursue that particular Hotwire lead if Le Meridian is more likely to be the win. There are two more Hotwire leads I will study.

Thank you!

[Plebian]

Forgot to mention that when I linked on the MAPS and HOTELS.com webiste, PRICELINE in its named section says Le Meridian is $169 and Hilton Inn at Penn is $229. Is that information reliable or no?

[Romelle]

Forgot to mention that when I linked on the MAPS and HOTELS.com website, PRICELINE in its named section says Le Meridian is $169 and Hilton Inn at Penn is $229. Is that information reliable or no?

That one is easy to check just by going on the retail (named) section of Priceline. It most likely is totally reliable.

And if you find it on the named section, that is 100% reliable as that is Priceline's retail price.

Romelle

PS - regarding the Hotwire deals - often times one can do a little better via Priceline bidding. No magic formula, but likely. Also, Hotwire tends to be a little more generous with their stars, so a 4* on Hotwire might be a 3.5* on Priceline. Lots of examples of this, but a few examples of same star rating and a few of a full star difference. It is just something to be taken into account when comparing across the two. If you line up the Hotel Lists from the two for the same city you can sometimes see the same hotel names in both, and then you can note if they have the same star ratings or not.

PPS - in your earlier posts you mention parking rates. Priceline bidding (guaranteed amenities) and Hotwire opaque offers sometimes have an icon showing for free parking.

[Plebian]

Won Philadelphia Sheraton University City Hotel-- $105

Travel date March 27

Purchased through PRICELINE EXPRESS Deals. Notice it says "This reservation has been provided by our partner Tourico Holidays, Inc."

Details:

Using Better Bidding PRICELINE links, I worked all the way through the regular bids adding zones at 3.5 all the way up to $150.

Reset browser, started with 3.0-star worked all the way up the level 3.0 to about $145 and again no hotel won.

Reset browser, with 2.5-star worked up to $150 and no hotel won.

Got to my last "you have not won" page and clicked the Express Deals. Was offered a hotel in the last two zones I failed at: University and Museum District.

I clicked on the University one and bought it at $105.

I did bid much higher than I originally planned but was still $50 less than the Expedia / Travelocity pricepoints for all three hotels in the zone. We felt we had bought airline tickets and wanted to maximize the time we had for the location. Also, I would not have gone so high on the 2.5 except I knew that particular hotel was brand new.

Other notes: Was surprised to see Pet friendly was an amenity for the Sheraton University City.

[Romelle]

I'm happy for you. And you are definitely bidding like a pro now. Very smoothly executed. Sometimes it just doesn't work, but you have the satisfaction of knowing you made the best possible try at it.

What star level is the Priceline Express deal you accepted? And what amenities did it show?

Romelle

PS - As they attempt their bidding in the Philadelphia area, other members will think kind thoughts at you for your full description of your adventures.

[thereuare]

Congratulations on your success!

Glad to see you got this stay settled and are hopefully pleased with the results.

If you recall, can you please add a reply to this thread confirming the amenities that PRICELINE EXPRESS associated with this property.

Tourico is a travel wholesaler who supply inventory to many different travel suppliers, they are legit and you should have no issues.

Thank you for sharing your win and using the PRICELINE links on the board to begin your bidding.

Enjoy your stay.

[Plebian]

Hi, thanks to both of you for your advice! I also read many other threads as I worked through the process. Thanks also for the input on Tourico.

I did write down the amenities:

3.5-Star Hotel, University Area, $105

Free Internet

Indoor or Outdoor Pool

Restaurant

Pet Friendly

Fitness Center

Initially, these were little blue icons and I clicked on them or a button to find out what they meant.

[thereuare]

Great... thanks for the follow-up!

Enjoy your stay.