Priceline Hotel: Travel thoughts on family WDW visit

[seningen]

I'm posting this because THEREUARE was astute enough to notice

I had mentioned different dates for my trip to WDW this October (in different posts)

He asked me which dates were valid and I sent him the following note: (both were)

He recommended that I post here -- as this apparently is a common case

with folks on this list:

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I've got multiple parties travelling -- so multiple overlap dates

I'm headed on business 10/1-10/5,

the family is joining to extend 10/5-10/10.

I have additional family visiting as well 10/6-10/9

for 2 rooms.

None of the individual dates HAS to be the same hotel,

but of course it would be nice.

Makes using PL & HW a little trickier.

My stragegy is to find the 10/5-10/10

somewhere in WDW area (either 3* or Resort)

depending on $$. Then get the 2 extra rooms

10/6-10/9 using the pirce info from 10/5-10/10

knowing that it might not work out that way.

10/1-10/5, I am very flexible -- just need to be

near the WDW or Seaworld area. So if

a 10/1-10/10 hit for a better rate than

10/5-10/10 that would be fine.

Another possibility is to land the 10/5(or 10/1) - 10/10 date

and call up the hotel I get and make and offer for 2 more rooms

10/6-10/9 -- but I don't have high hopes here.

A co-worker of mine had a similar case visiting San Diego this spring,

He had a room at the Hyatt downtown via PL, and his wife was visiting

later that week and he wanted to extend the visit through the weekend.

He couldn't get anything but rack rate from anyone at the hotel while we

were there -- so he called his wife back -- she PL'd -- hit the same hotel

for 1/3 the cost (within a buck or so of what we had paid). So dealing

directly may not work.

I know about PL's ability to tack on a night, but that really wouldn't work here for me

as if I did a 10/6-10/9 for 3 rooms, I would want to tack on one night in both directions,

and then do it for only one room -- I'm sure neither add-on works within the PL rules.

In the end -- I'll play it by ear and see what happens.

Mike

[thereuare]

If we break this down it really just boils down to three separate stays since you don't require the three sets of dates to be at the same property.

If it were me i would book the 10/1-10/5 dates and the 10/5-10/10 dates first. Then i would at least check Hotwire for 10/6-10/9 to see if what is believed to be the hotel won for 10/5-10/10 appears... i think it would be worth a few dollars more to increase the chances of having everyone be together at the same hotel.

I think bidding it as three separate stays instead of two (10/1-10/10 and 10/6-10/9) slightly betters your chances of getting the same property for the second half of the stay where you need two rooms.

It all comes down to how much you want to spend. If you give us a maximum bid amount we'll suggest a strategy.