Hotwire Hotel: 5* Rome Central March 26 - 31 2009

[Radar 12]

After seeing some other successes with De La Ville Intercontinental Roma,

I bid $160 each for 2 rooms for 5* Rome Central March 26 - 31, 2009.

PL countered at $210. I did not accept.

Added Vatican zone, rebid at $166. They did not accept.

PL then linked me to a non-opaque FeeChop reservation window for the De La Ville Intercontinental Roma for $269/night. Not interested.

This is vacation tourism. I want to be centrally located, not far out. I need room for 3 adults: Self, spouce, and spouce's mom. One triple room is fine, or 2 PL doubles, since you can't PL a triple.

Hotwire showed $259 for a triple, or $179 for 2 adults:

5-star hotel in Rome Central This hotel features the following amenities:

Fitness Center Guests have access to exercise equipment; an additional charge may apply.

Restaurant(s) Property offers at least one restaurant on the premises; hours and days of operation may vary.

Business Center Guests have access to business equipment and services; an additional charge may apply.

Sound like the IC, or something else?

Any suggestions for strategy?

I note that PL added $20.90 per night per room onto my bid price. I thought European hotels included all taxes and VAT in their quoted price? So is a $179 HW price better than a $166 (+$21 = $187 all inclusive) PL price, or does HW add fees on to the end, after they've got you, too? Whoops, I just found it, HW "Tax recovery charges & fees": $20.08/night. Boo. That is not small.

Yes I used the BB links as above.

BTW, I was referred here to BB by Flyertalk.com, where I am active on the COntinental board.

[WillTravel]

There are two ways to try to get a good idea of what a hotel is.

One is to look at the list of Hotwire hotels in Rome, which is included here:

Hotwire Hotel List

Looking at that list, you can see the list of amenities does match the Intercontinental.

Another way is to set up a dummy Flight + Hotel package which matches your date range (with an extra day at the start to allow for the flight), and see what hotels show up. This is not foolproof, as the hotels listed for the vacation packages may or may not be the same as you get when doing a regular search. Doing this, you also see that the 5* Intercontinental comes up with the same amenities.

It's hard to get a nice, well-located hotel for a cheap price in Rome, so I think this is a pretty good deal.

[thereuare]

Welcome to BetterBidding!

I will also add that PRICELINE only guaratnees double occupancy, after that it's up to the hotel, so bidding on PRICELINE when you'll actually be more than double occupancy, can be a risky proposition, especially in Europe where rooms are notorious for being a bit more 'cramped' than in other parts of the world. It's quite possible you could end up in a room with only one bed, little/no room for a rollaway, and you'd be at the mercy of the hotel to either accomodate your triple ocucupancy request as well as any additional charge they wanted in order to accomodate three people.

I would also suggest that an additional charge would be a very realistic possibility... if you search HOTWIRE again for 3adults (vs. the 2adults i assume you used on your previous search above) you'll see that the 5* jumps in price from $179/nite to $259/nite... so it seems to make sence that this property charges and extra ~$75/nite for a room which can accomodate triple occupancy vs. double occupany.

Let us know your thoughts based upon the above.

Thanks for using our PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links.