Priceline Hotel: timing of bidding

[karczar]

Hi. I'm new to this site. Read a few posts and seems like a great site and I will use your link to use priceline. I'm going to paris from May 26th to 31st. I'm wondering if there is an ideal time to bid to get a great deal on a 4 star hotel.

I'm not sure if hotels tend to lower their price more when the booking date is getting very close to the reservation date and they have not filled rooms, vs. if I book 1.5 months ahead of the actual reservation date.

Another more basic question since I've never used priceline. I understand it's a binding contract once they accept your bid. However, it seems from the previous postings that when you are offered counter bid you are able to choose? Is it possible to get multiple counter bid?

Thank you for help.

PS, My ideal place would be around $100 for Renaissance in La Defense

[AaronJB]

Welcome to the site. :)

There is no "best time" to bid. It is specific to the city and dates. My best suggestion would be to look on Expedia.com or other similar services and get an idea of what regular rates are for your dates, then get a sense of what a good starting bid would be based upon those rates. If there's something going on - a convention, etc - then rates are going to be higher.

Many, many people on the site ask when is the best time to place a bid. Unless one can somehow accurately predict occupancy rates well in advance, it's simply best to try and get a good price based upon what rates are like *right now.*

One of my favorite stories is a woman who wanted help last July with booking a hotel in Chicago in October. I told her there was a convention on those dates and she should book right then and there. She decided to wait it out. Guess who came back absolutely frantic looking for hotel help a few months later when all the hotels on her dates were now twice as much?

PRICELINE and HOTWIRE are NOT good choices to try to get a specific hotel, as noted in this post: http://www.betterbidding.com/index.php?sho...view=getnewpost

PRICELINE may or may not offer a counter-offer to your bid. You can accept it, or you can choose to not accept it and try to bid again to see if the service will accept a price between your offer and the counter-offer by the service.

[Romelle]

Regarding that "binding contract" part - it is! People able to get out of a deal are few and far between. Best to assume there are no options after you have accepted a bid.

Further, when you accept a bid, your credit card gets dinged right then. I learned this the hard way once when I thought I was putting in a "low ball" offer in London, some 5 or 6 months ahead of time. It was accepted, and I scrambled to fund that particular credit card bill. Hadn't been planning on payment right then for 10 hotel nights much later.

Romelle