Priceline Hotel: 3* Orlando (Universal-I-Drive North) Holiday Inn Universal

[cleverduck]

I recently used PRICELINE to book a hotel room with Holiday Inn in Orlando. Upon checking in I was told that the negotiated price the price that I pre-paid and could not be revoked was not in fact the final price. There was now an extra "Resort Fee" that I would have to pay. After a day of travel I was tired, my 5 year old was tired and I didn't have any fight left in me. It was a small amount less than 3 dollars per room per night but that is not the point. If a hotel can tag on extra mystical charges as they please, what is to prevent them from adding on more substantial charges next time. The whole PRICELINE.com system in my opinion breaks down at this point because if you try to take it up with PRICELINE after the fact you will be ignored without so much as the courtesy of a "we-got-your-email" type of response. Priceline failed to respond to my complaints despite my attempts to contact them twice over the last 3 weeks.

I will never use PRICELINE.com again.

[thereuare]

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[cleverduck]

Details of my win

Holiday Inn Hotel & Suites Universal / Intl. Drive

8214 Universal Blvd

Orlando, FL 32819

407-581-9001

Star Rating: 3.5?

Orlando zone 9

2 rooms - 1 night

Check in: Saturday, February 20, 2010

Winning Bid $44.00 per room

[thereuare]

Sorry to hear you're disappointed with the resort fee charged by this hotel.

You agreed to potential 'resort fees' when you initialed the box that you read PRICELINE's terms and conditions:

Depending on the property you stay at you may also be charged (i) certain mandatory hotel specific service fees, for example, resort fees (which typically apply to resort type destinations and, if applicable, may range from $10 to $40 per day), energy surcharges, newspaper delivery fees, in-room safe fees, tourism fees, or housekeeping fees and/or (ii) certain optional incidental fees, for example, parking charges, minibar charges, phone calls, room service and movie rentals, etc.. These charges, if applicable, will be payable by you to the hotel directly at checkout.

I've stated before that i feel hotels should have to include any mandatory charges in their room rate (this goes for both opaque and non-opaque bookings), but until this happens, i think you simply have to do your homework and consider the amount of 'extra' fees you may have to pay directly to a hotel in a zone that you are bidding, and adjust your maximum bid accordingly... or use HOTWIRE which has now been disclosing Resort fees in the "know before your go" section of the detail page before you make your purchase. The savings involved by using the opaque supplies is sufficient enough that most of us are willing to accept the potential 'unknown' fee, and to swear off of PRICELINE i think is to cut off your nose to spite your face, imo.

[cleverduck]

You're nuts. You're saying that any priceline hotel can hit you with an extra $40 per day, call it a resort fee and that the priceline system has so much as a shred of integrity left in it? Your tone is condescending and unwelcome, your manipulation of my posting shows this website to be a poorly disguised shill for these companies, imo.

[Scandinavian777]

Hi cleverduck,

While I completely understand your frustration (I really do, I raised this issue before on this board) I don't think the response from thereuare in any way indicates sympathy for or endorsement of the way it currently works with those fees. It is true that there is no way of knowing the resort fee until after the booking has been made. For you and me and thereuare and a ton of other people this is not optimal, for the simple reason that the final cost of the stay will and can not be known at the time of booking. Neither you nor I nor thereuare can do much about it, however, the more we raise awareness of this the higher the chance that priceline will change the policy in the long run.

I don't think thereuare is nuts, but like you and many others I do believe the system with hidden resort fee is borderline clinically certified nuts and I think that was what you really meant.

Best regards

Scandi

PS: thereuare - great forum, keep up the spirit.

[dahammer]

nobody likes surprises and a Resort Fee is one of my biggest gripes with PRICELINE. Winning bidders at the Red Rock Resort outside of Vegas pay a $25 resort fee. But, to put things in perspective, you probably saved $60 or more compared to a conventional booking, so you're still way ahead of the game considering a $3 fee.

There's no reason to use pejoratives here or to make false accusatory statements regarding the moderator or this board such as you have. The free tools and information found on this board has enabled me to save a couple of thousand dollars using PRICELINE.

[ready.teddy]

Hi Duck,

I got that H-Inn dump last August on Hotwire and was scammed with the $3 fee too. I was properly pissed with Hotwire for awhile too. Eventually I got a hold of them and they gave me $20 of hot bucks to use on a future stay. Keep trying with Priceline and maybe they will make you even too.

I'm hoping if enough people complain, these low life properties will be dropped, which is why I complained to H-Inn too. Never heard back, guess they don't care. I even slammed their business practice on Tripadvisor and can you believe that some foreigners (british I think) slammed me! THEY told me that resort fees are like taxes and always added to the list price! That is why they get away with it, because most people are sheep and accept getting fleeced. Funny how my review there disappeared, and other glowing ones are now, there-hello from the front desk...

This forum is not the problem though. I have always gotten straight advice and although I didn't like being told that I agreed to resort fees under the "rules of service", that is a fact. I have not seen any conflict of interest here. I have not found better hotel prices anywhere other than priceline and hotwire which is why I use them for all our family trips.

Happy Travels

Ready.Teddy

[cleverduck]

Thank you for all the responses.

There is a fundamental disconnect between how you folks look at this situation and how I perceive it. To a person you all proclaim your dislike for resort fees and how underhanded they are and then you all turn around and support the system with further transactions. Do you think that Priceline and Hotwire or any company or any politician for that matter cares in the slightest about your indignant words of complaint when your actions are contradictory. It would be the easiest thing in the world for these companies to require their partners to structure there bid acceptance based on a final - all in price. Why don't they just do this?, because they all know they can nickle and dime you fine folks and though you talk a good game in the end you won't actually vote with your feet.

The other common theme in your responses is that you are still ahead of the game because of the great rates you get and that you've learned to live with being locked into a transaction without knowing how much it is going to actually cost you. The father of a friend of mine once shared with me a PRICELINE EXPRESSion his father had brought from the old country. " Always deal with an honest man, a dishonest man has more ways of cheating you then you have of protecting yourself". You all deserve the system you support and none of you have any business complaining.

So though I have no sympathy with you, I do feel sorry for the hotels who have to play the crooked game as it is laid out by these bidding sites. They'd loose a lot of business to their competition hiding their true prices behind these dishonest resort fees if they didn't structure there bid acceptance in the same way.

And, I really feel sorry for the hard working desk clerks who are left to try to explain what the heck a resort fee is for to tired and irate travellers when the truth is that its a dirty little trick dreamt up by the folks in marketing.

The really scary part in all of this is that although you know what's right and wrong, you keep selling your soul off imperceptible bit by imperceptible bit until you left looking around wondering why you can't trust the political and business leaders you created.

I wish you all good luck. I'm travelling a different path.

[dahammer]

Thank you for all the responses.

It would be the easiest thing in the world for these companies to require their partners to structure there bid acceptance based on a final - all in price. Why don't they just do this?, because they all know they can nickle and dime you fine folks and though you talk a good game in the end you won't actually vote with your feet.

I usually vote with my wallet, and I'm not going to cut off my nose to spite my face. I just can't bring myself to paying rack rates anymore. Is it a perfect system? Not at all, but its the best way to get a great deal on a hotel room that would otherwise go empty.

I used to get unglued over having to pay parking fees at some airport hotels, so I discontinued bidding in these zones and just bid in an adjacent zone. In over 200 PRICELINE transactions, I don't recall paying one resort fee. This is where HOTWIRE might come in handy since they disclose resort fees prior to purchase. But, it has been my experience that HOTWIRE is generally more expensive than PRICELINE in similar zones.

[ready.teddy]

Just one more comment is necessary to add to this thread. The reason we are all here is that the posts and hotel lists give us enough clues to make a close guess as to what property we will receive. I for one use this info to avoid locations with parking and resort fees. Having read of $25 fees at some resorts, I will never be bidding a resort. I hope they appreciate the loss of business. Also, it costs nothing to complain, I got hotwire credit for the resort fee I paid and it looks like others have too, see this link to a CNN story:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/03/18/resor...x.html?hpt=Sbin

Better luck next time,

Ted

[davidmsp]

Cleverduck--I concur with you. In this electronic age, it is rediculous that the resort fee is not factored in. Plus, those locations that charge $10 to $12 per day.

Just ask, do you need parking, and bid it that way a room plus one parking space for $X dollar.

Or some hotels in the area have resort fees, what is your bid for the room plus the resort fess $XXX.

If one hotel has a $10.00 resort fee and another $3.00, you might stay at the latter hotel. Thus, Priceline does a disservice to the hotels with the lowest all in cost with a lower resort fee. Plus, it upsets a lot of its customers. It is easy enough to fix.

Hope Priceline and Hotwire get the message and change this bidding with resort fees and parking.