Hotel booking sites

We booked with Bookings.com to go to Malta .They cancelled five weeks before travel as hotel had closed. The only support they offered was to show us very expensive hotels. We were a party of eight and getting desperate to find somewhere. We took a chance and booked a house on Gozo on Air B&B and it was beautiful. The owner could not have been more helpful.

I usually use booking.com for weekend hotels but recently had to book a hotel in Rhyl and there was very little choice. It's my home town and I knew choice would be limited, so I then went on trip advisor and found a premier inn on the sea front. Fairly new, so booked direct with them at a good price.

Before booking any hotel, I always compare rates and which type of the services they provided. Mostly I prefer Booking.com and Expedia for hotels booking. There are also some other sites such as HotelsCombined.com, Trivago, Priceline, Hotels.com, Agoda.com, HostelWorld.com, Orbitz and HotelTonight.

how awful! What a nightmare start to a much anticipated holiday.

We've used agencies and hotels direct.
I booked via an agency (On the Beach) for a hotel in Egypt we had stayed in several times before.
Booking direct to the hotel was always more expensive so I just went with the agency.
BIG PROBLEM
When we arrived at 10.30 pm the hotel had security waiting for us, the hotel had been closed for over 3 months.
The agency had quite happily taken the full cost of the hotel for the 6 weeks we were to be there and had not known the B*** hotel had closed.
My fault I should have double checked.
Thank goodness we had stayed in the area many time before so knew the sister hotel and went there for the night before booking in at a better located hotel the next day.
I must say though it is the only time we have every had a problem, most hotels will contact you if there is a problem.
Always double check.

Roadrunner, would you elaborate on 'hotel programmes' please? I googled and what appeared seemed only for professionals.

I look on booking sites, then hotel's own site, then phone to make sure that they can cope with my husband's disabilities and idiosyncrasies. If they sound as if they can't be bothered, I go elsewhere.

We are just back from a few days in the lakes and although we were advised to go through booking.com phoned the hotel direct and got a better deal. On speaking to the owner she told us that they have to pay 18% to booking.com and by booking direct we got an online discount and an upgrade when we got there ?

Terribull Expedia and Booking.com are part of the same company.

I look at the booking sites and comparison sites and it's surprising that sonetimes the comparison sites sjow prices lower than the booking sites are showing themselves. I tend to use Hotels.com as after 10nights booked you get a free night but I wouldn't book through them if I could get it cheaper elsewhere. We tend to stay at Pemier Inn when visiting family in England and our most used one has given us their direct telephone number so we can ask for a particular room before we arrive

I have only used a booking website twice. I have been disappointed both times. The standard of room not good. Most hotels have rooms they have not renovated and use these for booking agencies. I have joined hotel programmes and have always got the room I have booked or better.

Some newspapers can give really good discount rates. Have to confess usually nothing on earth would persuade me to open the DM, but there was one left on our table in a garden centre whilst waiting for our meal.

They currently have an offer for rooms at Green King's Old English Hotels for a hotel room with breakfast from £19.50 per person per night (you have to book two nights). It's valid until the end of November, use the code DM201018 on wwwgreenekinginns.co.uk/offers/DM201018. Have a look!

sue01, thanks for that. Will certainly try your system next time. Not particularly my comfort zone bartering but with actual comparisons to quote it seems easier than simply open negotiating.

Ah yes... well, I find the deals... then we contact the Hotel directly... mention what we've seen... and ask them if they will match the price if we book directly with them.

They always do... and we've had upgraded rooms, cream teas and bottles of wine as a thankyou.

Works every time.

Only done this once but nevertheless would repeat. Looked at 3 booking sites to compare then phoned the hotel direct. Hotel cheaper!

It was Booking.com I used Dragonfly46 to book my foreign hotel room. I have used them one other time and the site said that they had a car park which I could use in London for the emergency hotel I booked. When we got there, it turned out that the car park was a public one within 10 minutes walk. As I had 2 disabled people with me, this was rather inconvenient. When I complained to the booking site, I was told that it was up to the hotel to put things right. Not very helpful at all.

I use Booking.com as I can often cancel the room at short notice. I have an elderly parent. I have not noticed that the rooms were inferior. They also have a price promise. I think it is not in the hotels best interest to give you poor rooms as the companies like Booking.com have a certain amount of clout.

Absolutely, Teetime, and often cheaper via the hotel directly!

I used a booking site to book a hotel abroad and it said that if I cancelled within 3 hours, there would be no fee. However, when I couldn't get flights, I cancelled within an hour. Three months later, I had to go to the credit card company to get my money returned. The booking site wanted nothing to do with giving a refund and the credit card company charged me for currency exchange even though booking site was priced in Sterling. I was singularly unimpressed. I usually use Expedia with no problem but didn't on this occasion.

I use a combination of Booking.com, Airbnb and direct booking. Using those booking sites means you only read reviews of people who have actually stayed there, but can then e-mail or phone the place directly to enquire their rates. If going to foreign parts, using a booking site may be more secure and some of the small hotels/guesthouses may not have their own websites.

Trip Advisor can be useful for reviews, but you need to look at the profile of reviewer. A number of "glowing" reviews are from posters with just one review and also one helpful vote, which is suspicious. After a bad experience with a tour company in another country, I started analysing their Trip Advisor reviews. I noticed that there were others with poor experiences, but immediately following a bad review, there would be 3 or 4 good ones, each from posters with 1 review and 1 helpful vote - very suspicious! Of course the good reviews push up the average ratings.

Obviously everyone has to post a review for the first time, but reviews from someone who has travelled a good bit, may be more reliable. Reading a negative review need not necessarily put you off - I've read one from an American complaining about lack of room service and small room in a 2 star hotel in a popular European destination. It depends what you're expecting.

I use bookings.com in France, Italy ,Spain a lot (4/5 times a year for short and long breaks ) and have always found that the venue is better than my expectation and there are often bargains to be had . ( ps I am not on commission from bookings.com just my experience lol ?) The photos of the room you choose with them are accurate.

Quite agree Jaxie!

Why run a B&B if you don't like people, or worse still other people in your home?

If I wake up grumpy …… it can happen! OH makes me stay in the kitchen until I've had two cups of coffee and he does all the running about serving breakfast which he's just cooked!

But why would anyone post a bad review on Trip Advisor unless they had good cause? Some establishments treat the client as if they are doing them a good turn. It's a business transaction and if the client is dissatisfied complaints should be taken seriously. Sometimes proprietors' bad attitudes don't make it easy for clients to complain.

We usually deal direct with the hotels as you can ask about favourite rooms and so on. In the Lakes we have always had a better deal by contacting the hotel rather than booking.com.

Kim19
Many moons ago when I worked in the travel industry we used to 'block book' rooms in hotels year after year, thereby getting a deal. Then offered them at cheaper rates 'Only on our Site' sort of thing. To be honest I'd be surprised if this happened in any hotel that was not large, part of a chain or abroad, where the agent has the ability to be 95% of filling the accommodation. There used to be a charge to us (as agents) if we didn't fill our allocation. I've no idea of the fees nowadays to big agents but as I said to us as B&B owners the fee for a room let can be as high as 17%
Thanks TerriBull,
I believe it can be a real problem for B&B owners the nasty TripAdvisor reviews.

This interests me a lot as I've newly returned from such a trip. Could someone please explain to me how an 'agency' can charge less for a hotel room than going direct to the establishment? I assume there are fees involved? I actually asked the receptionist this on Saturday and he replied that he wondered the selfsame thing!