Ok to book a hotel room through Expedia or similar?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I found a great rate. I think they give the worst rooms to people who buy at a discount but I’m ok with being next to an ice machine or elevator. Are those the only risks?

Call the hotel directly and tell them the rate you found on Expedia but would rather book with them. Expedia is a basically a travel agent with no accountability.

[Anonymous]

Read the fine print very, very carefully. And save it, because sometimes you can’t access it after you book. See what it says about cancellation, room guarantees, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've been using Booking.com for years, never had an issue.

I was the PP and also have used booking.com for 10+ years with no issues — UNTIL the 2 recent bookings for Lisbon and Amsterdam in the last 6 weeks.
Something has changed with booking.com
Be forewarned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I've been using Booking.com for years, never had an issue.

+1. I fully believe that people have had bad experiences, including the ones described here, but I have never had a problem with it and get pretty cheap rates. I use Booking.com.

Relatedly, I also always use third-party sites to book flights and have never had an issue there either. I guess it depends on how risk averse you are, but I am pretty risk averse in real life and the 2-3% chance of having an issue is a decent tradeoff for saving the money IMO. I guess I have also been lucky.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a terrible experience when I booked through Expedia. I'd chosen the location for the long weekend in large part on a beautiful historic hotel. When we got there, they had no room for us. They'd overbooked the hotel and gotten us a room elsewhere. No amount of protest from me worked. The place they got for us was a shitty motel miles away from the quaint downtown where we wanted to be. At a higher rate. We also hadn't rented a car, because everything was walking distance from the nice hotel that booted us, but nothing was from the other place. It was so bad we went to the airport and just went home.

No more Expedia.

This happened to me once too, and they’d rebooked us into a hooker hotel in Atlantic City. Good thing my husband is from Nj and knows how to complain. They ended up relenting and gave us a room, but it was a huge deal and there is no way I will ever use a site like that again.

How did your husband get the hotel to relent?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I've been using Booking.com for years, never had an issue.

+1. I fully believe that people have had bad experiences, including the ones described here, but I have never had a problem with it and get pretty cheap rates. I use Booking.com.

Relatedly, I also always use third-party sites to book flights and have never had an issue there either. I guess it depends on how risk averse you are, but I am pretty risk averse in real life and the 2-3% chance of having an issue is a decent tradeoff for saving the money IMO. I guess I have also been lucky.

Its great when it works, but when it doesn't - boy that's when you decided to never do it again. Like you used them for a while and loved how easy and cheap it was. But during a recent trip - when we had to make last-minute changes, complicated travel arrangements etc I realized I need to save my sanity not just my wallet when it came time to adjust. Going to take a break from them for a while.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We use Hotels.com (part of Expedia) all the time with no issues. We're Gold members so get good upgraded rooms and other perks.

Same! I love it.

[Anonymous]

The worst experience I ever had was once during a big cold snap there was no heat for awhile. It’s the sort of issue that would get your stay comped. But they couldn’t since I had booked with Expedia. But the hotel gave me a free stay with no time limit on usage.

[Anonymous]

I booked a room at the Bellagio via Expedia once for a one night stay for our family of 4 on our way to the Grand Canyon. When we got there around 5pm, our room wasn't ready because the person renting the room the night before still had not checked out, was not answering the door or the phone so there was still someone occupying it and it hadn't been clean. They refused to give us another room despite having vacancy bc it had been booked via Expedia. They also had zero Fs to give about the person still being in there and said as policy they don't kick people out so we were SOL. Calling Expedia customer service also provided zero results. Complete and total nightmare. Never again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I found a great rate. I think they give the worst rooms to people who buy at a discount but I’m ok with being next to an ice machine or elevator. Are those the only risks?

Most of the time, it works fine unless difference is significant, just directly book with the hotel, small saving isn't worth the big hassle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I booked a room at the Bellagio via Expedia once for a one night stay for our family of 4 on our way to the Grand Canyon. When we got there around 5pm, our room wasn't ready because the person renting the room the night before still had not checked out, was not answering the door or the phone so there was still someone occupying it and it hadn't been clean. They refused to give us another room despite having vacancy bc it had been booked via Expedia. They also had zero Fs to give about the person still being in there and said as policy they don't kick people out so we were SOL. Calling Expedia customer service also provided zero results. Complete and total nightmare. Never again.

This is your problem right here, not Expedia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We use Hotels.com (part of Expedia) all the time with no issues. We're Gold members so get good upgraded rooms and other perks.

Same! I love it.

I agree. I've used Expedia, Orbitz and Hotels.com and Hotels.com has been the easiest in terms of cancellations and changes. I also find their platform to be the most user-friendly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I booked a room at the Bellagio via Expedia once for a one night stay for our family of 4 on our way to the Grand Canyon. When we got there around 5pm, our room wasn't ready because the person renting the room the night before still had not checked out, was not answering the door or the phone so there was still someone occupying it and it hadn't been clean. They refused to give us another room despite having vacancy bc it had been booked via Expedia. They also had zero Fs to give about the person still being in there and said as policy they don't kick people out so we were SOL. Calling Expedia customer service also provided zero results. Complete and total nightmare. Never again.

This is your problem right here, not Expedia.

No, it wasn’t. The hotel had vacancy, in any other situation the hotel would have assigned us a different room. BUT they wouldn’t because we had reserved via Expedia (that’s what they told us) and it was up to Expedia to “fix the problem”. Bellagio offered to give us a different room at the walk up rate, so essentially we would have and be paying for 2 hotel rooms. Expedia said Bellagio had to give us a different room for no extra cost; Bellagio said to kick rocks, that our reservation is with Expedia and not them. No one wanted to fix it.

100% the problem was booking via Expedia. Never. Ever. Again.

[Anonymous]

I think Expedia etc employees have found this forum...

I regularly and happily used booking.com for all accommodations- in the US, Canada, Europe, and for a trip to Morocco - for the latter was able to book riads a day or 2 before and everything went smoothly.
I have probably used for 10, 15 years or more.

But got shafted on booking.com twice in a row for 2 different cities in the last 4 weeks- once at beginning of July and again in mid July.

You know that saying - fool me once shame on you, for me twice....

There isn't a fool me 3 times option. It's over.

For trip to Montreal I switched to hotels.com -- I know Montreal so less traumatic to have no hotel on arrival AND I had a back up plan and knew where there was availability elsewhere in a reasonable place. It worked out but I know I was a little worried hotel wouldn't honor the rate or something something....

If I can, I'll book direct. If the price is significantly lower on hotels.com then I'll book, but I suggest always having a plan B. Worse thing to have to scramble to find a place to sleep in a city you don't know, if you don't speak the language.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I booked a room at the Bellagio via Expedia once for a one night stay for our family of 4 on our way to the Grand Canyon. When we got there around 5pm, our room wasn't ready because the person renting the room the night before still had not checked out, was not answering the door or the phone so there was still someone occupying it and it hadn't been clean. They refused to give us another room despite having vacancy bc it had been booked via Expedia. They also had zero Fs to give about the person still being in there and said as policy they don't kick people out so we were SOL. Calling Expedia customer service also provided zero results. Complete and total nightmare. Never again.

This is your problem right here, not Expedia.

No, it wasn’t. The hotel had vacancy, in any other situation the hotel would have assigned us a different room. BUT they wouldn’t because we had reserved via Expedia (that’s what they told us) and it was up to Expedia to “fix the problem”. Bellagio offered to give us a different room at the walk up rate, so essentially we would have and be paying for 2 hotel rooms. Expedia said Bellagio had to give us a different room for no extra cost; Bellagio said to kick rocks, that our reservation is with Expedia and not them. No one wanted to fix it.

100% the problem was booking via Expedia. Never. Ever. Again.

No, the problem was that the hotel wouldn’t enforce their check out time. Frankly, I kind of disbelieve your entire story, because I stay in hotels upwards of 80 nights a year for work, and every place I’ve stayed has had no compunction about letting people know they need to leave.