Orbitz to book hotel overseas.

[guineapiggie101 0]

Anybody do this and if so, when you checked in, did you get ok rooms? (I've heard that hotels tend to give their less desirable rooms to people who book through a 3rd party consolidator (like Orbitz, Travelocity, etc).

I dilly dallied around and ended up waiting till last minute to book my hotel for my HK trip later this month. Was surfing around on Orbitz.com this morning and found a really good rate for an American-branded hotel (Hyatt, Sheraton, etc). Jumped on that and was able to secure a harbor view room for 6 nights for about $1100 USD total.

A long time ago we use to use Priceline to get cheap airfares, until we got burned on a flight that got cancelled. Now I usually buy air tix on the specific airline website. I also usually book hotels on the specific hotel website, but this was a really good deal.

My only preferences is that I get a harbor view ( for which I paid extra for) and that I get a non-smoking room (which I did request).

[wmw999 2,439]

Tickets on the airline websites are generally a good idea. OTOH, I book overseas hotels on consolidator websites (generally either Bookings or Travelocity) with no problems. I've found the rooms to be just fine.

After doing teh booking, communicate with them in email also, to re-confirm, and to assuage your mind. You can ask some question that you'd like clarified (e.g. do they have plug converters if necessary, what is hte current like, are there hair dryers in the room), anything that requires an answer, but doesn't sound high-maintenance.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Nataly 38]

First off, glad to hear you decided to go to HK
I use these sites all the time both for work and personal travel (hotel.com / lastminute.com / edreams.com). They are fine. You should just be aware about their refund policies, since the reason some of them are so cheap is that they count on people not realising the payment is non-refundable and taken immediately (as opposed to some reservations that you don't pay until you're at the hotel, and can be cancelled at any point).

I have never found the rooms to be of lesser quality than rooms booked directly through the hotel. In fact, some hotels will tell you they are fully booked but they won't tell you that they reserve a certain number of rooms for third party booking sites (so by looking you can still get a room-sometimes cheaper, too).

Like Wendy said... Nothing wrong with confirming your reservation directly with the hotel a day or so after you make the online booking.

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