Complaint Review: Hoteldiscount!com

people also want to be aware of hotelkingdom!com, on may 11th, 2004, i made reservations for a hotel in orlando FL..4days after making the reservation, i called them to cancel the reservations..the site says you may do so but there will be a $10 charge, no problem..i called, the representative at hotelkingdom i spoke to said it would take 7-14 days for the deposit to post back to my acct..it has now been about 4 weeks and it still hasnt posted back to my act..i contacted them about 6 days ago, a rep told me give it two more days and will post, 3 days later, yesterday, i called back noting it hasnt posted back to my act as of yet, the rep informed me they only have one girl that does the refunds and she is swamped ( poor thing) is that our fault? should they hire more people? am i supose to wait till the poor girl can get caught up? i emediatley asked to speak to a supervisor in which i did, i explained the situation and she said she would do it herself and would be posted emediatly, for me to consider it DONE..well that was yesterday EARLY morning and now is the next day, late at nite and is STILL not posted..im going to give them a couple more days then file a civil suit..the funny thing is, the refund is ONLY for $9.95 BUT that is not the problem, its the fact of the mater..so people, beware if you make a purchase or order a service via the world wide web, MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND THER REFUND POLICY

people also want to be aware of hotelkingdom!com, on may 11th, 2004, i made reservations for a hotel in orlando FL..4days after making the reservation, i called them to cancel the reservations..the site says you may do so but there will be a $10 charge, no problem..i called, the representative at hotelkingdom i spoke to said it would take 7-14 days for the deposit to post back to my acct..it has now been about 4 weeks and it still hasnt posted back to my act..i contacted them about 6 days ago, a rep told me give it two more days and will post, 3 days later, yesterday, i called back noting it hasnt posted back to my act as of yet, the rep informed me they only have one girl that does the refunds and she is swamped ( poor thing) is that our fault? should they hire more people? am i supose to wait till the poor girl can get caught up? i emediatley asked to speak to a supervisor in which i did, i explained the situation and she said she would do it herself and would be posted emediatly, for me to consider it DONE..well that was yesterday EARLY morning and now is the next day, late at nite and is STILL not posted..im going to give them a couple more days then file a civil suit..the funny thing is, the refund is ONLY for $9.95 BUT that is not the problem, its the fact of the mater..so people, beware if you make a purchase or order a service via the world wide web, MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND THER REFUND POLICY

You weren't charged any more than what you agreed to pay. Granted, what you agreed to pay was substantially more than what you could have gotten the product for. You made the mistake of not shopping around.

If I buy a computer at Best Buy for $1000, and then find out that I could have gotten it at Circuit City for $800, I don't accuse Best Buy of ripping me off, I kick myself in the a*s for not shopping around! Any experienced "internet traveller" will tell you that you that different sites often have very different prices for the same room.

Here's my tried and true tips for getting the best rates.

1) Download the free "Travelaxe" software. Travelaxe is the best thing ever to happen to the world of at-home travel planning. You choose the city you are going to from a scroll down list of every major city in the U.S. and plug in your dates and # of people. The program searches about a dozen websites, including travelocity, hotels.com, expedia and the hotels' own websites. The prices (including all taxes and fees) are displayed for comparison and links are given to each of the websites.

2) After finding your best deal on Travelaxe, call the hotel's reservation center to see if they can offer anything better.

3) Lastly, check the rates offered on Hotwire.com. Hotwire is priceline-esque, but less complicated. On Hotwire you do not know which hotels are offering the prices listed until after you buy, but you do know their star ratings, can read customer reviews, and see the amenities.

I end up using Hotwire about 75% of the time and have never been dissatisfied, usually I am amazed at how cheaply I get awesome hotel rooms (it's good for flights and cars too).

Use this three step plan when shopping around for hotel rooms and I guaruntee you will always get the best room for the lowest price.

You weren't charged any more than what you agreed to pay. Granted, what you agreed to pay was substantially more than what you could have gotten the product for. You made the mistake of not shopping around.

If I buy a computer at Best Buy for $1000, and then find out that I could have gotten it at Circuit City for $800, I don't accuse Best Buy of ripping me off, I kick myself in the a*s for not shopping around! Any experienced "internet traveller" will tell you that you that different sites often have very different prices for the same room.

Here's my tried and true tips for getting the best rates.

1) Download the free "Travelaxe" software. Travelaxe is the best thing ever to happen to the world of at-home travel planning. You choose the city you are going to from a scroll down list of every major city in the U.S. and plug in your dates and # of people. The program searches about a dozen websites, including travelocity, hotels.com, expedia and the hotels' own websites. The prices (including all taxes and fees) are displayed for comparison and links are given to each of the websites.

2) After finding your best deal on Travelaxe, call the hotel's reservation center to see if they can offer anything better.

3) Lastly, check the rates offered on Hotwire.com. Hotwire is priceline-esque, but less complicated. On Hotwire you do not know which hotels are offering the prices listed until after you buy, but you do know their star ratings, can read customer reviews, and see the amenities.

I end up using Hotwire about 75% of the time and have never been dissatisfied, usually I am amazed at how cheaply I get awesome hotel rooms (it's good for flights and cars too).

Use this three step plan when shopping around for hotel rooms and I guaruntee you will always get the best room for the lowest price.

You weren't charged any more than what you agreed to pay. Granted, what you agreed to pay was substantially more than what you could have gotten the product for. You made the mistake of not shopping around.

If I buy a computer at Best Buy for $1000, and then find out that I could have gotten it at Circuit City for $800, I don't accuse Best Buy of ripping me off, I kick myself in the a*s for not shopping around! Any experienced "internet traveller" will tell you that you that different sites often have very different prices for the same room.

Here's my tried and true tips for getting the best rates.

1) Download the free "Travelaxe" software. Travelaxe is the best thing ever to happen to the world of at-home travel planning. You choose the city you are going to from a scroll down list of every major city in the U.S. and plug in your dates and # of people. The program searches about a dozen websites, including travelocity, hotels.com, expedia and the hotels' own websites. The prices (including all taxes and fees) are displayed for comparison and links are given to each of the websites.

2) After finding your best deal on Travelaxe, call the hotel's reservation center to see if they can offer anything better.

3) Lastly, check the rates offered on Hotwire.com. Hotwire is priceline-esque, but less complicated. On Hotwire you do not know which hotels are offering the prices listed until after you buy, but you do know their star ratings, can read customer reviews, and see the amenities.

I end up using Hotwire about 75% of the time and have never been dissatisfied, usually I am amazed at how cheaply I get awesome hotel rooms (it's good for flights and cars too).

Use this three step plan when shopping around for hotel rooms and I guaruntee you will always get the best room for the lowest price.

You weren't charged any more than what you agreed to pay. Granted, what you agreed to pay was substantially more than what you could have gotten the product for. You made the mistake of not shopping around.

If I buy a computer at Best Buy for $1000, and then find out that I could have gotten it at Circuit City for $800, I don't accuse Best Buy of ripping me off, I kick myself in the a*s for not shopping around! Any experienced "internet traveller" will tell you that you that different sites often have very different prices for the same room.

Here's my tried and true tips for getting the best rates.

1) Download the free "Travelaxe" software. Travelaxe is the best thing ever to happen to the world of at-home travel planning. You choose the city you are going to from a scroll down list of every major city in the U.S. and plug in your dates and # of people. The program searches about a dozen websites, including travelocity, hotels.com, expedia and the hotels' own websites. The prices (including all taxes and fees) are displayed for comparison and links are given to each of the websites.

2) After finding your best deal on Travelaxe, call the hotel's reservation center to see if they can offer anything better.

3) Lastly, check the rates offered on Hotwire.com. Hotwire is priceline-esque, but less complicated. On Hotwire you do not know which hotels are offering the prices listed until after you buy, but you do know their star ratings, can read customer reviews, and see the amenities.

I end up using Hotwire about 75% of the time and have never been dissatisfied, usually I am amazed at how cheaply I get awesome hotel rooms (it's good for flights and cars too).

Use this three step plan when shopping around for hotel rooms and I guaruntee you will always get the best room for the lowest price.

I manage a few hotels and the company you booked with (hoteldiscounts.com) is just one of the many websites operated by Hotels.com.

The previous comment in regards to wholesale operators is somewhat true. Here is how it works. the hotel allocates a certain number of rooms that they will allow Hotels.com to sell.

Because Hotels.com has such an extremeley high volume, the better rate the hotel offers, the more volume they stand to get.

They then negotiate the rate between the hotel and hotels.com. The guest should never be made aware of this rate. Hotels.com then marks the rate up anywhere from$20 or higher. the higher the demand, the more they mark it up. Hotels.com then sells the hotel on the web and by receiving phone calls. What you see is an attractive rate. Usually its the lowest rate you can find. You then book the room and pay hotels.com.

When you arrive, you simply check in and present your credit card for incidental charges such as phone calls. You should never have been billed for the room and tax charges. I am sure you never saw the rate that Hotels.com is charged by the hotel.

You said the hotel sent you a copy of your bill. That is where they made their mistake. The mark up charge that hotels.com charges is their profit in return for delivering you (the guest) to the hotel. That markup starts at a minimum of $20. So if you see a $75 rate on hotels.com rest assured the rate the hotel is charging hotels.com is $55 or lower.

The reason for this is because people like yourself are looking for deals and companies like hotels.com are marketing machines. hotel companies and hotels usually can not afford to spend the marketing dollars that companies such as hotel.com can.

Many major hotel chains are guaranteeing the best rate can be found on their website. Go to sites such as 6continents.com for holiday inns. They mandate these programs.

Please do not misunderstand any of this but hotel.com is a vital part of hotel revenues for several hotels. They simply are able to market effectively. Also, there are so many travel sites and hotels.com is certainly not the only company doing this. Lodging.com, expedia.com, hotelkingdom.com, lodging.com. They all do the same thing.

The hotels are losers with these companies because they have to lower their rates in order to gain any kind of production from these companies.

The consumer generally benefits 2nd and the big winner is hotels.com. I would guess you have heard of Travelocity.com. Guess who their partner is - you guessed it, hotels.com. that partnership is due to expire. Hotels.com has done such an outstaning job in gaining a loyal client base that they are not going to go away.

They serve a purpose for both the consumer and the hotels. If you have problems t the hotel, dispute it with hotels.com. They need to take the lead in any refund. You can always dispute it with your credit card company. The quest for any refund must start at the point of booking origin. I hope this helps.

I manage a hotel and know all about how the wholesalers work. Yes, they do get a break on the rates because they can "guarantee" a certain number a bookings with either that hotel or the parent company. The wholesaler has a calculation to determain what the rate would be to the consumer to stay at that hotel. The calculation is based on the "rack" rate the hotel quotes for that day or days. The rack rate is the highest rate the hotel would quote, usually only quoted when the hotel is very full or for high demand dates. You cannot get a discount on top of a discount, ie AAA, AARP, etc.. The wholesaler rates can be a discount for last minute travels. The hotel may have told you that they lowest rate was $202. Did they tell you if it was available at the time you booked your rooms? Discounted rates seem to dissaper as the hotel fills up and remains available when the hotel needs heads in the beds. The bottom line is, DO YOUR HOME WORK! BUYER BEWARE!!