Difference between revisions of "Private hotel deals"
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| − | '''HotelStorm doesn't offer its service directly. You need to access it through one of its "marketing partners"'''. The easiest way to get access is through Boxed, a web site that primarily focuses on coupons, but they have many other partners. Just visit their hotel booking site at [//hotels.boxed.com hotels.boxed.com]. Don’t go directly to the Shoprunner site. If you access the site directly, rather than through one of their partners, you won’t get access to special rates. | + | '''HotelStorm doesn't offer its service directly. You need to access it through one of its "marketing partners"'''. The easiest way to get access is through Boxed, a web site that primarily focuses on coupons, but they have many other partners. Just visit their hotel booking site at '''[//hotels.boxed.com hotels.boxed.com]'''. Don’t go directly to the Shoprunner site. If you access the site directly, rather than through one of their partners, you won’t get access to special rates. |
===SnapTravel sometimes offers better deals, via a messaging user experience=== | ===SnapTravel sometimes offers better deals, via a messaging user experience=== | ||
Revision as of 16:54, 25 February 2019
Many travel websites claim to offer low hotel rates that you can’t find elsewhere. Sometimes, it’s even true.
“Private deal” websites frequently offer rates that are far better than what you can find on more conventional travel booking sites, or even the hotel’s own website.
For example, you can save $150 per night off a $450/night hotel room on the beach in Maui, get a $300 New York City hotel room for almost 50% off, or simply shave $50 off a $130 hotel room in downtown San Antonio. Prices consistently beat what is available from major travel websites like Expedia and Hotels.com.
Private Deal discounts vary greatly from hotel to hotel. If you haven’t settled on a specific hotel, you may want to choose a hotel that has a highly-discounted private deal, rather than choosing your hotel based on the normal rates, and then seeing if a private deal is available.
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How do these sites work?
Most hotels control the pricing of their rooms on other websites, so that you’ll see the same “best available rate” on the hotel’s own website, as well as 3rd party websites like Expedia. “Best Rate Guarantees” help keep hotel pricing consistent across the web.
- “Membership” based sites don’t have to stick to these standard room prices, and are free to kick-back part of their normal commission, or offer rates that are normally not available to the general public. Hotel companies allow these companies to offer promotional rates to more price-conscious shoppers, while keeping higher rates on more mainstream sites.
- Members-only rates are often fully refundable. When you see how low the members-only rates sometimes are, you might expect that they must be non-changeable, non-refundable rates. However, very often they are fully flexible rates. Make sure to check, because it differs on a case-by-case basis.
- In most cases, if you book from one of these sites, you won’t be able to take advantage of the hotel’s loyalty program. Just like when you book on websites like Expedia, you aren’t entitled to your loyalty program benefits, and won’t earn points on your stay.
- Each site offers a different set of deals—it can be worthwhile to search more than one. While there is plenty of overlap, each “Private Deals” website has its own set of discounted rates.
Sometimes, members-only prices are only a little bit less expensive than the normal room rate. This savings is mostly the result of the site lowering the normal commission that they keep. For these hotels, we prefer to book with chain hotels directly and participate with the loyalty program; or through some other site to get some sort of bonus points, cash back, or other benefits.
goSeek is the best single site to check
goSeek is our single favorite website for finding members-only rates. It revolutionized our ability to get find excellent hotel pricing, at many hotels.
goSeek is not a booking site per-se, but a meta-search engine that searches several different private deals websites. In other words, while you’ll find members-only hotel deals on goSeek, you’ll book them through a partner website.
The site is easy to use, and offers less expensive rates on a large number of hotels in a wide range of destinations. It even compares their member-only rates to the regular rates available from several more mainstream travel sites.
goSeek offers a premium membership for $20 per year, that provides access to even lower rates for some hotels. If you use this site on a semi-regular basis, it is easily worthwhile. However, since goSeek shows everyone when a premium-only rate is available, there is no reason to signup until the first time you want to take advantage of a premium-only rate.
Kayak can show private deals, alongside its regular results
Kayak isn’t as good as goSeek at uncovering private deals, but it has the best members-only offers of any of the mainstream travel sites. You can uncover these deals at the same time you are checking the prevailing hotel rates at your destination. Simply by being signed-in to the Kayak website or app, you’ll see “Private Deals” for a handful of hotels, alongside the regular results. These rates are often cheaper than you can find anywhere else.
HotelStorm is another great site for getting members-only pricing
Along with goSeek, HotelStorm is our other go-to site for uncovering members-only hotel rates. On average, it provides slightly lower discounts than GoSeek and it offers them on somewhat fewer hotels. However, each site offers different deals, so we wind up booking through both of these sites.
HotelStorm doesn't offer its service directly. You need to access it through one of its "marketing partners". The easiest way to get access is through Boxed, a web site that primarily focuses on coupons, but they have many other partners. Just visit their hotel booking site at hotels.boxed.com. Don’t go directly to the Shoprunner site. If you access the site directly, rather than through one of their partners, you won’t get access to special rates.
SnapTravel sometimes offers better deals, via a messaging user experience
We've also found some very good deals through SnapTravel. In some cases, these deals show up via GoSeek. But, in other cases, they are only available when you access the SnapTravel service directly.
SnapTravel works via Facebook or text messaging, rather than through a website or app. You send a message to their service, and they reply back with a link to view their deals. We find that this can be a bit more cumbersome than using the other services. But, access to the additional deals makes it worthwhile.
Less useful sites
Hotels.com heavily advertises their “Your Secret Price” hotels, but they are pretty sparse; and when they are available, they aren’t usually as good as you can find on the sites above.
Club 1 Hotels is a fee-based website that claims to give you great wholesale rates. They got a lot of press when they launched via an effective blog-outreach program coupled with “free” charter memberships. We find the site difficult to use, and once you factor in their hidden booking fees, it generally doesn’t offer better rates than what you can find on the free websites mentioned above. The service may improve over time.
