online discount accomodation booking sites

[DTM1]

Can anyone suggest some really good (and reputable/reliable) sites ? Looking for discounted 5 star properties, mainly in Asia, but also in Europe.

Have seen most of the major ones, with my favourite being Agoda.com

hoping to find some others.

Suggestions ?

 

[JohnK]

I use Agoda when not booking PC or Hilton hotels.

You can always try Asiarooms. They are competitive with most hotels but I avoid them as they only accept Mastercard, Visa and JCB.

Then there are all the ususal suspects like Asiatravel, Sawadee (mainly Thailand), HotelClub, Zuji and Expedia.

For Europe you can try HotelsRus and Booking.Com.

 

[RB]

We have had some success with HRS - HOTEL RESERVATION SERVICE previously when booking in Germany. Good feature for showing distances from rail, airport etc

 

[Flashback]

I'll 2nd that... just surveyed Asiarooms and Agoda, to book a hotel in Japan and Agoda was much easier to user... Asiarooms doesn't give you the selection of room types that its supposed to, and Agoda is just a much cleaner interface.

The only benefit of AR is that it has quite a few reviews.

 

[codash1099]

I'd agree that Agoda is one of the best I've come across.

You can cover a lot of other sites with one click by using Find the best hotel price from 30 hotel sites - Hotel Price Finder

 

[Gold Member]

two words...

1) Priceline
2) Hotwire

I have spoken.
GM

 

[tuapekastar]

I didn't like Asia Rooms. They presented me with some options, I selected one, provided my hotel, dates and CC details, and the response was "thanks, we'll check whether that is available and get back to you within 24 hours". If there was any doubt, why present the option? I don't think we're talking difficult IT here.

Anyway, it wasn't available, turned out to be a good thing because I found a much better option, but the killer was that the $1000 or so that the booking would have cost was 'deducted' from my CC and the funds unavailable to me for around a week.

I have subsequently found this is alleged to be a common practice (called CC blocking?), by which these companies ensure they get their share of your credit limit, should you be inclined to try and rack up debts way beyond your limit.

Maybe they all do this?


Edited to add: The better option was a deal via a specific hotel's website

 

[Ev1dent]

I've been using TripAdvisor for the reviews and booking with Expedia for my RTW trip that I am currently doing. However, I had a very unpleasant experience with expedia and a booking in New Orleans that means that i won't be using expedia again. Since my wife is asthmatic, I booked a non-smoking room, but when we arrived, the hotel told us that they had sold out of such rooms long before I booked. Phone calls to Expedia and speaking to the hotel manager didn't help and I was left with expedia/the hotel confiscating my first night's accomodation (US$200) when I had to make alternative arrangements.

While I don't know whether this is relevent to Asia, I have found that I get better service booking with the hotel chains directly once I know where I want to stay and many chains have a low price guarantee, which means that they will beat or match any other deals available on the internet.

 

[Flashback]

I agree with your sentiments on Expedia. When I tried to book my NRT-PER flight, it got all the way through to submitting the c/c details, then errored out and advised me to call them.

So I called them, and tried to do it over the phone only to be told the fare didn't exist.

B*gger this, I thought... went back to booking through qantas.jp and (for an extra $20) booked the same fare without issue.

 

[drron]

I use discount accommodation sites only to get the rate.I then phone or email the hotel directly and those rates are usually matched and sometimes even lower.Generally though I will use hotels online booking site and rarely is it way out of line with the discount sites.

 

[tscharke]

In a previous role I spent a lot of my time working with Flairview Travel on their online booking systems and have used them personally ever since for bookings through Europe, Asia & Australia.

Am especially a fan of the RatesToGo site for last minute bookings under 20days in advance.

HotelClub.com

RatesToGo.com

Asia-hotels.com

 

[sng1971]

I've used www.venere.com for hotels in Europe and found them to be very good.