We needed to book a room somewhere in the south Seattle area. I had found a place on Orbitz, and found that the price was the same on Priceline, the taxes and fees were lower. So I booked the room for four nights (check in Monday, check out Friday). The plan had been to go hiking with my brother on the Thursday, and then head across the Puget Sound on Friday. But it looks like my brother might have to work on Thursday, so we may go hiking on a different day. If we aren’t going to go hikng, we may head across the Puget Sound earlier. And we hear from my sister-in-law that even if we don’t go across the water on Thursday, that we could stay at their house on Thursday night.
So when I checked into the Econo Lodge in Federal Way, I told him we only needed to stay 3 nights, and not the 4 nights that I originally booked. The desk clerk was great and had no problem with it. He charged Priceline for the 3 nights that we were going to stay. He also mentioned that we could have gotten a cheaper price if we had booked directly, and not through Priceline. Like about $10 a night cheaper! Ouch!
After we checked in, I booted up my laptop, and logged up to Priceline.com. I wanted to cancel that 4th night. I got the 800 number, and the trip numbers and etc. I called Priceline and asked to cancel that 4th night that we would be here. The guy told me I couldn’t do that because today was the check in day. I would have had to cancel more than 48 hours in advance. I explained that the single day I wanted to cancel was more than the 48 hours away. But apparently I couldn’t cancel just one night, without canceling the whole thing. And since I was calling on the check in date, I couldn’t cancel the reservation. I asked to speak to his supervisor. I ended up speaking to a "Customer Care Specialist". And she told me the same thing. *grumble*
Will I still use Priceline.com? Heck yeah! But here is what I am going to do. I will find the cheap hotel prices using Priceline.com, then I will call the hotel directly, and save money by booking it cheaper!!!
Dear Hiren N.
Please clarify and escalate, because your email doesn’t make any sense.
Customer service should, at a bare minimum, follow logic. Below please see my questions regarding your prior correspondence:
You write: We apologize if the hotel had misinformed you regarding your reservation status.
>What does this mean? Do I no longer have reservation with them?
>Regarding
what, exactly, did they “misinform” me?
You write: We have contacted the hotel and have determined that they did not offer to cancel your reservation(s).
>The hotel said they would agree to cancel but I need to contact
>Priceline
(you) to successfully get the charges reversed. Which is exactly what I said in the prior correspondence. You are either mistaken or lying.
You write: Hotels are willing to offer great prices to Priceline customers because they agree that their reservations will not be changed, canceled, or
refunded.
>This was not a great price for this hotel. The Price was $15 more than
>the
hotel charges customers that visit it’s website.
You write: Thank you for giving us the opportunity to assist you!
>I find your self gratification from our exchanges particularly offensive.
You should not confuse what you’ve done to me as “assistance.” You have not extended assistance, I sincerely hope any “thanks” you’ve derived from our exchanges is not mistaken for genuinely helping your fellow man, quite the contrary.
Sincerely,
Barry
The vRA Advantage:—–Original Message—–
From: ‘Customer Service [mailto:OriginatesCR2@service.priceline.com]
Sent: Tuesday, March 18, 2008 6:01 PM
To: barry
Subject: Your Hotel Request 52344433112 (KMM27119043V77224L0KM)
Dear Mr. Vanroden,
Thank you for your patience while we researched your issue.
We apologize if the hotel had misinformed you regarding your reservation status. We have contacted the hotel and have determined that they did not offer to cancel your reservation(s).
As we indicated on our website, we are unable to cancel reservations and cannot offer you any other options. Hotels are willing to offer great prices to priceline customers because they agree that their reservations will not be changed, canceled, or refunded.
Thank you for giving us the opportunity to assist you!
Sincerely,
Hiren M.
Customer Relations Specialist
Comment by barry — March 18, 2008 @ 7:18 pm
I used to be a fan of them. But lately they have disappointed me terribly to the point of anguish
F**K priceline. They made me pay the full amount of $400 for the hotel stay that I didn’t even bid for because of a f**King system glitch. I hate them and won’t ever use them again.
Comment by Julie — March 20, 2008 @ 2:28 pm
I had bad experiences (lack of refund or service) with hotels and priceline. I won’t be using EITHER in the future. Had I known hotels was masked as expedia I wouldn’t have done biz w/them. They charged my credit card when reserved – ridiculous!! Most hotels don’t charge until you leave.
The hassle is not worth the “money you save.”
Believe me!!
Comment by KMH — May 13, 2008 @ 5:06 pm
They are absolutely TERRIBLE! I would not recommend them to my worst enemy.
Customer service is terrible. I have been passed SEVEN times and have been on hold 55 mins. STILL HOLDING!
Comment by Laura — June 2, 2009 @ 6:24 pm
What a total rip off. After using their name your own price it clearly states for specific with room assignments (ie queen or king rooms) you need to contact the hotel directly. Which I did and was referred back to Priceline! They flat out state they only guarantee 2 adults. A duh, I said on the very first webpage, I was traveling with my 2 daughters. I figured if it was a king bed or even a queen we could make do. Nope thanks to Priceline I am in a double bed…only one! This is bullcookies and I will not use it again.
April
Comment by April — July 10, 2009 @ 1:26 pm
They screwed me too, out of $370 because I had to bump a business trip up one week, no changes to car reservations through the. My fault for not reading the fine print, but their Customer Relations (ha! that’s a joke) department was about as un-helpful as they could get. I will NEVER use Priceline again for ANY purchase. And if I see William Shatner out on the street someday, I’m gonna kick him in his rear end !!!
Comment by AB — July 10, 2009 @ 6:53 pm
wahahaha!!!suckers!!!Priceline is the best!!!
Comment by anonymous! — July 28, 2009 @ 2:39 pm
Used to be a big fan of priceline. Nowadays, you can find the same price at other sites. I’ve been so disappointed with them. I booked a vacation package for more than a month in advance. All I want to do is to upgrade the hotel room type but they can’t do that. This will be the last time I booked my vacation on priceline. I hope people will learn from my experience and don’t book here. Same price at other sites.
Comment by quinn — August 3, 2009 @ 7:17 pm
Priceline SUCKS! They refused to refund me on a hotel reservation I canceled only 20 minutes after making it, after reading some nauseating reviews of people who had been there only days before. They did cancel the reservation but billed me for one night, and after the cancellation there was no longer any way to reach a live human being on their customer service line. I was at least able to send them an e-mail to which their response was, essentially, too bad. Don’t use Priceline unless you enjoy throwing your money away and being treated like a cock roach in the process!
Comment by Humantrick — September 25, 2009 @ 8:57 pm
This is exactly the kind of thing that happened to me. I got to the hotel, spent one night because I had to, and then went to another hotel the next night. The hotel they sent me to was not good enough for a dog.
They kept this kind of email going back and forth and then just told me TOO BAD!
So.. do not use them, they do not guarantee their rooms and if you are unhappy, you will just have to suck it up!
I will never use them again!
Comment by DAwn — January 4, 2010 @ 8:20 pm
Priceline should be banned from doing business. They’re ruining their reputation, and the reputation of the hotels booked via Priceline. I’d say “go someplace else” for hotel reservations. I’d like to tell Priceline where to go, but you can’t talk to them.
Comment by Dogbiskit — January 12, 2010 @ 12:39 pm
don’t have a facebook account to do stupid things like change my MOOD to ‘disgusted’ but I see now how theraputic that may be.
Every once in a while I do idiotic things- so I try to give people a break in general.. like today there was an advertisment in my driveway- a ziploc bag with a stone in it and a paper selling weight-loss drugs. The stone had rubbed and chewed right through the phone number I guess from being run over.. so if I was interested, I couldn’t even call. Pretty funny. THAT was an idiotic move.. putting a stone in the bag for weight not thbinking it might mess the ad up if run over- un, in the DRIVEWAY that it was left in. but I don’t have enough info to really call the dude an idiot. Actually, I think it may simply be an excuse for someone casing the neighborhood to drive around slowly, looking up every driveway.. and nOT a real ad.
On the other hand, the website PRICELINE.COM has idiotic people running it. You figure they would pay attention to the programming such that the stinkin site at least WORKS. I tried for 30 minutes to change the destination airport from one to another and the system continuously uses my original destination.. no matter what I enter!! JUST STUPID. When they come into the office tomorow and see that they sold ZERO tickets maybe they’ll fix it?? stupid.
It just perplexes me. I start to think that I can take over all their customers by craigslist-ize-ing the whole empty-airliner-seat sales app process. Simple, and BUG FREE! GET A CLUE priceline. Frustrated web-interface users will just plain never come back period.
Comment by Name Required — January 14, 2010 @ 10:48 pm
price line sucks they kept my 203 dollars even when i canceled and not staying at the hotel they suck!!!!!!!!
Comment by adriana — March 8, 2010 @ 3:25 pm
I too just got screwed by Priceline. At this moment I am trying to figure out what to do because the hotel that I’m suppose to be in is in a very dangerous area. There were drug dealers loitering right in the parking lot. AND Priceline doesn’t give a CRAP. They wouldn’t even just change the location for extra money. I’m probably not going to go there. I am a female travelling alone. Why would priceline even feature such places for their customers.
Comment by Soni — June 14, 2010 @ 3:23 pm
Tried Priceline for the 1st time tonight…the last time. One of the worst customer service experiences of my life.
I asked several times that if I needed to change the package would there be any fees. NO NO NO I was told. After booking and being told there was only an $8 resort fee at the hotel I called the hotel and was told it was $30, I decided to change hotels and since the hotel was in Miami instead of Ft. Lauderdale I wanted to change airports too. No problem until I found out that my car reservation was non changeable and non refundable. So if I wanted to fly into Miami and stay on South Beach I would have to pick up my car in Lauderdale. STUPID PEOPLE. I talked to customer service for an hour and it was like talking to robots. They would not budge. So I cancelled the whole package and paid them a cancellation fee for the car but will NEVER do business with them. Horrible!!!!!
Comment by david s — September 5, 2010 @ 11:20 pm
hahahahaha I just love reading all of these coments.
I`m no fan of priceline, in fact i would reveal the fact that i probably spoke to some of the people here!!!
Ì know how to beat priceline and get a full refund in any terms posible, withought an extra cost.
I would love to leave my email but… i would get into legal trouble. Sorry, company policy even though i am not in the U.S.A.
Now please remember:
1. Customer Care Specialists are very few north americans, the rest of the CCC`s are in the philipines and mexico
2. If a CCC already says “NO” never ask for a supervisor because you will be transfered to Customer Relations and they will tell you the same thing.
and most important
3. when you tell a CCC that a relative ……. coffin…… a good thing might happen 2 ya.
Now I`ve given you the clues to get a good ending in your reservation.
Take care people!
Comment by Michael — November 14, 2010 @ 12:27 am
so… just refreshing what I said b4…
on point number 3, if you make up information it does not matter. you will still get a great ending.
Comment by Michael — November 18, 2010 @ 12:46 am
PRICELINE SUCKS!! Beware, no cancellation & they DON’T match lowest price. Booked a room for NYC & later called the hotel itself, it was $100 a night cheaper directly with hotel. Priceline would do nothing!! Do not use them, they are nasty too!!!
Comment by Denise Litton — December 6, 2010 @ 8:26 pm
Beware of Priceline. We booked a hotel on Priceline using name-your-price. Within minutes the same hotel got cheaper. After talking to customer service for an hour, they refunded me the difference on price, but refused to refund the additional tax that I already paid on the higher price, pointing me to the “fine print” saying they dont refund any tax differences. I’m boycotting Priceline for my future purchases.
Comment by GG — December 7, 2010 @ 5:54 pm
Priceline.com sucks, their services are not at all reliable and not upto the customer satisfaction. I personally had real bad experiences with Priceline.com when I booked my flight and hotel. They charged me more than what they agreed for. And more over in that case, they not even give any chance of cancelling the reservation. Endedup loosing $310 to them.
Comment by Gilbert (Pissed customer) — December 10, 2010 @ 2:34 pm
Bunch of winers if you guys knew what we go threw you would be cold too. Its not that we dont want to do the things you need, its just that we cant, Id do everything u guys want me to do but i cant
P.S. IF CALL ABOUT RESERVATIONS ACTUALLY MAKEEE IIITTT!!!
Comment by Pcln worker — December 14, 2010 @ 3:48 pm
hahahahaha in fact I´m no longer with the priceline company. Dudes, people, ladies and gentleman. You can have great results and GET A FULL REFUND you know, michael is right. He gave you good info. He cannot say how to get the full refund but he gave useful tips on how to do it. PCLN does give refunds… only in special cases.
Comment by Pcln master — December 15, 2010 @ 2:44 am
Priceline is terrible. There is no customer service and their fine print will kill you! What hotel company doesn’t guarantee the type of room?!?! If I wanted to pay that price for a room with one double bed in it, I didn’t need to go to priceline for it!!! I thought I was getting a deal, but I just got bamboozled. And, those commercials are terrible…
Comment by Jodi R — January 26, 2011 @ 10:11 pm
You get what you pay for. 189.00 dollar room for 89.00 no way you get an 89.00 room for 89.00. It is the smallest room in the hotal, the mattress should be replaced, smells with smoke. Then on top of that any perks that come with the room are removed, you are treated like a second class customer, bottom line you get what you pay for, the pain will be remembered long after the price is forgotten. Priceline is a rip off selling nothing but heartache.
Comment by Chico Bombico — February 9, 2011 @ 9:10 pm
PRICELINE IS FULL OF SHIT! They wouldnt change my reservation dates…assholes! Their policies/restrictions/rules make it very difficult for customers to purchase airfare! The process is no less stressful or annoying than purchasing with a regular airline. The prices are right but the service is SHIT!
Comment by CHUA — March 2, 2011 @ 12:07 pm
PriceLine IS SHIT, and those people that work form them are a bunch of undedicated idiots! take my word for that
Comment by dado — June 1, 2011 @ 10:37 pm
I recently booked cruise through priceline, simply because they had “free hotel stays” at priceline partner hotels for qualifying cruises. since we needed hotels for before and after the cruise we thought this was a good deal and booked cruise for us.
later i get a confirmation email, and it stated “free hotel stays” means their ‘bonus cash’ for ‘name your own price’.
About a month later I finally received their ‘bonus cash’ via email. i checked and it’s 140 bucks worth for 2 nights, but if i want to book for longer than 2 nights, it will be divided by the nights I will be staying.
I really don’t like the fact that not knowing which hotel it is and where it is located, but since i had 140 dollars worth bonus coupon, might as well use it right?
I started to bid on hotels, whatever i bid on was also plus bonus cash of 46 dollars, so like 30 + 46, which comes up to 76 dollars per night. bids were keep getting rejected until i went up to 54 dollars (100 dollars per night) and bid got accepted. after taxes and fees, i paid total of 199.92, but since i had 140 bonus cash, it’s as if i paid for 339.92
After I received hotel booking confirmation, i was curious how much other places were charging for same hotel, after all they always claim if you use hotel bidding, you save up to 60%. First I checked priceline.com itself on regular bookings instead of hotel bids, and guess what? THE CHEAPEST ROOM HOTEL OFFERS WAS 84.02 PER NIGHT! and since it’s an european hotel, tax is included in that price. so nights would have been 252.06 total.
339.92 – 252.06 = 87.86
i got a hotel room for 87.86 dollar more than what it’s worth.
I called priceline to ask for price adjustment, but they told me there’s nothing they could do for me simply because I got a hotel room for 54 dollars per night. EXCUSE ME? what about 140 dollars bonus cash that i earned while purchasing cruise tickets through YOUR dang website? so it’s as if 140 bonus cash wasn’t honored.
I should have use orbitz, because they had 15% off on hotels for qualifying cruise bookings. it’s only 15% but at least i get to choose which hotel i get to stay at.
Comment by I HATE PRICELINE!!! — June 11, 2011 @ 12:46 am
(I agree with that most blogs have very informative information):
Comment by Rich — July 20, 2011 @ 4:55 am