FTDDD

Using the Name your Own Price feature I won a bid for a 5 Star Luxury category hotel in NYC at $265 a night. The hotel I won was the Kimpton Hotel Eventi - a 4 Star Property in NYC by their own account (I even called the hotel to confirm). The next day the price dropped to $253 on booking.com. After spending more than an hour on the phone I was able to use their BRG and got the difference + bogus taxes refunded. Priceline was unwilling to refund the money, despite acknowledging that I paid for a 5 star property and received 4 stars.

To put this into perspective: I was bidding and paying for a 5 Star Luxury Property and received a 4 Star property, which priceline fraudulently markets and sells as a 5 star property.

I took to their Social Media team and tried to get this resolved but to no avail. They claimed my check in had passed, which is not the case. Ultimately it looks like they're asking me to dispute?
I've offered keeping the reservation if they bump the room to a suite or a full refund. I'm thinking of disputing the charge with my credit card company? Putting this on here as a warning. Also, thoughts? Advice?

Thanks!

Transcript below:
Chat Conversation Start - Facebook
12:21PM
hi guys, I gave your Name Your Own price a feature a go and selected only 5 star luxury properties in certain areas of NYC.
the booking went through (#248-272-xxx-xx), however, the property - Kimpton Hotel Eventi - is a 4 star property and not a 5 star as I selected.
I've called the hotel and they confirmed that they are a 4 star property, also also displayed on Google if you search for the property name.
Before referencing the priceline star-rating I encourage you to call the hotel as well and ask them to confirm how many stars they in fact have.

Your marketing on the website is misleading and fraudulent. If I would've wanted a 4 star property, I would've selected that in the drop down.
I entered a blind auction trusting to get a 5 star property (as I selected), but instead was sold a 4 star property.

Name on the reservation: xxx

What are the options here?

Thanks,
David

If you can confirm a premier suite instead of the current king room at no extra cost, I'm fine with keeping the reservation. Otherwise please refund the money in full to the credit card I used for payment.

Priceline rep:

I'm sorry to know you are not satisfied with the hotel received Davidoff. As an advise, our hotel star ratings are indicators of the general quality you can expect from your hotel. Like other well-known hotel rating systems, Priceline considers a number of factors in evaluating the quality of participating hotels such as: amenities, facilities, reputation, brand, other rating services, customer feedback from guests who have stayed at the hotel, etc., to assign a single star rating.

For more information on the exact rating scale, click on the link below.

http://www.priceline.com/help/#/faq/14135

In regards to the room type, it is based on availability. All rooms booked through us are Standard Rooms unless specifically stated, request for King, Queen or 2 Double beds should be confirmed directly to the hotel and is not guaranteed. If you need to upgrade the room you can reach the property; however, a fee will be imposed for the extra cost. Kind Regards! ^SM
www.priceline.com
*Priceline Name Your Own Price® and Express Deals® services are different from published price services. Exact hotel, airline and rental car company are shown only after booking. All sales final.
priceline.com

Me:

ok then refund my money please, you sold me a 4 star property as a 5 star property and that is simply put fraudulent. have you called the property and confirmed that they only have 4 stars?

Priceline rep:
Once you make your purchase online, we immediately charge your form of payment to lock in your rate and secure your reservation. Your reservation cannot be changed, canceled or refunded once it is accepted. ^SM

Me:
please escalate this to your manager and tell me his name and your name and agent ID
this is fraud

Priceline rep:
I understand you're not satisfied with the answer provided; however, there is not another department or person that I can escalate your case, that would address your issue differently.

I'd be glad to research and compare the property received. Please send us the trip number to access the booking. Thanks! ^SM

me:
the priceline number is in my original message on the top of this thread. just to put in this perspective: you are telling me that the hotel is a 5 star property when the hotel itself is telling me that they are 4 stars. I paid for 5 stars and not 4 stars. just in full transparency this escalation is going to go on social media as well as travel forums and our corporate contacts with the priceline group if not resolved properly.

Priceline rep:
I will be certain to document your feedback. Its unfortunate to know you are not satisfied with the outcome.

Since your check in date has passed, we are unable to issue a refund of any portion of the reservation once used.

I also show that a partial refund of the difference; for our Best Price Guarantee feature, was applied to your booking. The remaining balance was paid to the hotel to ensure the room and rate. We no longer have access to these funds to cancel and refund you.

As an advise, the properties will rate their hotels with a different system, actually Priceline's sistem is stricter than the hotels. Please access the link previously sent for more information. We truly regret being unable to provide you with a different answer. ^SM

me:
my check in date is coming up this friday 10/14
it has not passed. once again, I urge you to refund my money in full before I have to take this fraud attempt of priceline abusing the name your own price feature to scam people public

Priceline rep:
As a consumer, it's at your discretion to contact your credit card company or bank about any transaction. I will document your record that this is what you advised us you will do. We will provide them with any requested information regarding your purchase. ^SM

DutchessPDX

There are no star ratings standards in the US, well, at least not like Europe, so companies like Priceline can rate properties just about anything they want to. That's not to mean they're completely arbitrary, stars are given based on hotel amenities and services. I just checked, and Priceline lists that property as a 5 star property, so you got what you paid for.

The time to research how opaque websites work is BEFORE you bid on travel, not after. There's lots of resources out there that help with bidding, including the stickie at the top of this forum.

FTDDD

Thanks for you advice. How can it be legal though that priceline rates and sells a 4-star property as 5-stars? If the property itself doesn't even consider itself 5 stars? That is clear fraud in my opinion.

DutchessPDX

Like I said, it's Priceline's rating system and under their classification system it's considered a 5 star property:

http://www.priceline.com/vp-web/jsp/...tarRatings.jsp

paperwastage

as DutchessPDX mentioned, stars are not a legally recognized term... no uniform way to measure

implicitly, they are offering "5-star property as rated/normalized by Priceline's guidelines"... and they met this requirement

(it makes sense right? a french hotel might say they are only 3 stars (out of 4)... and priceline would normalize it to their 5-star rating. french now uses 5 stars)

MSPeconomist

OT but when did France ever have a hotel rating system where the top was four stars? IIRC even in the 1970s there were five star hotels in Paris. Also, France has some properties that are five star "luxe" or palace hotels. There are also some hotels without any stars, although nowadays these tend to be hostels.

paperwastage

well, technically france went up to four star "luxe", which could be considered 5 star?

2010 (before their change to 5 stars)http://www.ehospitalitytimes.com/?p=367

(you can search google for more examples "France + four star luxe maximum")

http://tourismintelligence.ca/2005/0...-expectations/
since the french government controls the official rating, then if priceline was a french company, they would need to follow that rating... not sure if they actually do when selling in france right now? (and of they don't, you have a more valid reason to complain)

FTDDD

I don't agree that this is legal and think this is a fraudulent marketing tactic that only works in the US.

Imagine you are bidding on a first class seat and you receive a business class seat. And the airline itself defines it as business class as well but priceline calls it first class?
no matter the arguments, you still end up sitting in business class and NOT first class.

erik123

I wouldn't worry too much. It's a nice property at a good price.

DutchessPDX

There's plenty of variety even within FC seats and the airlines DO define what they mean by business class seat. United Airline's business class seats are nicer than most Alaska Airline FC seats. I've had business class seats that were better than first class seats on the same Airline. Fly UAL BusinessFirst overseas compared to a domestic first class seat, the BusinessFirst seat is far superior.

This is why when I book a ticket on United I look at the equipment before I choose my seat or class of service. Unfortunately when you book opaque you don't get to do that, BUT if you do your research you could look at what hotels are available on Priceline that are listed as 5 stars in the area you're bidding on BEFORE you bid you would have seen that property listed as 5 stars.

I'm not saying I like the policy, in fact I would probably never bid for travel on an opaque site because I tend to stay at my preferred brand or the location is important to me but many people do get good deals bidding.

paperwastage

this actually has happened

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/unite...plain-dot.html

buy first class ticket, but it's really "business-class-with-free-upgrade-to-first-but-downgrade-during-irrops"


feel free to complain to FTC (since this is an issue with false advertising right?)

lo2e

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea that it's illegal or fraudulent. There is no universal rating system for hotels in the United States. Every seller of hotel rooms can come up with their own rating system and it does not need to match (or even come close to) anyone else's. A Motel 6 could legally claim they have 5* hotels if they wanted to with zero repercussion. It is not illegal to over-inflate the rating of a hotel so long as the hotel's actual quality or amenities match the site's definition of the rating, if the site even provides that definition. Immoral possibly yes, illegal absolutely not.

PL gives rather vague descriptions of each of their star levels on purpose, and only if you can prove that the hotel does not fit their own definition of a 5* hotel can you claim you were the victim of fraud, and perhaps after your stay you can then try to prove they have given it an incorrect rating and get some or all of your money back. Otherwise, enjoy your stay and learn your lesson by perusing the sites that assist with PL bidding next time.

Romelle

On Priceline's web site, on the retail or direct purchase side, the Kimpton Eventi is currently showing as a 5*. One precaution when bidding is to take a look at what properties are available at the particular star level being bid. It isn't 100%, as there can be different properties offered on one side not available on the other. (For that matter, even different properties can appear on Priceline Express.) It is good though for a general idea as to what might be received via bidding or PE.

With the property clearly showing as 5* on the retail side, OP really doesn't have a case.

It did used to be a 4* on Priceline, but must have been upgraded.

Productivity

While your frustration makes sense and I agree Priceline haven't been entirely transparent here, if your suggestion of own hotel grading was used, it could work entirely the other way. That cheap hotel that really deserves two stars could self grade into a four star and then Priceline could run the line 'well that's what the hotel classifies itself as' if they didn't get to regrade.

SK AAR

I think the anwer is NEVER to use PL (or Hotwire) name your own price. As you have found out no significant savings are gained in return for the excessive fees added by PL. Simply not worth it IMO.