EBGflyer

I'm Hilton Diamond travelling this summer with my wife and 2 kids (8 and 3 years) and been trying to book our stays mostly at Hilton group hotels.

When searching for availability it's no problem searching for 2 adults + 1 kid. Mostly the same rate as single or two adults comes up. But when adding the 2nd kid (my 3 year old) things become a lot different. Mostly no availability is shown and I get offered only premium rooms like suites.

Many of the rooms that pops up when searching for 2 adults + 1 kid are twin rooms with two double beds. Obviously no problem fitting us family of four in there. But the system won't allow us to book it when we are 4.

How do I do this in a smart way in order to avoid insane rates?

Any experience on this?

Thx in advance for your input.

Jaimito Cartero

It depends where you are booking.

As long as fire safety codes aren’t involved, I’d just book for 2 adults and one child. In parts of Asia, it only allows you to book two people into a standard room. Staff has told me to just book the adults, and I’ve never had problems in 100’s of nights stayed.

:D!

Look at the family policy of the hotels, many of them say children stay free provided no extra beds are needed beyond what is already in the room. In this case you can just book for 2 adults, or if the age limit is 5 then 2 adults and 1 child.

As an Honors member you benefit from 2nd guest stays free so you can also book for 1 adult and 2 kids.

Combining the above in theory you can just book for 1 adult, but the hotel might get a surprise when everyone turns up, so best to put as many people in the booking as possible without it forcing a bigger room or raising the price.

arlflyer

If you can narrow it down to specific properties (to the point where looking at each individually won't be onerous), just go to the actual property websites and look at the room types. The descriptions should be pretty explicit about the furniture (e.g. 2 queens, king + sofabed, etc.) and in the details it will say how many it sleeps. A combination of that latter point and you using your judgement on what furniture can hold what people will probably be more reliable than using the algorithm's judgement on a hilton.com search.

aww3583

Father of two under 8 here. My two can share a sofa-bed. It may not adhere exactly to the T&Cs and fire code, but I don't add them to the reservation. I actively search out rooms with a sofa-bed and book them. No front desk agent has ever stopped us or mentioned occupancy limits.

If you want to follow the letter of the occupancy law and not break the bank, look for connecting rooms. Usually two basic level rooms that are connecting will be cheaper than a single suite with similar capacity.

sxpsxpsxp

This is certainly not a Hilton-specific issue, but as others have said, it often depends on your situation and on the property.

I've got two young kids who would rather sleep in a bath tub than share a bed (I'm exaggerating here, but to make a point ). I've been either booking suites/larger rooms that have sofa beds and then requesting rollaway beds, bringing my own extra bed (air bed now that the youngest is too big for a folding cot), or in some cases booking two rooms. The really awesome part of the Hilton portfolio is that you can actually book confirmed connecting rooms. And because of how premium rooms are priced on points bookings, it is often cheaper or almost the same cost to get two rooms. I do, however, wish Hilton would specify if rollaway beds are available/allowed in room descriptions like Marriott does. It would make some of this easier.

dbuckho

My kids are now 12 and 5, but most of the experience is pre-pandemic and when my 2nd son was 3 or younger. Often in Asia and sometimes in Europe the room max occupancy will be 3 (hence the results you see on the website searching for 4). In those cases I email the hotel and check in advance. Every time except once the reply was it would be fine to book 2 adults 1 child as long as we can use the existing bedding (which we always could since we were traveling with a Shrunks Inflatable Toddler Bed). I think always better to confirm ahead of time.

I have also had some odd responses re: max 3 occupancy rooms. For example one hotel in Dublin said the room (kind bed + sofa bed) would be too small to add a crib or rollaway, but they would provide an air mattress if I wanted. And a couple times the response has actually exceeded my expectations - for example in Tokyo one property suggested we actually get a King room, they would provide a crib, and that the window had a very large bench seat that our older son could sleep on (and it did - the window area was as large as a single bed - worked great).

That said, we have reached the point where my wife wants her own bathroom vs. sharing with the kids, so Hilton's confirmed connecting rooms feature has definitely increased our # of Hilton stays vs. others the past 2 years (all domestic US travel). Often Accor properties will return a 50% off second connecting room rate if you search 1 room / 2 adults + 2 kids which can be useful in certain parts of the world (i.e. we have an upcoming Australia trip and it is almost all Accor properties).

seawolf

As mentioned, the site will filter out rooms with occupancy limits that can't meet the your guest requirements. You can easily sneak in extra guests. Whether front desk strictly enforces occupancy limits will be YMMV similar to how strict they enforce corporate rate eligibility.

azepine00

I am not sure if "fire code" explanation holds true ss i have never seen anyone anywhere actually producing such code but i've encountered hotels offering same rooms for higher occupancy for extra payment.

That being said note that 2 beds in many places in europe and asia means two twin beds (and king are same beds moved together) and many rooms are too small to fit anything extra. Couches are often not fold out kind but just small sitting only type. Some places are much more by the book than others - i would advise against trying to sneak in extra ppl in japan for example.

No issues in north america or wherever you can book 4 outright. For others i would recommend emailing hotels to clarify (and second room for discounted rate is quite common overseas and really helps with sanity ime ) .

It will get even tougher as kids grow older..

DELee

If you are searching in Europe ot Asia, there are strict limits on numbers of people per room.

David

Nonameabc

initially we searched for 2 adults and 2 kids but the price is skyrocketing. But when we reduced it to 2 adults and 1 kid, it’s way more affordable.

So we booked a Double Queen bed room with 2 adults and 1 kid (age <12). Can all 4 of us check in without extra charge? Both kids are < 12.

The hotel policy says “Children under age 12 stay free when sharing a room with a paying adult on a room only rate.” I assume this means it’s ok that all 4 of us can stay in the room without extra charge?

we tried to reach the hotel front desk a few times but no one answered the phone…

seawolf

You have to consider it could possibly be a local fire code constraint. If that is the case, be prepare to pay for another room or refused check in.

You need to talk to hotel to understand if this is a fire code constraint, mistake in loading room rates or, hotel just violating Hilton rules on kids under 12.

azepine00

Need sanity check - that wording implies including those 12 yo right?

Nonameabc

I tested with 3 adults vs 3 adults + 1 infant, the latter also skyrocketing price than the first one. How could an infant affect fire code? There must be a bug in the searching system, treating all kids as adults.

arlflyer

A google search will reveal that for a long time there has been something going on with hotel room pricing as a function of occupancy in Dubai, where adding a second child causes prices to skyrocket. There was even a newspaper article written about it...back in 2016. But none of this discussion even suggests a root cause. Interesting.

For this particular poster, if they wish to stay within the rules...have they considered looking into Hilton's connecting room booking functionality (1 adult and 1 child per each of two rooms)?