Priceline.com skepticism...need feedback
 

Now that Delta has the first right of refusal on bids with Priceline, has anyone used them recently? my problem with them is that you cannot contact them to ask questions, and they will only take phone orders for fares over two hundred dollars. I would like to try them, but i do no want to end up on a smaller carrier or some ridiculous itinerary! Help!!

jms8090 ~ I don't think you have to worry too much about either of your concerns. First, they only book tickets on one major carriers, which are:

American Airlines
United Airlines
Delta Airlines
Continental Airlines
US Airways
Northwest
America West
TWA

Most of the tickets that Priceline had issued before their deal with Delta were on TWA or America West, so now your ticket will most likely be on Delta, TWA, or America West.

Second, they guarantee that you will have no more than one connection each way, so you won't get stuck with an itinerary where you'll have to make a whole bunch of connections.

It was my understanding that UA and AA did not participate. I may be mistaken however.

UA and AA may not provide "unpublished" low fares to Priceline, but Priceline is a travel agency and can book those airlines using standard published fares.

It is up to Priceline to use any airline they want, but Delta's new deal basically gives Delta the "right of first refusal".

On Wednesday of this week I decided I wanted to try and fly from New Orleans to Miami to see my brother race in an offshore powerboat race down there.

Only problem is I couldn't find a fare for less than $500 on a major, and even AirTran wanted something like $400. At this point I decided to give Priceline a try.

Before I decided to use Priceline though, I will admit that I pretty much knew if I did bid low enough I would be flying on Delta, which although I wouldn't get miles or upgrades, I would get CRC access and Medallion preferred seating. I knew chances were I'd end up on Delta because I had read that the primary airlines they use are TWA, America West, and Delta, and I figured there's no way I'd fly TWA from New Orleans to South Florida and America West doesn't even serve that route.

Anyway, I enter my cities. I tell it to use only New Orleans airport and that I'd be willing to fly into MIA, FLL, or PBI in South Florida (I had to tell it I wanted to fly to FLL instead of MIA though to get to choose all three airports) for $165. I took a $5 "bonus" for accepting a free, no obligation calling card and submitted my bid.

About 40 minutes later I got an e-mail telling me I had a ticket, and sure enough it was on Delta from New Orleans to West Palm Beach. I called the Medallion line, and they gave me preferred seating and she said she put my SkyMiles account number on the ticket, so we'll see if that does anything FF mile wise.

The one important lesson I learned here is that if you have multiple airports, I'd try and submit bids for each one individually, which I think you can do (you are allowed to submit multiple bids for different destinations I believe). In other words, I probably should have bid on MSY-MIA only first, then MSY-FLL, and finally MSY-PBI since those are closest to furthest from where I want to be (though I don't mind the extra hour or so drive in South Florida really). The drawback to this strategy would have been I think you can only get the "bonuses" to your bid once probably, but I'm not sure.

Anyway, so far, so good ... I'll let you know how it turns out after the trip ...

Next on my list ... hotel room ... I already tried Priceline again (being adventurous this trip, might as well go all the way!) to get a 3 star room in Miami Downtown for $70/night, and it got turned down ... might try some more with different parameters though ...

This has probably already been answered, but I couldn't find it..

Does tickets issued by Priceline allow Freq. Flyer mileage earnings?

No as far as I know.

So I say "NO" to Priceline.

Must get my MILES!

I found it, and Catman is right - you do not earn miles. Here is the link:

http://www.priceline.com/InformationCenterASP/html/faq.htm

"Tickets issued through priceline.com are not eligible for Frequent Flyer miles, or upgrades"

Catman ~ I think you may be reacting a little too harshly ...

In this case I had the choice of $185 and no FF milage (but still Medallion benefits of preferred seating and boarding and CRC access) or $500 and FF milage ...

I'm sorry, but 5,000 miles and four segments in my Delta account is not worth $300!

I have not had a positive experience using this service.

You know, my passion is not collecting ff miles for the sake of ff miles, my passion is travel, and miles are a means to that end.

I collect miles when and where I can (including charging my Priceline.com ticket to my Delta AMEX card ... be interesting to see if I get the 50% for buying a DL ticket ...), but in this case I decided I wanted to travel somewhere and I had to figure out how. I could have tried spending miles, but I decided it would not be a good use of my hard earned miles. A regular ticket would have cost me $500, which was beyond my budget ... so I gave Priceline a shot (knowing I'd get DL most likely if I got a ticket) and got a $500 ticket for $185 ($165 + $20 tax). To me, spending an extra $300 on a ticket for a short trip just to earn 5,000 miles and 4 segments and possibly the opportunity to upgrade was not worth it. In fact, not only would it not have been worth it, it would have been financially unfeasible. Therefore, my choice was really not take the trip or use Priceline, and to be honest the choice was easy!

Now, I can certainly understand if you've had a bad experience with the company, but I've read through all the postings and the only truly "bad" experience I've found is demeter having to fight a faulty charge on his credit card. All the other complaints have been about no ff milage, no choice in times and flights (both of which are explicitly stated by the company), and the company not accepting "reasonable bids", which is also well within their rights.

Actually, I think Demeter (Ceres) is a "her"

http://members.aol.com/flyerpics/wanted.htm

(Thanks, NJDavid)

Yes Beckles, Maybe I did act a bit too harshly concerning priceline.

I only used the service twice -- once earlier this year and once friday night... both times my bids were rejected (plus on the second flight they gave me a two plane change itinerary.)

I put in reasonable bids (about 10-15 dollars less than what the airlines were charging) but no go.

It's great that the service is working for you and others though. Just not for me.

Catman ~ I just can't believe people would condemn such a service just because their bids are rejected.

I'm surprised you've tried it and your bids got rejected for the prices you're talking about, and to be honest I wouldn't use the service in an attempt to save $20, $50, or probably even $100, but in my case it was the choice of not taking the trip for $500 or putting in the bid at a last minute attempt to get the trip at a price I could justify.

I am actually quite mystified at the service at this point. I put in a bid for 1/3 of the lowest price I could find (a price which by the way would be cheap even for 21 day advance purchase) and won, but then I read stories about people bidding $20 below the lowest price and not getting it (such as your case) ...

Even more curious about my trip is that at the price I'm paying I'm flying my return trip Monday and even one leg of my outbound trip on flights that are oversold, even though I bought my ticket only days before the flight ...

I think that part of the key to getting the most value out of the service is that you need to bid on trips that are close, when the airlines know they have seats that need to be filled, as opposed to bidding on more distant flights when the airlines are still holding out hope of selling the tickets to their own customers and not Priceline's.

Also, and I'm going out on a limb here, since (allegedly) most of their tickets are issued on TWA, America West, and Delta, it probably helps if you're flying to and from cities with decent capacity from one or more of these carriers.

Counsellor ~ I stand corrected ... I certainly did not in any way intend to demean our good friend demeter by accusing her of being a male!

Beckles... just for the record I DO NOT CONDEMN ANYTHING... People, airlines, travel services, people who disagree with me. I think that's a wrong choice of words.

And remember I said "if the service works for you, then terrific."

All I was saying is that I put in bids and they were rejected. Maybe I didn't act fast enough, maybe someone bid even lower. I just tried Priceline as an alternate to the airline websites and the other travel services.

THe second route in question was EWR-HOU and I did have to change planes twice.

A lot of people like bidding. I'd like to get a price immediately and decide then if I want it or go elsewhere.

BUT REMEMBER: WE ALL BEAT TO OUR OWN DRUMMERS. IF PRICELINE WORKS FOR YOU, THEN HAPPY & SAFE TRAVELING. IT'S NOT MY CAN OF PEPSI.

Catman ~ I wasn't talking about you! I was referring to some other postings I had seen either here or in USENET of people saying it was a BAD service just because the company had not accepted their bids ... although maybe I shouldn't have addressed that comment specifically at you!

Sorry for the misunderstanding!

On another note ... I flew the first leg of the trip yesterday, everything went fine. Priceline had originally had me leaving at noon and arriving at 5:00 PM, but I wanted to try and get in earlier, so I went to the airport and stood by for an earlier flight. First leg was fine, but the second leg (ATL-PBI) was going to be tough. I was waiting patiently in the boarding area for them to call my name for the second leg (never even asked the desk agents once about my status because I had already checked on it in the CRC and they were busy enough as it was), and they called my nameright after first class boarding, so I hop up quickly to the counter wanting to get my boarding pass and board with the Medallion members so I won't have trouble finding overhead space for my roll-on. The nice young lady hands me by boarding pass and my jaw drops ... FIRST CLASS BABY!

As long as you are willing to put up with Priceline's limitations (no control over times of travel is a BIG limitation to me), Priceline *can* work. I have used it for business and leisure travel, and once for hotel ($85 hotel room for $50, with an additional 1 free night promo deal).

Yes, it's best for short-notice travel when regular prices are a fortune, and you have the flexibility of traveling anytime on a given day. Theoretically, however, you need not use the magic Saturday night stay.

About FF miles: I recommend you send your ticket stubs through the mail, and see what happens. You might get lucky ...

arturo themk yu peepl krezie. yu argie ovr nuthin. et jist a por quito aerolin teckit. arturo es imbareassed bye yur jibberesh.

Beckles, thanks for understanding that I do not attack anything or anyone. Friends, OK?

I hope PriceLine works for you. And if you can post a trip report reflecting your Priceline experiences (maybe we need a new tread talking about purchasing airline tickets and hotel reservations this way.

And arturo: sometimes your jibberage makes a lot of sense! For YOU: HAVE A MEOWY DAY!!

I have submitted two reasonable bids. Both were rejected. Got a better deal than even the submitted price through a travel broker. I don't trust them is all. If you know how to hook up why bother with such a service?

I tried priceline a couple of months ago to get some tickets from SFO to New York.
My offers were rejected.

HOWEVER:
a couple of weeks ago, I bid $350 for a ticket from SFO
to Tokyo. It was accepted and the whole thing cost me:
350
54 tax
---
$404

The flight was on ANA, and Ana gives you a 20,000 Yen (~$180) gift certificate on top of that. (as a promotion of starting service in San Francisco). And I still got FF mileage on United.

The second best deal I could find were AA e-fares for $454, but I could not stay as long as I wanted (only 8 days).

Conclusion:
I am satisfied and will try priceline again.

one (more) caveat of using priceline...

flying out of jfk last night, i chatted with a student trying to get to chicago. her nonstop jfk-ord twa flight was cancelled, and no other airline would honor the priceline-issued ticket. she eventually got on a very late jfk-stl-ord twa flight which was delayed on the tarmac for an hour due to weather in stl (i know because i was on the jfk-stl leg), and missed a reunion -- a problem which may not have happened had she had a published fare.