Originally Posted by pinniped

Why would you ever use Expedia, Travelocity, etc. for a hotel booking if they didn't offer a pretty good advantage over the hotel site to do so? Specifically - their niche is that they offer much cheaper rates with more restrictive rules. I use Expedia Special Rates from time to time when I absolutely want a property with a kitchen (in a Priceline zone where I can't specifically get that). That makes sense: that is Expedia's unique product. In certain cases, they do kind of fill that gap between Priceline and the full rate that I was writing about above.

I understand that you could also find the fully-refundable rates on Expedia.com (in fact, I see them there for Hampton Inns all the time), but if I want one of those I will go to the hotel site every time to book it. I don't understand why I would book that rate through Expedia when I can just book it through HHonors.com and know that I am only dealing with 1 confirmation number, 1 computer system to possibly mess things up, etc.