lewisc

The site doesn't meet your needs. I get it.

I look at the site as a tool that helps manage rebidding opportunities. I don't think it has enough data to reliably offer suggested minimum and maximum bids in all zones.

The OP has been fixing technical issues since the site was launched. It was presented as beta and bugs are being fixed. People didn't want to be limited to IE and he listened.

edited to add I think the OP (slightly) overstates the value of his site when he talks about one place for all your PL bidding research. There is no substitute for checking rates available conventionally before you start your bidding. I guess you could make a case that zones with a zillion rebidding possibilities might be the exception. 5* in Vegas for example.

biddingtraveler

We have thought about this and want to build it. The greatest fear with this one is that we build it and no one (besides you, of course ) uses it. Keep in mind that watching the whole process unfold (seeing counteroffers as they show up) is available in manual bidding, especially recently now that we added the ability to do very small increments. Usually the people who use AutoBid just want the convenience (the 'Just get it for me, I don't care' mentality) and just want the assurance that they're not grossly overpaying.

That said, obviously counteroffers work, otherwise PL wouldn't be offering them, and we could probably convert a few more users by allowing a stop. It's definitely on the list.

With any piece of software there are always a million things you want to do to it particularly as people give you feedback and want you to do X or Z feature. And it's frustrating that if you get a lot of good feedback as we have, you don't have the resources to do it all in one week, so you just have to order the work items according to how much return you're going to get out of it. The current feature we've chosen to work on is a pretty major improvement and we hope it will be well received when it's out.

euromannn

The site with minimal knowledge on how bidders use other sites to track bids, bonuses, and then bid on PL.

OP is constantly behind in understanding the architecture deficiencies and issues posted and rarely can
project a date of confirmation of changes just taht things are being worked.

Seems like issues with database implementation, rebidding strategy, GUI interface issues with different browser are as prevalent today as months ago when posted for trial use.

I really don't see progress when the coding and DB issues are ongoing.

jackal

Well, the people who truly have the "Just get it for me, I don't care" mentality are going to book retail and not waste their time with bidding on PL. If someone is using PL in the first place, that infers they're a value-pursuing customer and want the best bang for their buck. Anything that can help reduce cost would be received with open arms, IMHO.

At least he has reached out to the FT community for feedback. That's fifty times better than most other travel websites out there. If you don't like it, don't use it.

SQ421

The "Bidding Strategy" page doesn't display correctly while using Chrome.

Anyone else faced the same issue?

biddingtraveler

Sent you a PM.

biddingtraveler

Thank you very much for reporting this. It's been fixed. If the same error shows up try clearing your browser cache or pressing CTRL-F5/SHIFT-F5 (not sure what the key combination is in Chrome to force cache refresh).

sonofzeus

I was trying to decide...this permission helped.

nasa808

Used the software the other day and I absolutely love it!

biddingtraveler

Live in the US? Pick up a copy of USA Today and check out the Money section on page 2. Thanks to Dennis Schaal for writing such a great article (it takes up 1/3rd of the page!)

There's been a pretty major revision to the site over the last week addressing some of the concerns people have had and adding some great new features.

First is that we've added the ability for you to post your own Priceline bids even if you haven't used our bidding tools. "Big deal," you say, because every other PL site out there has forms where you can do that. Well, try our version and see how it's better.

Next is that we've made it even easier to see the Priceline hotels you could get and more importantly, showing the approximate retail price so you can make easy comparisons to the traditional retail shopping channels.

More details on the blog.

cedric

Used the site for a second time today. Very handy tool, and worked fine for me both times - didn't notice any particularily long delays as other posters had mentioned.

What I did notice is that the suggest low and high offers were higher than I would have expected for the particular market that I was bidding on (Vancouver, BC) based on my past experience. I therefore used a range that was more in line with what I would have expected, and got a winning bid that way. The winning bid, in fact, was exactly what the site suggested as a low bid, so the range wasn't totally out to lunch, although I have certainly received lower winning bids as recently as last month.

biddingtraveler

ZOMG, we made it onto television!!

Thanks to you all for the continued support!

DIAFlyer

Congratulations!

The more people using the site the more data you have to make the bidding suggestions even better (just used it for a trip to Washington DC yesterday).

USAFAN

biddingtraveler:

Congratulations!

I did read the article .... and used your program for a hotel in London. Your program works great!^

Dennis wrote: "....Previously, I naively thought I was a skilled Priceline Name Your Own Price hotel bidder. Now, I realize I may have been over-bidding in the past, wasting time, and losing some great hotel stays...."

I agree with Dennis. I use Priceline a lot. BTW, I believe I never have been overbidding Priceline in the past! But anyway: Your program makes using Priceline much easier.

fidelsan

biddingtraveler:

Congrats on your success and great feedback on FT.

I myself used your site for my recent trip to Paris. It was amazing how easy it was to use and how easy it made it for me to get a hotel.

One suggestion:
Your algorithms, currently goes from one zone to the next and the first time it wins, it selects it. One thing I would like to see is the ability to "rank" your zones depending on which ones you prefer. So if I see that I won Zone A at price X, but my preference was for Zone B, I know that Zone B was tried first. DOes this make sense?

Other than that, I can see how this will get better as you get more collective intelligence from usage.