heraclitus

Just found out about Roomer in the hotel deals subforum. Premise is interesting, it allows people with prepaid, non-cancellable reservations to sell (Roomer takes a cut and changes the reservation name to the buyer's).

Seems interesting. Looking at my upcoming travel dates, it is definitely cheap when it comes to booking last minute travel... prices for some places are coming up as much lower than Kayak/Trivago, etc.

Anyhow, I was wondering if anyone has had any experiences buying or selling using the site? I'm particularly interested in the latter... I'd be more emboldened to book non-cancellable rooms if I could at least get some of my money back if I had to change my plans. URL is https://www.roomertravel.com/

sandra_lemieux

Looked into it. I'm not an early adopter so I haven't tried it. To be honest, it seems like there's just one too many middlemen in the transaction which could lead to confusion and disappointment. There's a similar product called Cancelon that is reviewed here: http://www.hoteldealsrevealed.com/bl...iceline-hotel/

I would give it a try if I had a cancellable hotel reservation that I was trying to offload. Much less risk if you're selling and you've got nothing to lose. But as a buyer, the deal would have to pretty fantastic before pulling the trigger.

heraclitus

Yeah, most of the prices I've seen on roomer aren't compelling enough to make me want to chance it. I'd be interested mainly as a seller if for some reason I had to cancel plans after making a nonrefundable hotel reservation.

I'm just amazed that this is even possible... I thought you couldn't change the name on a non-cancellable reservation once it was made?!

ranman1973

I had a chat with one of the founders a while back. He said that hotels generally do not care if the room is switched as long as they are getting their money. He said he's never had a problem.

Their entire business model is based on the assumption that you can switch names. If that's not the case, seems like they were doomed from the start.

I can't say I've ever used them for either buying or selling. But if you're selling and are going to lose out on a reservation anyway, I can't see how it would hurt.

daeagle

I tried buying a hotel room from them but there was a glitch with their inventory and it didn't go through. It took a while to contact them - their phone number goes to a receptionist who takes down your information and then will have someone contact you back. In my case, I didn't get a response back for over a day. I wasn't too happy with their customer service.

Schneestarre

I just looked up rooms in Berlin, Germany for this and next week's FRI and SAT nights and several others, and what I find really strange is that they offer rooms for all these nights in many rather unsual hotels on the outskirts of town. It seems rather strange that there would be people booking these out of the way hotels and than cancelling them, for EVERY night. My opinion is that many hotels seem to offer unsold inventory through this channel, expecially, since the room prices are only a couple dollars below the regular price, at almost all properties. Doesn't look like genuine cancelled rooms to me.

WillTravel

I got a similar impression. Maybe they offer these canceled rooms in some special cases, but most of the listings are just regular hotel listings like any OTA.

catwings01

That is a generalization and absolutely not true for all -I would guess many -hotels. Prepaid non refundable reservations are usually by terms of booking not changeable for any reason. Many hotels do not want their rooms resold and if you think about it there is no real incentive for them to work with this company. After all - if the booking is prepaid with no refunds they get their money whether the room is occupied or not. The hotel "is getting their money" without any help from Roomer.

This is my industry and I am not and was not interested in working with them. So just be aware that they cannot resell your rooms unless the hotel has an agreement with them permitting this. Don't pre purchase non refundable reservations with the expectation that you are guaranteed the ability to resell them.

MarcJ55

I suspect you're right. Imagine the massive undertaking it would be to get a decent inventory of hotels from people who booked and can't cancel. Even craigslist would have a hard time cracking this chicken and egg problem.

MarcJ55

By the way, Roomer just raised $5million in Venture Capital, so somebody with deeper pockets than me believes in their business model. Good for them, but they're not on my roster of go-to sites.

http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/25/roo...d-hotel-rooms/

DAV2355711

Hi,

I "bought" a reservation last summer from Roomer and had some issues with their customer support.

When you buy a reservation, they're supposed to get back to you within like, I don't know, 24 or 48 hours or something, whatever, they didn't get back to me within that time, I wrote them, they never replied but my reservation went through the next day so I wrote it off.

When I got to the hotel, though, the reservation had never been transferred into my name. I gave them the printout from Roomer and they found the reservation based on the original booking code and let me check in but gave me a look and the whole thing took like 15-20 minutes and the kid had to talk to his manager and the whole thing was kind of sketchy. Wasn't the best check-in experience and at a more top-shelf hotel, I can't imagine they would've just given me the room (this was an Ibis I was checking into).

My 2 cents.

I'd use them again if I were in a pinch or a really great deal came up but buyer beware, I received close to no support, the process dragged out longer than it was supposed to, and in the end the reservation was never even changed into my name.

MSPeconomist

I'd worry that they're just adding your name to an existing reservation as the second room occupant. This is already the way some folks here transfer reservations to frineds or attempt to get elite benefits for friends and points/nights/stay credit for themselves. You can check in, but the original room occupant could show up, get a key, and you'd have a stranger in your hotel room. No thanks.

NikitaT

not yet !

escapefromphl

I'm pretty sure that is what they do. I have seen a few reviews where they always have issues checking in because the res is still in the original bookers name.

But I suspect it is also the properties themselves doing last minute inventory dumps.

Here's a Marriott property on the outskirts of Boston, Boston Marriott Burlington for $32 a night Thursday to Monday 16-20 April 2015.
https://www.roomertravel.com/hotels/...2347/43950583?

SinglePapa2

Well boys and girls, I wish I'd seen this topic before. On March 23 I paid $500 for all-included April 5-10 stay, advertised as Roomer Exclusive! So two weeks hence hotel couldn't find my name at check-in. Half-hour later hotel says: got your suite; just cross out this name/info on checkin card, fill in your own info and enjoy!

At check-out 5 days later: I discover that hotel used my MasterCard collected during check-in "for incidentals" to sell me that suite at the price 140% of What I already paid Roomer two weeks prior to check-in (confirmation of which full payment to Roomer on March 23 hotel had stapled to my check-in card on April 5, and never told me there was any issue). When I asked hotel why they charged my card shortly after check-in without ever telling me anything, they didn't provide any explanation - except for this strange barrage:
1. Roomer went thru booking.com to get you all-included deal, as we have fee inclusion agreement with booking.com
2. Neither Roomer nor booking.com paid us
3. The person originally on this check-in card DID show up and stayed at the resort
4. You should talk to Roomer because they're the ones who have your money/owe you money

So two days later Roomer tells me that hotel admitted their error, and could I send them my bank statement so they refund in 48 hours...it's been 90 hours since I provided statement, and the only thing I'm in receipt of is today's email from Roomer that they're diligently working on it. I'm currently out $1,212 on the $500 deal I bought from Roomer