Berto - can you take another peek at Panama City Beach? I *think* we've got this all fixed now

Just checked, everything is right where it belongs! ^

I trust this is on sub-topic at least.

Glad you have Panama City in good shape...what a great beach to hang out on.

Update to the software - you can now search for rates directly from the maps. Date parameters will be saved for 24 hours or until you change dates so you don't have to re-enter as you search availability at multiple properties. Pictures are also shown on-hover when available.

As always, feedback welcome.

It's a nice idea and potentially very useful. But really don't like the way the mouseover popups just stay there even after you move the mouse away from the hotel locator. The mouseover popups should disappear once you move the mouse away. This one feature is so irritating I find it a major obstacle to using the maps.

Tim - thanks for the feedback.

I trust you noticed the X in the top right corner to close a bubble? Still, we know that the behavior is not perfect. What we're not sure of is, what the ideal behavior would be given that some people like to mouse over a lot of hotels in a very small radius while others search large suburban area with very few hotels per mile.

The problem with having it disappear when you move past is that we don't know if you are moving the mouse up and around to one of the links in the bubble.

What we could do is revert to the original behavior where you need to click on the hotel icon to see the info and then hit the X that is in the top right to close it and select another (or just click on another icon which will simultaneously close the 1st and open the new one).

Thoughts?

Once you notice the x marks to close the window, and also notice that when you click somewhere on the map the popup closes, it becomes more manageable. But it still seems confusing to have one popup block so much of the map even when you mouse away from it. I don't know what the solution is. I kind of prefer the way that, for instance, the ua.com hotel site does it: the map indicators are just numbers, and then you can scroll down to the number of the hotel in a list below that.

I also notice that your site says that the Travelodge Chessington Tolworth is right in the middle of Heathrow Airport -- can this be correct? Chessington Tolworth is near Hampton Court, not all the way to Heathrow, isn't it?

Fair enough - we'll take another look at the mouseover behavior.

Regarding that Travelodge: indeed it is on the wrong spot. But it's a function of the property loading incorrect coordinates. What I will do is forward the property to our technical team who will have it checked and fixed (probably in 1-2 days tops). This does happen occasionally, though infrequently. It's an easy fix when notified though and we do have a link at the bottom of the map to notify us of any inaccuracies.

Timfid - the Heathrow hotel coordinates have been updated. No more Travelodge in the middle of the runway ;-) Cheers.

typed in Hong Kong, the map returned 2 hotels in France....

Correct. It would not function properly in Hong Kong as the Google Maps API doesn't support it. At the top of the maps page we list supported countries:

Currently supported countries in the Interactive Hotel Maps include: Australia, Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, Monaco, New Zealand, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United States of America, as well as Birmingham and London in the United Kingdom.

I'm not sure why it would return two hotels in France except that those hotels must have given GDS incorrect coordinates.

Long time without an update, but we are testing a new feature where you can book certain properties from the map directly at the relevant company's website. (It will take you directly to that property's booking page.)

You can still check the corresponding Hotel Magician rates from the same spot. This can be especially useful in cases when you want to book directly but they show as sold out, while we have prepaid rooms still available.

Currently this should work on all Westin, Sheraton, and Four Points branded properties. If this is successful we'll of course move to include more brands.

Interactive Hotel Maps