Hotel booked on Booking, asking hotel for better price UPDAT

[debthaven]

Has anybody ever done this before? 

I HATE "destination" events but I understand that one sometimes does them for certain people. We are invited to a 50th birthday party of DH's close friend in Jan. Flights were dirt cheap as long as we go carry on only (no problem). We were really looking forward to spending time with close friends from the UK who are also invited. They suggested an apt, I (stupidly) said I preferred a hotel (rare treat for us!). There was no further discussion, they gave us the hotel info for the room they booked, and told us to please book the same hotel so we could be together. 

I said, is it reasonable? They said, oh yes, very reasonable!

Well, everything is relative. It's NOT reasonable by our standards! It's too expensive for us, but not by much. BUT we want to spend time with these friends, i.e. eat breakfast together (included in the price for us), chill together, have a drink in the evenings, hang out together. 

All this to say, for the first time in my life, I wrote directly to the hotel, told them I had booked a room through Booking to be with friends, but could they please offer us a slight discount, in which case I would cancel our reservation through Booking and book directly with the hotel. I told the hotel that Booking offered us free cancellation and free breakfast.

I don't know how it is in the US, but here, Booking is considered a "bully". I have NO problem with cancelling our reservation through Booking (since they offer free cancellation) and booking directly with the hotel if they can offer us a discount. 

Has anybody else ever done anything like this? It's definitely a first for me. 

ETA: I've also checked out Agoda and other online booking sites. And I plan to keep checking. 

[debthaven]

Obviously there is NO expectation.

The other reason I was fine with booking that hotel is that we can find a more reasonable one and cancel for free. 

[obelisk]

In  the past I have asked for a corporate discount which was not denied locally and internationally especially for off season.

[debthaven]

The hotel wrote to me this morning offering an 11% discount with the same conditions: free cancellation, free breakfast. :-) 

They asked me to confirm, I confirmed, and I asked them to confirm. They confirmed too, so I cancelled the Booking reservation. 

So it's not bugging me anymore because the nightly rate is just within our budget (albeit the upper limit). ;-)

[TheOtherMe]

Yeah! 

[alabamagal]

I be not used booking, but I have used other search engines to compare prices then when I chose a hotel went directly to hotel website to book at the same rate. Hotels don't require upfront payment and you can cancel until the last day.

[Cookies Galore]

Dec 11, 2015 17:04:27 GMT -5 debthaven said:

The hotel wrote to me this morning offering an 11% discount with the same conditions: free cancellation, free breakfast. :-) 

They asked me to confirm, I confirmed, and I asked them to confirm. They confirmed too, so I cancelled the Booking reservation. 

So it's not bugging me anymore because the nightly rate is just within our budget (albeit the upper limit). ;-)

Treat yo self!

[debthaven]

Cookie, this whole thing I have zero interest in doing is going to be expensive enough LOL. 

[8 Bit WWBG]

Great job!  If you never ask, the answer is always no!  Now you get what you wanted.