<p>Can anyone give me an overview of their positive or negative experiences? I am especially interested in what the parameters are in terms of dates. Is there a window or can you submit a specific departure and arrival date? My next stop is the misc travel sites but I thought I good get qualified anecdotal advice here. Thanks!</p>
<p>I’ve never used Priceline for airfare, but have used it many, many times for hotels with great success. Generally, I don’t think there are any great deals on airfare and you have to be flexible with travel times. There is a great website I use with lots of information on every aspect of priceline. People log their bids and hotels/rental cars/airfares won. Each section has a FAQ’s that is very informative. You might want to check out the airline FAQ’s and see if that gives you some answers. The site is: <a href=“http://www.biddingfortravel.com%5B/url%5D”>www.biddingfortravel.com</a> I can’t imagine using priceline without it!</p>
<p>I have used it with good results. However, it’s important to realize that you probably will end up with the worst times for your flights such as 5:30 a.m. arrivals and departures. That’s the tradeoff for getting relatively cheap fares.</p>
<p>You can submit specific days, but not specific times.</p>
<p>Thanks for the input!</p>
<p>My S used priceline to buy a ticket (last week) but he did not bid - just accepted the asking price. You can pick specific flights as long as you take the listed price. He found it cheaper than any of the other flight websites for the day and place he needed to be. He just bought a one-way ticket. Bought the other direction on another site. By booking separate one ways, he got cheaper flights at times he wanted.</p>
<p>Use it as a tool. Go to the web-site and see what prices you get. (also times/dates) After you have checked for deals go to the web-sites of the airlines that come up on priceline. Oftentimes on the airlines own web-site you will get the exact same fare on the same flight without paying the $10 princeline fee. Always do this BEFORE you accept the priceline (or any other similar web-site) fare as the “best deal.” Do the same thing with hotels. See what price you can get and then call the hotel directly. (the actual hotel NOT the 800#) Oftentimes they will meet the quoted price and you will be assured of getting better service if you book through the hotel. Another benefit is that you won’t have to pay for the hotel in advance.</p>
<p>^ Your hotel advice is true for the part of Priceline where they just quote a bunch of hotels and prices. It doesn’t apply too well to the part of Priceline where the amazing bargains lurk - the “Name Your Own Price.”</p>
<p>In the last three or four years I’ve never found a price for an airline ticket on Priceline/Expedia/Travelocity/etc that was lower than the airline’s own Website. Unfortunately, doing it my way takes longer, since you need to visit several sites. I do use PETetc to see which airlines fly between certain cities before going to the airline Websites.</p>
<p>After a while you start to learn the basics – like flying into Denver will usually result in a non-stop itinerary on United that will cost more than a one-stop trip on some other airline. So – ironically – don’t fly United to their biggest hub if you want to save money, despite the fact that United flies a zillion more airplanes into DIA than any other airline. You also find that flying a commuter airline to a small airport 400 miles away usually costs more than flying from LA to New York.</p>
<p>My h was able to use the Priceline “Name your own price” to convince a hotel to match it. We’d bid twice for the same area, and got the same hotel for roughly the same price each time. So when we needed the third reservation, he called the hotel and told them that he’d rather pay them that rate than pay Priceline. We got the room for that price, and the hotel was happy not to pay Priceline.</p>