Complaint Review: Priceline.com LLC - Norwalk Connecticut

It seems to me that Priceline ensnares customers who think they will get a good deal on "name your price" bids. In my experience, one trick is to inflate the "star" ratings of certain hotels that tend to have excess room inventory, resulting in the consumer thinking he/she is getting a good deal when in reality the assigned hotel is actually less desirable than a property that may be rated lower in their system.

My recent experience with this involved booking a hotel for downtown Athens, Georgia. There is not a large selection of hotels in the downtown area, and certainly none that could be described as luxury hotels.

I entered a bid for 3.5 star hotels, of which there are only 1 or 2 in Priceline's defined downtown Athens area. My bid was accepted - but surprisingly it was for an alleged 4 star hotel.  I was highly skeptical (since Priceline was also offering diretly discounted rates for that same supposed 4-star hotel at far less than the going rate for the 3.5 and 3 star hotels). But I decided to chance it, as there was nothing else I could do at that point.

When I arrived at the alleged 4-star hotel, an independent hotel called The Graduate Athens, I laughed. First of all, it is not even a hotel - it is a motel.  Second, it is a conversion of the former Foundry Park Inn, which was itself a conversion of a former cheap chain motel.  Aside from some freshening of the interiors, which is mostly superficial, it's still a motel. It is nice than it was...but no one would label it a 4-star hotel by any commonly accepted standards of hotel ratings.  Except Priceline, of course!  And that's the catch - in the fine print, Priceline indicates that they have their own standards for their star ratings and that they can't be compared with any other travel site or hotel rating service. If challenged, they also default to user reviews of the hotel, which are positive.

Fair enough, I suppose...but anyone familiar with these particular hotels would have a hard time arguing that Graduate Athens is a 4 star hotel and in some manner superior to the Hotel Indigo Athens (3.5 stars, per Priceline) or the Hilton Garden Athens (3 stars, per Priceline).  I have stayed at these two and I would rate either of them ahead of, or at the very minimum, on par, with Graduate Athens.  And NONE of these are "4 star" hotels!

I wound up turning in my key at Graduate Athens and went elsewhere. I plan to take the matter up with AMEX because I believe categorizing that hotel as a "4 star" (same rating they give to Chateau Elan, incidentally) is comical.  While I may not get my money back - even though I didn't stay there -  I think consumers deserve to know about Priceline's tactics, such as this sort of dubious rating of hotels.

As the saying goes, there's no such thing as a free lunch.  Next time, I won't go looking for a "deal" -- I'll pick where I want to stay and look for discounts directly with the hotel chain, avoiding Priceline like the plague.