I am for direct reservations specially in the
case of small properties.
During our last trip to Italy, I made the reservations
directly and not only I got the
best possible rates, but I was
able to ask several important questions to
Lorenza the owner of Arco del Lauro in Rome and to Paolo
also one of the owners of Hotel Casci in Florence.
For me it is invaluable, because not only I had the best possible rates,
but I had
exactly the kind of rooms I was looking for,
( we were three adults and it was important ). Also
the kindly answered a lot of questions that helped
us a lot. For instance Lorenza, booked me for a single
night later in a nearby hotel because Arco del lauro
was full, it was a Saturday night and I had tried on my
own and got nothing. She found a room at a good rate
not that I would rather stay there than in Arco del Lauro,
a thousand times NO!! but it "save my life" since I had to sleep
that night in Rome in order to catch my early next morning
flight to New York. The autoleggio she sent to Fiumicino to pick us up
was the best and so on. Paolo, made reservations for us at museums
and gave me the right information encouraging us to take
an Intercity train versus a Euro Star saving 60 euro (in 3 tickets) which
turned out be a perfect choice.
For me the direct reservation creates an unique bond with owners
of small hotels that is impossible to replace.
In the case of big hotels it varies, I have noticed now that many
big hotels match any other rate, guaranting the best rate possible
which I think is a good thing.

For some time, I thought hotels would care that a guest might report back to their booking agency that they had a less than satisfactory experience, but now I don't think so. At Hotel Vendome St Germain, in Paris, at checkout I reported having had a problem and the manager just shrugged and really did not care at all. They have plenty of other guests. Now I book directly, hoping the hotel will think of me as THEIR guest, rather than an Expedia customer, for example.

I really can't think of a time I was treated badly because I booked through a third party, often saving hundreds of dollars. I've done both direct booking and third-party booking, choosing whatever is cheaper, and treatment I experience has not differed.

For some areas, it really works best to book directly, because many hotels just don't work with third party online sites. This is true in some parts of Mexico, for example, and all my hotels for Mexico have been booked directly. Or, for some hotels, booking directly gives the best price.

In my experience, people who use Expedia seem to be only interested in the lowest possible rate, more than the actual quality and service of a hotel.

Then they think they've really scored something special, when if they would call the hotel directly to ask for the same rate, the hotel would be happy to do it.

It's also a little hard on hoteliers because Expedia doesn't provide any guest information to the hotel. Unless the guest calls, there's no way for the property to initiate any kind of service communication, thereby developing a relationship.

I always got similar or better rates directly and we often I avail myself of the opportunity of making the reservation to get good advice from the hotel. Once making a reservation in Mexico I asked the hotel how much should I pay for the taxi from the airport and believe me that was an extremely helpful information.

I always book directly. If there's a misunderstanding or problem with the reservation, I don't want a third party involved. I'm also not looking for a highly discounted rate that might insure me the worst room in the hotel. If I can't afford (or don't want to pay) a hotel's going rates, I stay elsewhere. If I've stayed in a hotel before, I always mention that fact in my inquiry.

So far, knock wood, I've had no reservation problems anywhere and would recommend almost every hotel we've stayed in.

I probably book 95% of my hotel reservations directly with the hotel. However, I usually don't have any special requirements or requests so find it is not necessary to "correspond" with the owners or management beyond the original reservation.