Last Minute Hotel Rates
 

It seems to me that hotels would want to fill up any rooms that have not been booked 24-48 hours in advance. Seems as long as the rate earned exceeded cost of cleaning and utilities, it would enhance profit.

In reality, however, I don't usually find this. What I do find is that all the so-called "last minute" websites merely direct you to a list of hotel prices and availabilities that are more or less identical to the ones you would find if you went straight to Expedia or the like. Also, they only seem to include big chains. What about independent hotels, resorts, b&bs etc.?

Is calling the hotels the only option? That's pretty time consuming, and generally I only have marginal luck.

Is there something I'm missing?

It may not be exactly what you're thinking of, but priceline is usually the best in this situation.

I think you can priceline up till 3 p.m. of the check-in date.

I'm pretty sure that PL works until 6 PM of checking date; there was a recent thread in which a hotel search, culminating in a PL win, was presented in real time.

Litespeed, if hotels discounted TOO drastically at the last mnute, there would be too many people waiting untl the last minute to book, willing to take chances in order to reap big savings.

Smaller places just don't have the budgets and staff wherewithal to participate in those bid Expedia-type sites.

The bottom line is that you'll find the very best last minute rates through the hotel directly.

Any rates given to third party providers always get marked up.

Roomsavers.com has coupons that are generally accepted last minute on a walk-in basis only. But we have had good luck calling a few hours ahead and asking the hotel if they will be accepting the coupon that evening.

Entertainment Rate is another way that hotels fill up last minute rooms. They offer discounted rooms on dates when they are 80% full or less. You join and membership is annual, some hotels will give you a deeply discounted rate 30 days in advance, others don't discount till 48 hours before. Over the years the discounts haven't been as good as they used to be before the card membership was so popular. There are different books...for instance the Hawaii entertainment coupon book will give you coupons for attractions and restaurants in Hawaii, plus a membership card for hotel discounts all over the country and some international too.

You can call a hotel and ask for their "Entertainment Card" rate. If they offer it, you can then buy a membership after-the-fact at entertainment.com (assuming the discount outweighs the price of the membership).