Priceline does not allow you to re-bid within a certain number of days (for example, if my bid for a rental car wasn't accepted today, I cannot re-bid without changing dates or type of a car for 7 days). How does Priceline enforce that rule? Would registering under another name suffice? Do they go by the credit card #?

Do I understand this correctly? You want assistance with breaking Priceline's rules?

Registering under another name doesn't make sense, since the person who made the reservation must appear to claim the room, flight, and/or car.

You can re-bid if you change your parameters at all -- add a star category or another neighborhood to your hotel specs, for instance.

You can learn a LOT about strategies for Priceline thru the website (especially the FAQs) at www.biddingfortravel.com

Marc (or Sherlock),

You've cracked the case!!!!!

Jen, forgetting for the moment the issue of evading the re-bidding process, are you sure the person making the reservation has to be the one to show up? I thought you could use Priceline to bid for your kids, parents, friends, etc. No?

The problem, Marv, is that you have to show your ID when you claim your reservation... thus you have to use your real name.

To what extent this is enforced by hotels, etc, is a good question... but I would presume that they would take care to check the ID to prevent two people named Marv from showing up and trying to claim two underpriced rooms, whereas only one Marv has made an actual Priceline reservation. Think it through before you try anything adventurous.

I think some people misunderstood what I was trying to do.

Lets say I, Marv Johnson, bid $50 for a full-size rental car in JFK, and my bid was rejected. I cannot change the dates, I want to pick up my car only in JFK and I do not want to settle for anything less than a full-size. Priceline would make me wait 7 days before I can bid $51. What if I go ahead and register with Priceline again, as Marv Johnson (there's got to be more than one in this country), but use a different e-mail address. Would that work?

No, not unless you have a credit card with a different name and number. I believe they may track users using both cookies and credit card numbers.

Now you're cooking with gas!

I suspect the combination of name, location, dates, bid item, and price would probably trigger some keys in PL's program that would kick it back. Plus there are the cookies they've left all over your computer.

Book a cancelable rate somewhere else, then keep trying PL or Hotwire when you can.

I had a bid on Priceline rejected for ME. I re-bid in my husband's name and was successful (don't even go there!). He had to rent the car. Don't know if this will help you. The other deal about changing "something" works also. Is it 7 days or 3 days if you are unsucessful? Think 3?

Actually, if you rebid (even under the same name) using a different credit card, and making a minor change, you'll probably be OK.

You can also rebid through priceline.co.uk. Prices, obviously, will be in pounds, so make sure you check out the exchange rates on the day so that you know what you're bidding.

You need to wait 72 hours before rebidding. I tried for a hotel on Friday, then Monday, then Thursday. I tried changing credit cards but kept my email address the same and used the same name on the reservation and Priceline still called me on it.

Mr. Shatner has been helpful in answering Priceline questions. His email is [email protected]