julieah

We've already booked hotels in Amsterdam and Brugges for the first week of April.
Should we offer to pay now, the dollar falls lower every day.
TY

caroline_edinburgh

Nobody knows how exchange rates wil move between now & then. If you have the money now, why not stick it in a high interest savings account until April ?

Dukey

And if the Dollar goes back up will you feel you made a mistake?

wally34949

I agree with the last post but if you do pay ahead of time, make sure you bring a receipt with you when you arrive at the hotel.

I often will forget what is paid and what isn't.

julieah

Good ideas.
Since there's no way of knowing what these things will do, it' hard to decide what's best to do.

AAFrequentFlyer

Most of the chain hotels, i.e. Hiltons, Sheratons, usually offer a lower pre-paid rate on their websites. The catch is that it's non-refunbdable but if you are willing to take a chance then it could save as much as $20 per night of the lowest internet rate.

Te CC gets charged the same day of the reservation, but from my experience the same day charge is mostly true for US based hotels whereas the foreign hotels reservation is not for some odd reason. It doesn't mean that you will get to keep your money if you don't show up. They will charge the entire amount on the first day of your stay, regardless if you show up or not.

Anyway I thought I pass that little bit of info for anybody wanting to save few $.

rkkwan

I've used otel.com (based in Istanbul) a couple of times. They charge your card in USD immediately, but for most of their listings, the reservations is refundable if you cancel in time. READ THE POLICIES CAREFULLY.

Underhill

If only there WERE such a thing these days as a high-ínterest savings account!

Christina

It's only a couple months, what if you get hit by a bus by then.

I've prepaid hotels in Europe due to getting a discount (from the hotel itself, some do that as I guess prepayment outweighs possible cancellations and they can manage inventory better).

However, in all cases where I've done that, the hotel definitely has charged my CC as soon as I reserved and agreed to that rate (for at least one day, sometimes the whole stay). I don't stay at Hiltons and Sheratons, though, but regular nonchain hotels have charged it when I booked.

Travelnut

Christina
LOL

hetismij

Put the money in a savings account. Any interest earnt on it is a plus. Who knows what the dollar will do next year?
However if you do decide to pay upfront, I suggest you yake out trip cancellation insurance first. SInce that will cost you more than you will lose if the dollar goes down only you know if it is worth doing.

Felschurch

Ahh --the good old days when the Euro was US$1.40.