Okay, that was really easy. Got on, no problem. Faced with big list of hotels…luckily, I’d done my planning last night and know the hotels of downtown by heart so that didn’t take long. Had to fill out all info…total time. Less than 10 minutes.
BUT…
NOW THE AGONY BEGINS.
Waiting, waiting, waiting….sheesh, this is like auditioning for a play or something.
UPDATE: The big mystery for all concerned is what happened to the Hyatt? Read on for theories.
Although it was listed on the San Diego Comic-Con pdf of available hotels — it was NOT on the pulldown menu of hotel choices for today’s lottery. It’s unclear if it was available for the exhibitor lottery last year. According to Erik Amaya’s tweet “I got through by phone, they mentioned the Hyatt was already booked up by “corporate guests.”
According to Travel Planners, Manchester Hyatt did not close a deal with the con and on the hotel’s website they are saying they are booked–or will higher price rooms open up in a few days?
The Manchester Grand Hyatt is a spot of some controversy — Gay rights groups have been calling for a boycott of the hotel due to controversial owner Doug Manchester’s monetary support of California’s anti gay marriage bill. (Although Catholic, Manchester was himself embroiled in a messy and costly divorce.) While the Manchester Grand Hyatt has long been seen as indifferent at best to the Comic-Con’s parade of oddity, it is THE go to place every night for the Nerd Prom after party and if you’ve never waited 30 minutes for a weak vodka tonic there, you haven’t really done Comic-Con.
In addition, the Hyatt is the largest hotel on the waterfront on the West Coast, and its 1625 rooms are a huge part of the available room supply. Losing it for the con — for those with no social conscience — is a serious matter.
I had a bit of trouble with the Web form. There was no Arrival Date dropdown, and without that info, you couldn’t submit the form. Turns out this was a problem with the AdBlock plugin to Chrome/Firefox, which would have been nice to know (and even nicer if they’d tested it), because it was rather frustrating to fill out the whole form and have it get kicked out. Luckily, my wife got through on the phone in about 2 minutes. Fingers crossed…
I’m pretty sure the Westgate was missing, too. Not that it matters as much.
I called the Hyatt to see if I could figure out the problem. My wife and I actually straight up booked a fallback room(not at the discounted rate) through the hotel’s interface about a month ago. So they did not block all the rooms.
They also were not releasing the rooms to travel agent as mine has been attempting to get us a package deal there for 2 months.
The fellow I spoke to at the concierge desk, who was helpful but terribly confused, said the hotel is fully booked and would not divulge beyond that. When I explained the situation he said that the Comic Con website in no way has anything to do with them. So yeh, that was that end of things.
got through by phone to the con people dealing with the rooms after a half hour, gave my request and now I wait. the person on the line could not have been nicer and warm. I have my fingers crossed.
Jimmy
My pal received his confirmation already and won his top hotel choice, SD Marriot Marina next to the convention. I am still waiting on mine and I’d say we each submitted within a minute of each other. But fairly confidant based on his experience that my top couple choices should pan out.
Wow… compared to last year, it looks like a WIN for Travel Planners.
Instead of waiting anxiously online, you wait off-line for the confirmation to arrive.
When I travel to conventions, I usually stay at youth hostels. (Dorm living… a place to shower, sleep, and store stuff.)
I wonder if the yachts in the Embarcadero Marina can be rented?
The Westgate is there — it’s just listed under T for THE Westgate. That threw me for a bit of a loop when I was trying to fill out my choices.
People have been posting on Twitter that confirmations are starting to go out, but I’m still waiting for mine. And worrying that I misspelled my email address (I used a different one than I usually do), or entered the wrong check-in date, or requested two rooms with one occupant each instead of one room with two occupants…
I’m stunned…in at the Bayfront which was the first choice after a nice experience there last year. Whew. Now to find the $$$.
For those of us avoiding it this year, today is just the first day of march madness.
Ha! “The” Westgate…I didn’t notice that.
Still waiting on my email, too. And I think I submitted at 12:06. This is a mysterious process…
I submitted within 15 minutes of Noon here in NYC and by 5pm I had my reservation.
Although I would love to see the reservation statistics that had me with my 12th choice by that time. But hey, at least I have a reservation. That’s better than waiting to get into the site.
I filled out the form with my 12 hotel choices at 12 EST. It’s now 5:18 and I still haven’t gotten any email from Travel Planners asking for my credit card. Have people actually sealed the deal with their rooms or are they still just assuming things are working?
I was in at T + one second and got my third choice- the Hilton Bayfront. Took about 90 minutes to get the email.
My pal and I both submitted within 6 minutes of the start time. He received 1st hotel choice (Marriot next door to con) and a confirmation within two hours.
I finally just got my confirmation 6 hours after the fact and didn’t get a single choice on my list of 12 locations! Randomly assigned some location in Mission Valley! So something didn’t work as planned behind the scenes. That far off within 60 seconds of a timestamp? Guess which location we are keeping…
I submitted my top 9, um make that 8 (no Hyatt), ordered from least to most expensive, plus 4 quick add-ons at 9:05AM (and an unknown number of seconds) PDT. My confirmation was sent at 4:36PM PDT. I got my #6 choice. Though pricey, it’s cheaper than what I had in hand, so I’m guardedly happy. If and when I successfully make the reservation and cancel the other room, I’ll be ecstatic.
Got in at 9:02 Pacific – still no email at 6:15 pm. Will they send an email even if we don’t get anything?
Despite the fact that I don’t have to worry about a hotel and that I’ve been a staunch supporter of keeping the Con in San Diego since I first started attending 18 years ago, hearing all this is forcing me to lean towards the “the con should move elsewhere” camp. It just doesn’t seem worth any of this hassle and heartache if attendance and hotels can be solved by moving the Con to another city. I would like the Con to stay but ONLY if it gets the support it deserves from the hotels and city and the Hyatt (a strategically important hotel) can’t be bothered, why should the Con?
Got in at 9:12a.m. PT, have heard nothing yet. Last year it took a couple of days, and we got our 1st choice. Considering comments above on quick turnaround, I’m worried.
Was in by 5 minutes with all 12 choices already planned out, a bunch of neighboring choices and a few “safe” ones up to a mile out, just in case.
Got an Email back at about 5pm PST…not a single one of my choices, and in fact a random hotel 3 miles away. Very disappointing…
I finally got my confirmation at 11:30. So that’s eleven and a half hours of waiting by the computer for fear of not getting a hotel. And the hotel I got must have been the last minute 12th choice after realizing the Hyatt mysteriously disappeared because I certainly never would have chosen it intentionally. But I guess beggars can’t be choosers and I’m glad I can at least go to the show again this year. Now if I could just get an artist alley or small press table!!!
Couldn’t access the site for a few minutes at first, but then got on and submitted at 12:06EST. Got my 12th choice, but sounds like some who submitted later got better hotels. Looks like that timestamp system isn’t going as planned. I had two friends helping me try to book a room. One got his reservation in under my name one minute after me, and still no email, though it would be interesting to see what hotel it would give me to compare. Maybe they deleted multiple reservations in the same name? Booked a back-up hotel last year and might still stick with that.
NEVER AGAIN.
ComicCon’s hotel booking is a joke. It certainly wasn’t first come, first served!
I had that form sent three minutes after it had opened up. I checked my e-mail to see which of my picks I ended up getting…
NOT A ONE!
They sent me to some hotel 8 friggin miles away! Yet people who waited 15 even 30 minutes after it had opened up got great hotels! ?? How the hell did that happen??
So I started calling hotels on my own. And guess what? I ended up getting the Marriott right across the street for only $350 a night (that is with taxes and fee and 4 people!). Kind of makes me wish I hadn’t wasted time and frustration on their stupid site. From now on, I’ll just make my own reservations.
my tale of woe and intrigue is on my blog:
http://kleinletters.com/Blog/?p=8373
I don’t think the time-stamp thing worked, or it wasn’t honored. Can’t think of any other reason why, though I submitted the form immediately when it was available, I got my 12th hotel choice, but at least I’m downtown. Paying more than I’d like, but I’ll take my punishment.
Wow. Seems like I actually lucked out in getting my 10th choice – a hotel that I’ve stayed at before but don’t really like. I successfully booked two rooms (!), but they screwed up the number of people and beds in my request, so we’ll see how that pans out. I may have to wait a bit and book a full-price room closer to the show later on.
I received my email today (3/19) with no hotel. I have a back-up plan but it just makes me think if the hotel situation is so bad in SD then just think of how it would be if they moved it to Anaheim? That would be effed up because you would be vying amongst fewer hotels AND also going up against people who are going to Disneyland. THAT would suck big time.
Fingers crossed though that I do get a room on my list!