Reserving Hotel Rooms 2017... fun times

[Kyra_Maverick]

Weiss Schwarz, I would recommend looking into one of the local hotels not affiliated with Fanime while you wait for Friday to roll around. I know there are a few hotels in the downtown area that don't offer Fanime discounts and had rooms open when I checked earlier today. AirBNB is also an option that I know people have fallen back on in the past.

[Red_Eye]

Only ONE good spot left on my preferred list, logged in RIGHT on the DOT of my booking time, and of course it says overbooked right after I select it!  -_-

I sincerely hope they have a wait list for the others in case of cancellation...

If not, it'll be a longer walk to and from all the action.  Not terrible overall, I'd just rather leave most of the walking for the Con itself.

[Weiss Schwarz]

Only ONE good spot left on my preferred list, logged in RIGHT on the DOT of my booking time, and of course it says overbooked right after I select it!  -_-

I sincerely hope they have a wait list for the others in case of cancellation...

If not, it'll be a longer walk to and from all the action.  Not terrible overall, I'd just rather leave most of the walking for the Con itself.

Fairmont? That was my preferred hotel. It's crazy just how quickly they all went away.

[Weiss Schwarz]

Weiss Schwarz, I would recommend looking into one of the local hotels not affiliated with Fanime while you wait for Friday to roll around. I know there are a few hotels in the downtown area that don't offer Fanime discounts and had rooms open when I checked earlier today. AirBNB is also an option that I know people have fallen back on in the past.

That is definitely a good idea, one that I thought of but couldn't really find much that fit what I was after. I know I can't be too picky but still.

~~~

At this point, I'll be at the mercy of the waitlist. I have no idea how well it works out for people but guess we'll see in my case.

[Ko-tan]

First time I've ever been waitlisted in 6 years :(waited until my slot for today a 7 am and the hotels were mostly booked. Looks like I will have to make a twitter or FB account for next year since fanime doesn't have a mailing list like other cons. I'm so disappointed. :'( :'( :'(. I regrestered the day pre Reg opened  at 6pm so I must've been too late. I hope it all works out.

[Kuudere]

Seems to be a mixed bag of experiences regarding the new-ish system. For me, it was painless. I refreshed the page a few minutes to 7 and saw that it was up, so I went ahead and booked in under three minutes. The only reason it took that long was because the default dates were Saturday-Monday, and I didn't notice where I needed to change them until I was on the pre-confirmation page and saw the mistake. But luckily I caught it before submitting the info. I still much prefer this set-up to the mess that was years before.

Waitlist Information

For those who didn't get the hotel you wanted, the waitlist is a good resource. To get on it, you MUST reserve a room through Fanime's website (doesn't matter where, just somewhere), and call (800) 924-4232 (Mon-Fri 6 AM - 6 PM PST). Ask to be placed on the waitlist for whichever hotel you want. They will want your current hotel registration info, which is why you need to reserve a room before doing all this. IF someone drops a room from the hotel you want, you'll be on the list of who they give that open room to. These rooms are supposed to go to the waitlist before being open to general public (there was a mix-up last year regarding that), so it's important to be on the list rather than just wait for dropped rooms to be open to everyone.

The waitlist has been a success for me every time I've needed it, though it's not guaranteed. Dropped rooms do happen, even in popular hotels. My group will likely drop one Marriott room if some of our 'maybes' turn into 'no's' for how many people are going with us, and that room would go straight to the waitlist. But once it gets to the final days for people to drop hotel rooms without a penalty (April 28th), you're going to essentially need to "play chicken" with the system - as in, you're going to have to hold on to your room in the hopes that someone ditches theirs last second and you may be stuck in the room you booked, or you're going to drop the room you booked because you don't want to take the chances of being stuck there or needing to pay a fee to drop it. Hopefully you get a room before this situation plays out, but it does inevitably play out for some people each year.

Hopefully this information is helpful to those of you who are refreshing the hotels page and waiting for your time to reserve so you know that all hope is not lost. There's still a chance to get the hotel you want if you put the work into it.

[Red_Eye]

Fairmont? That was my preferred hotel. It's crazy just how quickly they all went away.

Exactly that.  Good guess.  Shows you how just looking away for ONE day will change everything.

[attiebby]

It was a good experience for me. I got there yesterday at 7am and tried to book the westin, it got filled as I was booking it but when I looked at the hotels again, the fairmont was open! Snagged that ASAP. I had no crashing or lag problems.

If you still want to go you do have a few more options. Theres the Sheraton downtown which was not listed for some reason? Its very close but costs something like $360/night. You can also get a hotel in a nearby city and use lightrail. Great Mall has a Marriott Inn and a lightrail/bus station right next to it.

[Admiral Donuts]

Theres the Sheraton downtown which was not listed for some reason?

Not every hotel in the area is willing to be part of the Fanime housing.

[Ko-tan]

It was a good experience for me. I got there yesterday at 7am and tried to book the westin, it got filled as I was booking it but when I looked at the hotels again, the fairmont was open! Snagged that ASAP. I had no crashing or lag problems.

If you still want to go you do have a few more options. Theres the Sheraton downtown which was not listed for some reason? Its very close but costs something like $360/night. You can also get a hotel in a nearby city and use lightrail. Great Mall has a Marriott Inn and a lightrail/bus station right next to it.

Was your reservation for the whole weekend? I was wait listed for the Fairmont when I logged in at 7am on Thursday so I was curious (I wanted saturday-monday).

[attiebby]

I booked Friday to Sunday and was on around 7:30

[Ko-tan]

I booked Friday to Sunday and was on around 7:30

Thank You!Thursday 7am must be a really busy for hotel booking, probably a lot of us pre regged at the same time. It also looks like hotels were released in batches and the waitlist will open up after those batches are released this week and people start canceling reservations (April 28th deadline).

[Amanojaku]

Another year of smooth sailing.

[thepharaohinleather]

Another year of pain and suffering for me at least. I had the first slot at 7am so I was up and ready way before. Out of curiosity, I began checking the site only a minute before 7 and already the entire hilton was booked out and some of the Marriott as well. I find this extremely irritating that even before the supposedly first choice people are allowed to make their bookings that the website allowed people to make reservations ahead of everyone else. If this is what they let happen, then honestly what is the point of even having booking windows? Despite always having a great time /during/ the convention, the entire process leading up to day 0 has my frustration levels at maximum.

Not only was this allowed, but of course the website couldn't handle nearly all the people trying to book rooms during their GIVEN time and constantly crashed for about 45 minutes for me. During this time, I was making reservations for a room at the marriott without hassle actually until after I had already put in my credit card information. That's when it crashed the first time for me. In my frustration and impatience, I closed the tab and opened a new one. How I wish i hadn't done that. I realized in time that had I just kept refreshing it, I would have gotten back to where I left off and gotten my two double bed room at the marriott. But alas, I lost that the moment I closed the tab. By the next time the page loaded for me, Marriott and several other hotels wouldn't even show up (instead of just saying unavailable) to which I attribute people like me closing the page before finishing a reservation. Thus I made the rest of my efforts toward a room at the Hyatt, which in the end was successful but only after 45 minutes of the site crashing and much frustration on my part. I shouldn't really expect anything different even after 7 years of attending Fanime at least until there is some actual organization at the core level (ie an actual company keeping some consistency for more than one year in more than one or two areas of the planning), but whatever part of me hoped this year might be different and hotel booking might not make me want to pull my own hair out was completely shriveled up. I'm pleased to have gotten my slot from when I registered and having the opportunity to get a hotel so close compared to many others, don't get me wrong. But if even I didn't have a chance to get the Hilton when I was supposed to be in the first slot, then I can only imagine the frustration of anyone in a later booking window.

Overall, I don't think Fanime housing is working on what needs to be changed. Yes, this is a new and different system with pros and cons of course, and I'm happy to see the effort being put in to improve it. But if the website can't even handle these new changes, then what has really improved? Fanime attendance is only growing. Thus the number of people trying to book a hotel at the same time is growing, and the website should be able to handle that many people without crashing AS MUCH (I know I can only ask so much). I'm waiting for the day getting a hotel actually seems as fair as it is advertised to be, and some part of me is still hopeful for that day.

In the end, I booked a room with two double beds at the Hyatt from Thursday to Tuesday (I cosplay and have a friend who does artist alley, so we always have so much stuff. Checking in a day early and out a day late honestly saves so much hair pulling and strokes) with my window at 7am.

[Nina Star 9]

Thepharaohinleather's post makes me wonder something I've been wondering for a bit...are the hotel rooms released in blocks?

I had the second reservation window (10AM on the first day), and there was plenty of Hilton and Marriott availability when I logged into the system at about 9:50 (kept the window open until 10 before attempting to book, so I can't speak to whether I would have been allowed in early or not). I believe there was one Hilton room type sold out at that time (king bed with rollaway, I want to say), and I had no issues getting a double bedded room there at about 10:01 once my reservation went through. (My sister was on at the same time and had the same experience with getting a double bedded Hilton room right away -- we did it with two of us just in case, and then cancelled the second room right away.) As far as I remember, the Marriott had full availability, but since I wasn't looking specifically at the Marriott, I may be misremembering, but it had close to full availability if not.

It seems odd to me that the Hilton and Marriott were both showing as totally sold out during the 7AM window, but then fully or mostly available just before the start of the 10AM window. Are people doing what my sister and I did and snapping up rooms as quickly as possible to up the chances of getting at least one and then immediately cancelling the extra unneeded rooms, and would enough people be doing that to make two hotels totally sold out and then pop up with more availability a few hours later? Or are the rooms being released in blocks, so that the first reservation window doesn't book every single room? It would be nice if there were transparency on how the system was set up if it's the latter.

It may also explain why the Hilton wasn't showing as available even at the start of the 7AM booking window -- the block that those rooms were part of may not have opened yet in the system. So far I haven't heard anyone bragging about getting their room before the 7AM slot opened, but I also haven't been combing FB. Considering that I was able to get a Hilton room no problem, I seriously doubt that they were actually sold out, but rather that there was another issue with the availability not pushing through the system in time somehow. Pretty major issue either way.

The server crashes were inexcusable. No issues from the 10AM block as far as I experienced or heard, but a lot of people are saying that the 7AM block was pretty bad. After so many years of this issue cropping up, you'd think the con would be able to fix it for good, but I guess not.

[TC X0 Lt 0X]

I would hope it isnt broken into blocks, that is even more unfair then having to wrestle with everyone at once.

[Kyra_Maverick]

Another year of pain and suffering for me at least. I had the first slot at 7am so I was up and ready way before. Out of curiosity, I began checking the site only a minute before 7 and already the entire hilton was booked out and some of the Marriott as well...

In the end, I booked a room with two double beds at the Hyatt from Thursday to Tuesday (I cosplay and have a friend who does artist alley, so we always have so much stuff. Checking in a day early and out a day late honestly saves so much hair pulling and strokes) with my window at 7am.

I think the reason it looked like Hilton and Marroitt were already selling out are because they didn't offer the days you needed. Everytime I've stayed at Hilton I've always needed to be waitlisted for Thursday, they just never seem to have those rooms loaded into the system on opening day. Add to that a Tuesday checkout, which is an unusual day to check out and not all hotels offer that day as part of their Fanime block.

I thought about staying until Tuesday myself this year, but when I checked for a Tuesday checkout my choices were pretty limited. A Monday checkout and everything was still availiable.

[Kuudere]

I think the reason it looked like Hilton and Marroitt were already selling out are because they didn't offer the days you needed.

I'm pretty sure this was the reason. Tuesday's not the date people usually pick to check out, and when you change the dates, hotel availability will change too. Fanime probably doesn't have deals with all the hotels to secure a Tuesday checkout, is my guess.

I was in the first 7 AM block and I can say with certainty that every hotel had every type of room open when I booked. I  checked up on the page a few times before the next 10 AM block started, and there were still rooms in even the connected hotels. I don't think they're released in blocks.

[Nina Star 9]

Ahhh the Tuesday thing would make sense. I've heard of enough people checking out on Tuesday and have been to enough other cons that extend the con block out a day or two that I didn't even think that the day might have been the issue.

[thepharaohinleather]

Ohhhh my goodness, I didn't think of that!! It's very likely that was the case then, as I was trying to get Thursday through Tuesday. Understandable! Thank you for bringing that up, that clears up a lot of questions!