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Booking a Hotel |
| 1. How do I book a hotel? |
| 2. How do I book children and infants? |
| 3. I cannot get any availability. Am I doing something wrong? |
| 4. What are the different room types? |
| 5. What are the different board types? |
| 6. The 'check availability' and 'book' buttons do not work?! |
| 7. Can I pay a deposit? |
| 8. How do I pay the balance? |
| 9. Can I book over the telephone? |
| 10. Can I book a double room for 1 person? |
| 11. Can I make reservations for someone else? |
| 12. How do I check-in at the hotel? |
| 13. How do I obtain my hotel voucher? |
| 14. How do I change or cancel a booking? |
| 15. I contacted the hotel and was told they do not have my booking. What is going on? |
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Prices |
| 16. Are prices per room or per person? |
| 17. What is included in the price? |
| 18. Why am I being quoted two prices for what seems to be the same room? |
| 19. Are flights, transfers and insurance included in the price? |
| 20. What are the charges for more than two people in a room? |
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Security |
| 21. Is the diytravel.co.uk website secure? |
| 22. What happens to my personal details when I book a hotel? |
| 23. Is diytravel.co.uk a member of ABTA or ATOL? |
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Booking a Hotel |
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1. How do I book a hotel? |
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All hotel reservations are carried out on the Hotel Reservations tab using the diytravel Reservations Suitcase.
- Check Availability
Enter your destination, travel dates and room requirements into the Reservations Suitcase and click the 'Check Availability' button. The system will find all available hotels and display them with the total price for your stay.
Please ensure that you select the appropriate number of rooms when searching - for example, you will see more hotel availability and prices for four guests if you split them into two rooms.
- Choose A Hotel
Browse through the available hotels and click the 'Book' icon next to the hotel room(s) you wish to book.
- Enter Guest Names
On the next screen enter Guest Names and review the cancellation policy for your booking. Click 'Continue' to add the hotel to your shopping basket. You can now continue shopping for hotels or go to the checkout and pay for the hotels in your basket.
- Enter Customer Details
You will be asked to enter your customer details.
- Checkout
Enter your payment details into the secure payment page, review the general booking terms and conditions and click 'Confirm Booking' to pay for your hotel. If you are not happy to pay online, call our London reservations team on 020 7183 7183.
- Booking Confirmation
On booking completion, we will send you a confirmation email. When full payment is received we will send you a hotel voucher that MUST be presented to the hotel to check-in. When you receive the confirmation email and voucher, please check that all details are correct and don't forget to take the voucher with you when you travel!
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2. How do I book children and infants? |
Infants are aged under 2 years. diytravel.co.uk does not charge for infants but you must include them as a child when searching for availability. By doing so, the hotel will know that a cot is required.
Different hotels have different child age policies but diytravel.co.uk makes searching easy. Select number of adults and children based on children being aged 2-16 years. Our system will verify the child ages entered against each hotel's policy and will show available room options and prices.
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3. I cannot get any availability. Am I doing something wrong? |
Seeing no availability could be because there genuinely isn't any availability, or because you have not filled in the availability search correctly. Try these options:
- If searching for 1 adult, try searching for 2 adults and book a double or twin room.
- If searching for more than 2 adults, try different room breakdowns. For example, 4 adults should be split into 2 rooms.
- If searching for multiple rooms, try searching for 1 room first. If you can't get availability on 1 room, you will not be able to get it on multiple.
- Try different travel dates.
- Telephone our London reservations team on 020 7183 7183.
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4. What are the different room types? |
| Room type | No of People | Description |
| Single | 1 | Room for 1 person and may be small than other rooms. |
| Double | 2 | Room for 2 people with a double bed. |
| Twin | 2 | Room for 2 people with 2 single beds. |
| Triple | 3 | Room for 3 people, usually with 3 single beds but sometimes with 2 single beds and a roll-out / camp bed for the third person. |
| Quad | 4 | Room for 2 adults and 2 children. Not guaranteed to be larger than a double or twin, sometimes with 2 roll-out / camp beds for the children. |
| Family | 4/5 | Room for 2 adults and 2/3 children. There may be 2/3 roll-out / camp beds for the children and the room could feel cramped when fully occupied. |
| Double/Twin | 2/3 | Room for 2 people with either a twin or double bed. If you specifically require a double or twin room, please email us after making the booking. We cannot guarantee your request, but will pass it to the hotel.
When 3 people stay in the room, the third bed is likely to be a roll-out / camp bed. |
| Double/Twin for Single Use | 1 | Room usually for 2 people, but can be booked for 1 person. |
| Studio | 2/4 | An open plan room with kitchenette, living space and bedroom in the same room. The room could contain either beds or sofa beds and usually sleeps up to 4 people. |
| 1 Bed Apt | 3/4 * | Apartment for 3/4 people. 2 people sleep in double/twin beds in a separate bedroom, and 2 sleep on a sofa bed in the living area. |
| 2 Bed Apt | 5/6 * | Apartment for 5/6 people. 4 people sleep in double/twin beds in 2 separate bedrooms, and 2 sleep on a sofa bed in the living area. |
* Occupancy is sometimes indicated with the room type, for example '1 bed apt' could appear as '1 bed apt for 3 people'.
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5. What are the different board types? |
| Board type | Description |
| Room only | A hotel room only with no meals included. |
| Self catering | An apartment or studio with kitchen facilities. |
| Breakfast included | A room and breakfast. Breakfast could be English, continental, buffet and lots more - it depends on the country you are visiting. |
| Half board | Breakfast and an evening meal. Drinks are not included. |
| Full board | Breakfast, lunch and an evening meal. Drinks are not included. |
| All inclusive | Breakfast, lunch and an evening meal. Local alcoholic drinks, soft drinks, tea, coffee and hot chocolate are all included. Non-local (i.e. imported) alcoholic drinks may be charged for. |
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6. The 'check availability' and 'book' buttons do not work?! |
Javascript must be enabled to book hotels. Follow these instructions to enable Javascript and then refresh the booking page, or give us a call on 020 7183 7183.
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7. Can I pay a deposit? |
When your booking is made more than 35 days before hotel check-in you can pay a deposit of £20 or 10% of the booking, whichever is greater. The option to pay a deposit is presented on the checkout page. Balance of payment is due 35 days before check-in and is payable by credit/debit card or cheque.
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8. How do I pay the balance? |
If you paid a deposit when booking, the balance is due 35 days before check-in. Balance is payable by credit/debit card or cheque payable to diy travel Ltd and sent to diy travel Ltd, 35 Kingsland Road, London, E2 8AA. We will send you an email to remind you when the remainder is due.
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9. Can I book over the telephone? |
Yes. Call our London team on 020 7183 7183 (+44 20 7183 7183 from outside the UK). Refer to Contact Us page for office hours.
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10. Can I book a double room for 1 person? |
Yes. If the guest names page asks for two names, just enter the same name twice.
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11. Can I make reservations for someone else? |
Yes, but only when hotel check-in is more than 4 weeks away and only by calling us on 020 7183 7183. We require payment by cheque or Internet transfer for such bookings.
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12. How do I check-in at the hotel? |
On receipt of full payment, we will send you hotel vouchers that must be presented at hotel check-in. If you book online, we will send vouchers to your email address; or if you book over the telephone, we will post them to you. Failure to present this voucher may cause the hotel to refuse your booking.
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13. How do I obtain my hotel voucher? |
We email vouchers to you on receipt of full payment. You can also log into the 'My Bookings' page and print your voucher.
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14. How do I change or cancel a booking? |
To cancel or amend your booking, contact us (using the information on the Contact Us page) quoting your diy travel Ltd booking reference. Cancellation and amendment charges are available on the Terms and Conditions page.
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15. I contacted the hotel and was told they do not have my booking. What is going on? |
Before you pay diytravel.co.uk we confirm your booking with the hotel. If you call the hotel and they say that they do not have a record of the booking, this is because they only have reference numbers and not guest names. Hotels will only be able to find your booking using your guest names from 7 days before check-in as this is when our reservations system sends names through to hotels. If required we can send names through earlier. If you have any queries, please Contact Us.
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Prices |
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16. Are prices per room or per person? |
Prices on diytravel.co.uk are total prices for all room(s) requested.
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17. What is included in the price? |
All diytravel.co.uk prices are total prices for all rooms and include everything - there are no hidden charges, taxes or fees. To work out the price per person, divide the price shown by the number of guests.
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18. Why am I being quoted two prices for what seems to be the same room? |
We have several suppliers and try to pick out equivalent rooms to just display the cheapest prices to customers. Our system can only match rooms and remove duplicates when the room type is identical. For example, the words 'double bed and breakfast' do not exactly match 'double including breakfast' so the system would display both prices. It is highly likely that they are exactly the same room and we would recommend booking the cheaper one of the two.
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19. Are flights, transfers and insurance included in the price? |
No, we do not sell flights, transfers or insurance yet.
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20. What are the charges for more than two people in a room? |
Each hotel has a different policy regarding multiple guests per room. The booking system displays the appropriate price for your room when you select the number of adults and children that will be staying in the room. Please ensure that you do not reserve a room that can not accommodate the required number of guests.
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Security |
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21. Is the diytravel.co.uk website secure? |
diytravel.co.uk takes Internet security very seriously. If we didn't we would go out of business very quickly. See the Security page for more information on site security.
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22. What happens to my personal details when I book a hotel? |
Your personal details (name, address, phone number, etc) are held in our secure database alongside your booking. Your credit card details are not stored in our database. Instead, your credit card number is passed securely to Barclaycard Merchant Services for them to authorise payment. Barclaycard store your credit card details in their secure databases.
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23. Is diytravel.co.uk a member of ABTA or ATOL? |
ABTA and ATOL bonding is only required by companies that sell package holidays, or all the components of a package holiday. As an accommodation only website, diytravel.co.uk does not need to be a member of these associations.
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