Hello All
Im sure this has been asked before. I have heard from a few people that you can stay in the top hotels in Thailand for around £60 a night. Is it better just to book flights and then turn up at hotels and see if they have rooms available?

Thanks from a newbie

But you can get excellent walk-in / phone-in rates on the day, yes. Memories of low season rates and offers of stay 4 nights, get another 4 free come to mind.

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We did this in Krabi at the Sheraton who offered stay 4 nights and get 4 free nights just paying for breakfast. The best bit was they didn't charge us for the breakfats so had four nights absolutely free!!!!

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Alison

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It's Better to Burn Out than just to Fade Away!

I thought walk-in rates in posh hotels were almost always considerably higher than rates booked online through companies like Sawadee? You can sometimes get good deals with local agents too I think. .

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“Not all those who wander are lost.” Tolkien.
Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.

there are times that a walk-in is much better than booking in advance. But sometimes you can get a cheaper place to stay when you get a package tour.all-inclusive from plane ticket to hotel accommodations. and another down-side to walk-in is when the hotel is fully booked then you won't have any place to stay. It is better to be sure that when you arrive a foreign country, you already have a definite place place to stay to.

Yes, I agree, these days the big hotels sell to tour operators at wholesale prices and then the airlines get specially incentives from their respective destination governments to offer all inclusive (hotel and flight) deals which means they can knock these out at around the same price as a standard airline ticket fare on its own.

Sometimes though you get what you pay for and hotels have "a" and "b" category rooms within the same guest category (e.g. standard, deluxe, etc.) and the "b" rooms go to package tourists on such deals. I have seen this and a HUGE difference in the quality of room / location / even size provided. The other thing is, this applies to big hotels generally, or specific tour group hotels and in many, many cases I would not stay at such a hotel out of choice, although there are some exceptions for sure. That is why I liked walkabout so much in this respect; you turn up, do they have a room available, can you see the room, how much is that particular room on the day.

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There are two categories of travellers, those that experience a country and those that take their home with them wherever they go.

Be warned, as with any forum, picking a fight with the admin guy is not recommended!

To answer the OP question 60 GBP is about 3900 baht which certainly will not get you a 5* luxurary hotels but a very good 3* or mid range 4* during high season in Bangkok. For the low season you can do a little better. For Chian Mai this will get you a very nice hotel but not at the top end. For the Islands during the high season you propably will get the same but I not really sure since I don't visit them very much.

In the high season the majority of hotels in the 3/4* catogery would be much more expensive for a walk in rate and even a rate directly with the hotel. An internet agents rate will be the cheapest and uasually includes the 17.7% tax and breakfast. And you may not get what you want if not booked in advanvce. In the slow season it is possible just to arrive and look around.

Agree with this last post. The days of very cheap 5 star have gone. The best that you can hope for is a deal on a good 4 star of say buy 5 nights get five nights free so that the overall cost comes down. You will still have to buy breakfasts for the extra nights and these can be £10 each per night. And of course with these hotels there is ++
Some of the best deals if you are going on a 2 week holiday are through the travel agents with the flights included they get special IT fares and rates.
I still, and I have said it before on this forum, can't get my head round how with the economy in Thailand hotels can justify rates of £100+ a night. I would balk at paying this in London and that is supposed to be one of the most expensive places.
Still whilst people keep paying it.

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Kiss
God laughs at people who make plans.