ovff reservations...

[tollers]

If you haven't made your OVFF reservations already, the room block is apparently sold out for two nights already (not the hotel... just the block). I just booked for Thursday night through Sunday night and got two nights at the block rate and two nights at the regular rate

Comments

[s00j]

is it just me, or does the hotel website state very clearly that once you reserve a room, they charge you, and you can't get a refund if you end up not being able to go..?

this may be normal with convention-level hotels, but grr. I'm just not entirely sure yet if I will be able to make it in from my Kentucky gig in time for the con to not be over.

[tollers]

Hmmm... I called the hotel directly (I usually book online, but for room blocks I've found I have better luck getting the reservation right if I talk to a human) and she didn't say anything about it.

You might try calling and talking to the hotel directly... it may be that the "pay now, no refunds" policy is for the online rates. I don't think I've ever heard of it applying to the con's negotiated rates (which, unfortunately, don't apply for two of the nights now that it's all booked up... I got two nights for $99 and two for $127).

If you don't mind sharing and your plans are going to be up in the air, you'd be welcome to share w/ me and Xap (caveats... I snore, and I don't sleep unless the room is meat-locker cold). That would solve the whole "not knowing if you'll get there in time" thing.

[kyril]

I do believe it's only the Internet rate that's 100% non-refundable. For Capricon, when the room block was closed the Internet rate was slightly more money and had that restriction; I put off registering, and when the block rate re-opened there was only the usual cancellation deadline. $127 doesn't sound like the internet rate, it sounds like a talk-to-a-human rate.

I just called Sally, who's in charge of this:

[s00j]

Sally our hotel liason says that that line about no refunds is nowhere in our hotel contract, so she will deal with that as soon as she can reach the hotel today.

She also said:
1) the room block is supposed to expand automatically when it fills up, but sometimes it's not as automatic as it should be, and she will deal with that.

2) Speaking to a live person is the best way to go, but occasionally the person on shift at the hotel hasn't been briefed, or reads the wrong line off of the screen. Check with us (OVFF concom), and call the hotel back at a different time; this is the best advice I can offer at this moment.

[madfilkentist]

I don't know about OVFF, but with other cons temporarily "filling up" the room block is a normal occurrence; it just means the hotel has to release more rooms into the block. Contacting the con's hotel liaison is likely to help.

I don't see anything on the OVFF home page which points at hotel information, or even registration information. That greatly surprises me. Don't they want people to come?

[tollers]

I'm pretty sure the home page originally at least linked to the hotel, so I'm wondering if they're in the middle of changing some info and just didn't finish? I did notice that same thing (including no links to contact information for con comm, so I couldn't contact the hotel liaison since I don't know who it is).

Nice to know that it might be as simple as getting more rooms added to the block. I went ahead and booked my room anyway, but I certainly wouldn't complain if the two nights at the non-block rate came back down to the block rate. :-)

[madfilkentist]

I now see a sidebar that wasn't there earlier. I'm working from a different computer now, so I don't know if they just changed it or it's a browser issue.

[tarkrai]

It's actually quite simple.

When I first posted the OVFF website for this year, all I had to work from was the information on the back of the OVFF24 program book. Which I faithfully put up. :)

Then, eventually, I got data to populate the site, and so I did.

Then... it was pointed out that the dates were... wrong. There was a typo on the program book, and no one caught it, even though it had been faithfully copied to the website.

So, a few days ago I did a sitewide update to correct the date. And somehow, the original home page (without the menu) was put back in place.

All fixed now, tho...

[andpuff]

I have this weird insecurity concerning OMG NO ROOM FOR ME! so I read your post, ran around panicking for a moment, and booked. I definitely owe the beloved a trip to Toronto and baseball game sometime this summer!

[tollers]

That's kinda what motivated me to go ahead and call... I usually forget 'til much later, but since this year's event promises to be bigger than normal, and 'cause I know that I'd participate less if I had to drive back and forth from another hotel, I wanted to go ahead and get a room locked down while I was thinking about it!