Room Key: Search. Book. Relax.

Travelers

• What is Room Key?

  Founded by six of the world’s leading hotel companies, Room Key is the hotel search engine built by hoteliers. We’ve designed Room Key to deliver relevant hotel information in an experience tailored for ease of hotel shopping. Because we believe a hotel search should be a lot like a hotel itself — relaxing, rewarding and inspiring.

  Room Key was born in January 2012 out of a question posed among a group of hospitality experts: “How can we make it easier for our customers to find the right hotel?” We believe that finding a hotel is a different experience than choosing a flight or renting a car, and that requires a different kind of search.

• What is the difference between hotel cards with buttons that say “Book Direct” vs. “Book” buttons?

  Room Key provides you with the most accurate information available, delivered straight to us from our “direct connect” hotel partners. When you click “Book Direct,” we take you straight to the hotel’s website, where you get all the benefits of booking directly with the hotel.

  

  We pride ourselves on ensuring we always provide you the right hotel, in the right place, at the right price. And in order to do that, we present additional hotels on our site beyond those of our “direct connect” partners. On these hotel cards, the button states: “Book.”

  

  So why did Room Key go to all this trouble, you ask. Well that’s simple, because you deserve a hotel shopping experience that is built just for you, an experience that allows you to Search, Book and Relax. And at Room Key, that’s our number one priority.

• What are the benefits of booking directly with a hotel on Room Key?

  When you select and book a “direct connect” hotel on Room Key, linking directly to the hotel’s branded website to book your reservation, there are a number of benefits to you as a traveler:

  • Get the lowest available rate — You will always get the best publicly available rate from the hotel you’re booking, guaranteed by our hotel partners.
  • Experience greater flexibility in making or changing your travel arrangements — When booking direct, there are no hidden fees — no fees or penalties to change or cancel your reservation* and no third party booking fees. And when you want to make changes to a reservation, you simply call the hotel directly — there’s no middleman.
  • Receive your requests — Do you prefer a king bed to two doubles? Have a preference as to which floor you stay on? Prefer feather pillows? Your requests will be honored when you book directly with the hotel.
  • Earn your loyalty points — We know you value those loyalty points that provide you benefits like upgrades, special treatment and free stays. When you book directly with a hotel, you get to earn your points. And the hotel knows who you are; they know your reward status and treat you like you’ve earned the right to be treated when you stay at their property.

  *Subject to rate rules as noted on the hotel’s website and/or your reservation confirmation.

• How do I find my reservation?

  If you have a question regarding a reservation booked through a hotel’s website, simply contact the hotel with which you booked, either by logging in to their website or calling the customer service number listed on their website.

  If you have a question regarding a reservation booked through Room Key, click on this link to our access our Reservation Center for assistance.

  Please be sure to have your confirmation number handy so your questions can be answered as quickly and simply as possible. This number will be in the confirmation email you received from “Reservations@roomkey.com.” (Hint: If you can’t find the email, you may want to check your spam folder.)

• How do I tell if my reservation was booked directly or booked through Room Key?

  If you booked your stay directly, your confirmation email will come from the hotel you chose (e.g.Marriott, Holiday Inn, etc.).

  If your booked your stay through Room Key, your confirmation email will come from “Reservations@roomkey.com.”

  In some cases, when you book through an intermediary, you may receive an email from that provider.

• How do I change or cancel my hotel reservation?

  When you book a hotel directly through one of our hotel partners (Hint: You can tell you booked directly if your hotel reservation confirmation was sent to you directly from the hotel with which you booked), and you need to cancel or change your reservation in any way, you simply contact the hotel with which you booked, either by logging in to their website, or calling the customer service number listed on their website. The hotel will handle all of your needs directly.

  When you book a hotel through Room Key (Hint: You can tell you booked through Room Key if your hotel reservation confirmation was sent to you by Reservations@roomkey.com), and you need to adjust your reservation in any way, simply click to access our Reservation Center for assistance.

  In some cases, when you book a hotel through an intermediary (Hint: You can tell you booked through an intermediary if your hotel reservation confirmation came from that provider), and you need to adjust your reservation, simply contact that provider with which you booked, either by logging into their website, or calling the customer service number listed on their website.

• What does “estimated total” mean?

  When you stay at a hotel, in addition to the nightly room rate, there are often additional charges, including things like local taxes and hotel fees — and it all varies by city and hotel location. Room Key calculates an estimated total daily cost of the room, inclusive of these taxes and fees. With the “estimated total,” we do the budgeting math for you.

• What is a shortlist and how do I create one?

  The Room Key shortlist tool enables you to narrow down the hotels you want to consider, compare and share your picks with friends and family to get their valued input as you make your hotel selections. You can choose up to 10 hotels across different cities to add to your shortlist.

  Creating a Room Key shortlist is easy! Once you’ve searched for a hotel, get started building your shortlist by checking the “Add to shortlist” box on the hotel listing for those hotels you want to include. Once you have chosen the hotels you want to consider, click the “View & Compare” button on the shortlist toolbar located at the top of the hotel search results page, directly below the search filters.

  From there you can:

  • Personalize your list — add or remove hotels as well as customize the name of your shortlist.
  • View the selected hotels on a map or in a list, and compare the features across hotels. If an amenity is listed in grey, it’s unavailable at that hotel. If a hotel in your shortlist says, “Booking Unavailable,” it has sold out for your selected dates.
  • Organize your list by location, or in any particular order you choose by dragging and dropping a hotel and building the list in your preferred order. Uncheck the “Group by location” box if you want to drag and drop hotels between multiple locations.
  • Share your shortlist with friends and family to get their opinions of your selections.
• How can I share my Room Key shortlist?

  Once you’ve created a Room Key shortlist, click the “View & Compare” button on the shortlist toolbar then choose how to share it with your own personal network of travel experts to get their two cents’ worth. Just select the shortlist you want to share then choose how you want to share your list — via email, Facebook or Twitter — and click on the icon in the “Share your shortlist” box.

  When you share your shortlist via Facebook, it will appear in your News Feed. When you share it via Twitter, it will appear as a Tweet. Either way, you can choose to add a comment to personalize your shortlist before sharing.

  Your Room Key shortlist will appear as a link when you share it so that your friends and family can simply click to see the list of hotels you’ve created. They can then email you their thoughts or comment on Facebook or Twitter, creating an easy forum for collaboration on hotel selection for your next trip.

  Can’t find your shortlist? Just perform a quick hotel search. “My shortlist” (or the personalized name of your shortlist) appears on all Room Key search results pages, directly below the search filters. If you have multiple shortlists, they will all be available to you in the “Other shortlists” drop down menu, which you can access once you click the “View & Compare” button on the shortlist toolbar.

• How do I access a shortlist the next time I come back to Room Key?

  Just perform a quick hotel search. “My shortlist” (or the personalized name of your shortlist) appears on all Room Key search results pages, directly below the search filters. If you have more than one shortlist, click the “View & Compare” button on the shortlist toolbar, and this will take you to the “Compare and Organize” page where you can select any of your lists from the “Other shortlists” drop down menu.

  Shortlists are associated with users via cookies, meaning each list is local to an individual computer. So as long as you access Roomkey.com via the same computer on which you created your shortlist or viewed a friend’s, and you don’t delete your cookies on the computer, your shortlists will be waiting for you on Room Key whenever you return!

• Can I have multiple shortlists existing at once?

  Yes! If friends share shortlists with you, or you create multiple, the shortlists will all be available to you in the "Other shortlists" drop down menu, which you can access by clicking the “View & Compare” button on the shortlist toolbar. (The shortlist toolbar is always visible at the top of the search results pages.)

Hoteliers

• How do I get my hotel listed on Room Key?

  At Room Key, we are always working to ensure our travelers can easily find and book the hotel that best meets their needs. If you are a hotel owner or hotel chain that would like to be listed on Room Key as one of our “direct connect” hotel partners, please email us at feedback@roomkey.com

• Does Room Key allow independent hotels to be listed on the website?

  Yes, Room Key invites hotels of all kinds — small and large, corporately owned or independent — to join our site, so that we can ensure we always offer consumers the right hotel, in the right place, at the right price to meet their needs. Interested in expanding your audience? Become a Room Key commercial partner today.

• Who do I contact about a review of my hotel property?

  Room Key obtains our hotel reviews directly from a third party, TripAdvisor. If you are an owner or employee of a business with a review displayed on Roomkey.com, and you have a question about that review, please contact TripAdvisor at www.tripadvisor.com. Once on the TripAdvisor site, you can use the links in their Help Center for further information.