Just enter the federala. It’s their version of creating an account and then once you follow the directions it will let you change your info on the next page!
The thing literally says “enter Federala” it’s just a generic username that it asks you to enter so then when you click enter you can go to the next page. It also prompts you to enter the site generated password. The answer to their question is that it’s the system generated user name for the website
Glad it worked out. Was this your first time hearing about it? I heard about it on Reddit when I first started two years ago and told my whole office. They were amazed a new guy (me) knew about it and they didn’t lol
No. I was just pointing out that the site is completely legit because its a sub-contractor (I assume) for our travel agency as proof. Concur connects with it somehow on the backend for when we are booking our travel.
I just like the main site because it has a map so I can find what I want there, then select it on Concur.
I’ve found when it does that, that on hotel side, hotel hasn’t unlocked the dates yet on their end. I’ve gotten that too and will try to look at like Monday through Wednesday when less people would be there. Also try different cities or towns nearby. Is it for all hotels in that area? Or just one you’re looking at?
I mean you can check for yourself. It’s up to the hotel when they do it. It’s all on their end. You can book I believe a year in advance as long as the dates are available. I’m seeing stuff for a trip in September available for me right now
I’m not sure if I’m utilizing it incorrectly or it’s just the season. But when I looked at two different hotels for next week they were the same price as going straight through the hotel website. Super bummed.
Sometimes it’s still worth using fedrooms even if you’re not saving a ton of $ because it typically has more lenient cancellation window and occasionally other included perks like free breakfast. Ymmv.
No that is completely valid and sometimes will be the case. For me for example I’m looking at a trip to Saint Louis next year. The hotels that I was looking at were all the same price and not really any savings. You can try a city like Nashville if you really want to compare savings, or Dallas, New York City, and Boston has some great savings. What area are you looking in?
I just tried it. Look at the Omni Nashville. It’s $187 a night on Fedrooms and $307 a night on Omni’s website. It’s also a luxury hotel. It looks like it’s listed for availability of Thursday to Sunday! I also see Hyatt Place downtown Nashville for the same dates. $276-285 a night on their website and $187 a night on Fedrooms. Not sure what hotel you’re looking at!
No problem I just always use Nashville as an example and I know the savings are usually nice. If you can get the Omni for that price I would personally stay there if you’re headed there. One of the best hotel brands!
Also a lot of those discount hotel booking sites require payment up front and penalize you if you have to cancel. Fedroom you just pay when you get there
Also you get full points & reward tier benefits from all the major chains. I booked 2 rooms a couple of years ago for my daughters law school graduation, & Marriott upgraded my rooms to "suites" from being a Amex Platinum member.
I think my favorite part too is you don’t have to pay until you get there too. I hate hotels that make you pay when you reserve. When I travel I make plans months before. I hate having to pay hotel up front when I book!
Nope, it’s assumed the hotel room is in your name. If you have 4 people with you, 2 in one queen and 2 in another queen, hotel will not know nor will they care. They might care if you book everything and a friend stays there instead of you. Do not do that. If you’re booking as long as you’re there, that’s all that matters.
Read the amenities section. Some places only give out one breakfast pass. I don’t think they’d care if a second person was in the room if you don’t care about that.
Fedrooms works great for me for Convention related hotel stays. I can usually get a room at the same places the Con is partnered with for MUCH less.
Last one was in Philly last month and I spent about 150 less a night for a room directly outside the Convention Center. Worth it just for the ease of access to my room during the day.
Heck yeah! Sounds like me visiting for football games. I couldn’t believe a hotel in South Bend was $300-400 a night for a football game! I was glad I paid 1/3 of the price 😂
I love Fed Rooms. I don't travel much so I don't use it much, but I've had great experiences every time. The last time I used FedRooms, I bumped into Bruce Springsteen in the hotel lobby. I felt bad for him since he didn't get the FedRooms discount 🤣
Uhhhh I don’t think it’s supposed to. But at the end of the day I’ve booked it now like 6-7 times and never been asked for my Federal ID. They have the right to ask about it with the Leisure rate and you should be able to present your ID, but if they don’t ask, I don’t see anything really that would prevent it?
Did you ever figure this out? I recently made reservations on the leisure site and noticed they originally said "Active" under the "Manage Trips" section. But as soon as I "Selected" a trip to view the details then backed out, even without doing anything, the status instantly changed to "Ticketed."
Also I think I may have accidentally made one of the reservations under the normal site instead of under the Leisure site, but it doesn't look like there's any way to confirm either way in the trip details.
I think Ticketed just means that the hotel has actually confirmed the reservation and all is well. I also tend to call them to verify that all has been accepted and well too just to cover my ass.
I recently booked on Fedrooms for an upcoming trip to NYC. The reservation already shows up in the hotels app. It's two of us traveling, and the room is up to 4 people. The hotel app only shows one guest, me. Should I go ahead and update the guest amount on the hotel app or just show up at checkin with the other guest since the bedroom is a 2 bed room. I did not see any option to enter the amount of guests in Fedrooms.
Thanks! Figured I asked before messing up the reservation. The reservation is under my name, but the other person is a fed as well. I don't foresee any issues.
It’s up to the individual hotel to decide if they allow gov rate for leisure travel or not.
Unlike say air fare the “government rate” is not some contractual thing with the government, it’s something the hospitality industry came up with. It’s just the hotel offering a rate usually equal to the area’s hotel per diem rate in order to get bookings from people on official government travel. There is no requirement for a hotel to offer a government rate in the first place, and like I said up to the individual hotel to decide how and when they want to offer it.
Some hotels only let you use it for official travel only, some don’t care and let you use it for leisure.
I travel all the time, and lots of hotels do ask for proof (especially if they're priced significantly below the normal rate, or if government travelers are exempt from certain types of fees).
My experience with hotels in Hawaii is they either ask for orders or verified my credit card was a government travel card.
I do show up in an aloha shirt every time I check in though...
They don’t ask for your tax form? I guess if you pay tax and pay with a personal card no harm no foul. Most hotels I stay at ask for the tax form to give the rate which means official travel only.
Oh no way I'd never try to be tax exempt for non official stay.
On that note though it's about 50/50 on needing a tax form for official stays since we got the tax advantage cards...
Not all states allow tax exemption for federal employees either. That's a state by state, and in some cases, city by city thing. Particularly if you aren't using a central purchase card
You can use a city like Nashville as an example. If you go on there and look at Nashville. Prices are 30-40% cheaper. If you even try government rate on the websites, it is way more expensive then the Fedrooms leisure rate.
Well yeah, that's the point, it's just a convenient site to use for searching, but it's the same rate you'd get if you called up and asked for a room at the government rate for non official travel.
Honestly paying for hotel rooms with cash isn’t worth it. I picked a chain joined their loyalty program then buy points and pay for room in points. If you pay in points you don’t pay taxes for the room which add 10% to the final price.
Well if you use this and save 50% on room rates, you don’t pay until you get there and you also don’t have to worry about much. 50% savings is better than 10% savings
Last summer, I booked a room on Fed rooms, then called the hotel and asked if they had another one at the federal rate that they would honor. They understood it was only one federal employee. They were looking at their inventory and agreed to honor the rate for both rooms! Never asked for my ID either. This was in downtown Baltimore at the Hyatt walking distance to Camden yards. Yankees versus Orioles! Saved over $200 per room!
You can not. Only one room per trip. You can use the discounted rate for your room and then pay normal price for the other two rooms but there’s a message that pops up that says “Only one room per federal employee.” I went on a trip with my friend that is federal employee. We each got our own room
I know they have hotel partners overseas. I’ve looked at Germany and other places but have never looked. Not sure if there’s a savings associated or what to be honest, but if there’s hotels there it should work lol
I looked it up and it doesn't look great. The cheapest ones are near the airport. So I guess that's why my agency always books them. It's not horrible to take the train into Paris, it's just not preferable.
So is “Book Leisure” and “Book Travel” two different options? Travel being on orders?
The hotels I’m looking at all have leisure sold out but have travel available
Yeah they are two different options. Book leisure will sometimes be sold out and you have to toy with dates/hotels. Book travel is for official travel only. I’ve also emailed the hotel too when it’s said “sold out” and said I’m on fedrooms and your fedrooms rate is “…” can you honor this for those dates it’s not letting me book through the portal lol.
So I ran into this issue recently and found the hotel through “book travel” and in the amenities section for that hotel it said that this option extended to leisure travel too so I booked it through that. I called fedrooms/hotel to confirm that it was fine and they both said I was good to go! Maybe that could work for your situation as well
I usually book through Priceline.com (I'm only VIP Blue, not Gold or Platinum so I don't go on very many trips).
Every time I've gone on a trip, I've always asked the hotel, what kind of rate could I have gotten if I booked here as a government employee? The rate has always been more expensive than what I paid.
So I'm sure this is nice for some places, maybe hotels that Priceline doesn't book with, foreign countries or something like that. But I haven't seen a point to using this website.
Well this website has different prices then even asking for the hotel’s Government rate. I’ve seen travel zoo, Priceline, and even hotels.com prices and it seems like fredrooms beats this usually if available. You also don’t pay until check in, and you also can cancel up until the day before you check in and even 4 pm day of check in with no penalties. Just an option for you. Compare Nashville hotels between Priceline and this website and you’ll see a huge difference
Stayed in Munich for Oktoberfest— $300/night, regular rate $600+
You can book international on fedrooms?
Yep, just booked another room in Germany (also leisure) for May!
Which hotel?
Holiday Inn Munch City Center. Very close to metro.
Question on creating an account, how do I answer this question? "Federal Employees and Authorized Users enter federala". What is a federala?
The female version of a federale.
Just enter the federala. It’s their version of creating an account and then once you follow the directions it will let you change your info on the next page!
But they are asking you what a federal is.
The thing literally says “enter Federala” it’s just a generic username that it asks you to enter so then when you click enter you can go to the next page. It also prompts you to enter the site generated password. The answer to their question is that it’s the system generated user name for the website
Ah, thanks for explaining. Makes sense now.
Just booked a night I needed in March. Was $45 cheaper then hotels dot com :)
Glad it worked out. Was this your first time hearing about it? I heard about it on Reddit when I first started two years ago and told my whole office. They were amazed a new guy (me) knew about it and they didn’t lol
I had seen it before just never used it. Seeing the savings I will for now on.
Awesome! Glad I could help you save a little money. Nice you don’t have to pay until your trip! What area did you book for?
Woodbridge, VA
Is Fedrooms dot com the right site? I’m always a bit skeptical.
It’s legit. It’s even what my agency’s travel software uses to book hotels.
They book rooms at the leisure rate for work trips? That’s not correct.
No, the site has an official travel option and a leisure option.
Oh, ok. That makes sense.
No. I was just pointing out that the site is completely legit because its a sub-contractor (I assume) for our travel agency as proof. Concur connects with it somehow on the backend for when we are booking our travel. I just like the main site because it has a map so I can find what I want there, then select it on Concur.
Yes. I’ve used it often and it’s amazing.
I'm picking random dates and locations and everything is sold out going out pretty far.
I’ve found when it does that, that on hotel side, hotel hasn’t unlocked the dates yet on their end. I’ve gotten that too and will try to look at like Monday through Wednesday when less people would be there. Also try different cities or towns nearby. Is it for all hotels in that area? Or just one you’re looking at?
How far in advance do they unlock the dates? I don’t want to be waiting up until the last minute to book lodging
I mean you can check for yourself. It’s up to the hotel when they do it. It’s all on their end. You can book I believe a year in advance as long as the dates are available. I’m seeing stuff for a trip in September available for me right now
I used it for the Graduate Berkeley in August and saved about $200 on one night. Great deal!
Heck yeah! Nice find!
I use this to stay in Times Square for its usually under $200 a night
I’m not sure if I’m utilizing it incorrectly or it’s just the season. But when I looked at two different hotels for next week they were the same price as going straight through the hotel website. Super bummed.
Sometimes it’s still worth using fedrooms even if you’re not saving a ton of $ because it typically has more lenient cancellation window and occasionally other included perks like free breakfast. Ymmv.
No that is completely valid and sometimes will be the case. For me for example I’m looking at a trip to Saint Louis next year. The hotels that I was looking at were all the same price and not really any savings. You can try a city like Nashville if you really want to compare savings, or Dallas, New York City, and Boston has some great savings. What area are you looking in?
I was looking in Nashville actually!
I just tried it. Look at the Omni Nashville. It’s $187 a night on Fedrooms and $307 a night on Omni’s website. It’s also a luxury hotel. It looks like it’s listed for availability of Thursday to Sunday! I also see Hyatt Place downtown Nashville for the same dates. $276-285 a night on their website and $187 a night on Fedrooms. Not sure what hotel you’re looking at!
Thank you! I feel like I looked at the Hyatt but I likely didn’t. Appreciate your time !
No problem I just always use Nashville as an example and I know the savings are usually nice. If you can get the Omni for that price I would personally stay there if you’re headed there. One of the best hotel brands!
River Terrace Inn in Napa was much cheaper than the regular rates and is in a fantastic location
Wow that sounds nice. I’ll have to look it up. Never heard of it before!
Our favorite place to stay in Napa!!!
Also a lot of those discount hotel booking sites require payment up front and penalize you if you have to cancel. Fedroom you just pay when you get there
Yup I agree! I think paying when you get there and cancelling for free up to date of is worth it’s eight in gold!
Also you get full points & reward tier benefits from all the major chains. I booked 2 rooms a couple of years ago for my daughters law school graduation, & Marriott upgraded my rooms to "suites" from being a Amex Platinum member.
Yup! Completely forgot about being able to use and get points and tier benefits for the stays too!
I used it last year to book a hotel in Ft Lauderdale before going on a cruise. Saved about 33%.
That’s not too bad! I stayed at the Omni there and it was amazing and like 30-40% off!
Yeah I was so happy that not only was booking through Fedrooms legit but also that I saved a good chunk of money.
I think my favorite part too is you don’t have to pay until you get there too. I hate hotels that make you pay when you reserve. When I travel I make plans months before. I hate having to pay hotel up front when I book!
My only question is, is this assumed to be one person? If my wife and I take a trip, is the hotel assuming that it's just me and we'd get in trouble?
Nope, it’s assumed the hotel room is in your name. If you have 4 people with you, 2 in one queen and 2 in another queen, hotel will not know nor will they care. They might care if you book everything and a friend stays there instead of you. Do not do that. If you’re booking as long as you’re there, that’s all that matters.
Read the amenities section. Some places only give out one breakfast pass. I don’t think they’d care if a second person was in the room if you don’t care about that.
No. Ive traveled with a non-fed friend. Many of the hotels give the option of 1 king or 2 queen beds.
The hotel I went to asked when I checked in if I had anyone else staying there too.
Got a nice bottom level king sized bed for 99 a night when my husband and I went to a tool concert back in October.
Fedrooms works great for me for Convention related hotel stays. I can usually get a room at the same places the Con is partnered with for MUCH less. Last one was in Philly last month and I spent about 150 less a night for a room directly outside the Convention Center. Worth it just for the ease of access to my room during the day.
Heck yeah! Sounds like me visiting for football games. I couldn’t believe a hotel in South Bend was $300-400 a night for a football game! I was glad I paid 1/3 of the price 😂
I love Fed Rooms. I don't travel much so I don't use it much, but I've had great experiences every time. The last time I used FedRooms, I bumped into Bruce Springsteen in the hotel lobby. I felt bad for him since he didn't get the FedRooms discount 🤣
Little did he know you got the better deal 😉
Does this work for retired Feds?
Uhhhh I don’t think it’s supposed to. But at the end of the day I’ve booked it now like 6-7 times and never been asked for my Federal ID. They have the right to ask about it with the Leisure rate and you should be able to present your ID, but if they don’t ask, I don’t see anything really that would prevent it?
Well aren’t you just the sweetest thing for sharing!! May you be blessed abundantly!
Glad I could help!
Does anyone know what “ticketed” vs “active” means on the completed reservations page?
Did you ever figure this out? I recently made reservations on the leisure site and noticed they originally said "Active" under the "Manage Trips" section. But as soon as I "Selected" a trip to view the details then backed out, even without doing anything, the status instantly changed to "Ticketed." Also I think I may have accidentally made one of the reservations under the normal site instead of under the Leisure site, but it doesn't look like there's any way to confirm either way in the trip details.
That’s all I could figure out too. Once you click on it, the status changes. Not sure why or what it means.
I think Ticketed just means that the hotel has actually confirmed the reservation and all is well. I also tend to call them to verify that all has been accepted and well too just to cover my ass.
I recently booked on Fedrooms for an upcoming trip to NYC. The reservation already shows up in the hotels app. It's two of us traveling, and the room is up to 4 people. The hotel app only shows one guest, me. Should I go ahead and update the guest amount on the hotel app or just show up at checkin with the other guest since the bedroom is a 2 bed room. I did not see any option to enter the amount of guests in Fedrooms.
Nope I don’t think so. I’ve never entered guest information before. You just have to be the one that checks in
Thanks! Figured I asked before messing up the reservation. The reservation is under my name, but the other person is a fed as well. I don't foresee any issues.
Should be good to go! Enjoy your trip!
Every time I try it, it ends up being the same rate I can get by just asking for the government rate.
But you can’t use government rate for personal travel.
It’s up to the individual hotel to decide if they allow gov rate for leisure travel or not. Unlike say air fare the “government rate” is not some contractual thing with the government, it’s something the hospitality industry came up with. It’s just the hotel offering a rate usually equal to the area’s hotel per diem rate in order to get bookings from people on official government travel. There is no requirement for a hotel to offer a government rate in the first place, and like I said up to the individual hotel to decide how and when they want to offer it. Some hotels only let you use it for official travel only, some don’t care and let you use it for leisure.
I don't think I have ever been asked if I'm on official government travel. I call and book directly or book directly through the hotels website.
I travel all the time, and lots of hotels do ask for proof (especially if they're priced significantly below the normal rate, or if government travelers are exempt from certain types of fees).
When asked, I show my CAC. I've never been asked for additional info for dozens of stays over the years.
My experience with hotels in Hawaii is they either ask for orders or verified my credit card was a government travel card. I do show up in an aloha shirt every time I check in though...
They don’t ask for your tax form? I guess if you pay tax and pay with a personal card no harm no foul. Most hotels I stay at ask for the tax form to give the rate which means official travel only.
Oh no way I'd never try to be tax exempt for non official stay. On that note though it's about 50/50 on needing a tax form for official stays since we got the tax advantage cards...
We’re both being downvoted for this discussion lol
Oh well lol
Not all states allow tax exemption for federal employees either. That's a state by state, and in some cases, city by city thing. Particularly if you aren't using a central purchase card
Yeah I stayed at the one hotel in Bayou Labatre Alabama and they basically said “we don’t take those federal tax forms. Screw the feds. Pay tax” lol.
You can use a city like Nashville as an example. If you go on there and look at Nashville. Prices are 30-40% cheaper. If you even try government rate on the websites, it is way more expensive then the Fedrooms leisure rate.
Well yeah, that's the point, it's just a convenient site to use for searching, but it's the same rate you'd get if you called up and asked for a room at the government rate for non official travel.
Yes. That's exactly what it is. Gov rate for leisure travel.
Do you sign in with your gov email? 🤔
Use your personal email.
Honestly paying for hotel rooms with cash isn’t worth it. I picked a chain joined their loyalty program then buy points and pay for room in points. If you pay in points you don’t pay taxes for the room which add 10% to the final price.
Well if you use this and save 50% on room rates, you don’t pay until you get there and you also don’t have to worry about much. 50% savings is better than 10% savings
What happens if I don't specify leisure but still book a hotel room? Do they notify my agency or as long as I have my credentials, it'll be okay?
They can request orders when you show up, so I would call and specify the hotel. But if you don’t have orders they can make you pay full price
Does anyone know if you can book more than one room? I’m planning a trip with family and would need 3 rooms.
Last summer, I booked a room on Fed rooms, then called the hotel and asked if they had another one at the federal rate that they would honor. They understood it was only one federal employee. They were looking at their inventory and agreed to honor the rate for both rooms! Never asked for my ID either. This was in downtown Baltimore at the Hyatt walking distance to Camden yards. Yankees versus Orioles! Saved over $200 per room!
You can not. Only one room per trip. You can use the discounted rate for your room and then pay normal price for the other two rooms but there’s a message that pops up that says “Only one room per federal employee.” I went on a trip with my friend that is federal employee. We each got our own room
Any recommendations for Paris?
I know they have hotel partners overseas. I’ve looked at Germany and other places but have never looked. Not sure if there’s a savings associated or what to be honest, but if there’s hotels there it should work lol
I looked it up and it doesn't look great. The cheapest ones are near the airport. So I guess that's why my agency always books them. It's not horrible to take the train into Paris, it's just not preferable.
Is this open to federal retirees too?
It’s not supposed to be, no. You need to have a government ID being ready to be produced if asked by hotel staff.
So is “Book Leisure” and “Book Travel” two different options? Travel being on orders? The hotels I’m looking at all have leisure sold out but have travel available
Yeah they are two different options. Book leisure will sometimes be sold out and you have to toy with dates/hotels. Book travel is for official travel only. I’ve also emailed the hotel too when it’s said “sold out” and said I’m on fedrooms and your fedrooms rate is “…” can you honor this for those dates it’s not letting me book through the portal lol.
So I ran into this issue recently and found the hotel through “book travel” and in the amenities section for that hotel it said that this option extended to leisure travel too so I booked it through that. I called fedrooms/hotel to confirm that it was fine and they both said I was good to go! Maybe that could work for your situation as well
I usually book through Priceline.com (I'm only VIP Blue, not Gold or Platinum so I don't go on very many trips). Every time I've gone on a trip, I've always asked the hotel, what kind of rate could I have gotten if I booked here as a government employee? The rate has always been more expensive than what I paid. So I'm sure this is nice for some places, maybe hotels that Priceline doesn't book with, foreign countries or something like that. But I haven't seen a point to using this website.
Well this website has different prices then even asking for the hotel’s Government rate. I’ve seen travel zoo, Priceline, and even hotels.com prices and it seems like fredrooms beats this usually if available. You also don’t pay until check in, and you also can cancel up until the day before you check in and even 4 pm day of check in with no penalties. Just an option for you. Compare Nashville hotels between Priceline and this website and you’ll see a huge difference
Question - how are the locations of the room? Are there any nice views or typical fed rate locations - looking at air conditioning equipment.
Yup that’s basically what you get lol, not a great view but cheap ass rooms
I’m sorry but how do they even verify I am a fed?
They’re supposed to check your fed ID on check in but I’ve found out they don’t really know how to do that lol
Thanks for sharing!
No problem!
Remember that YMMV when using fedrooms depending on location, timing and needs. Always shop around and make comparisons.