Finding Cheap Accomodation Online
Booking a hotel online allows you to check rates and availability and ensure that the hotel is within your price range without going near a travel agent. Booking online also allows you to check and compare hotels through so you can decide whether the quality and facilities offered by the hotel, as well as the rates, suit your needs. 
There are lots of good resources online for booking hotels. These sites listed are the most popular used by Aussies when booking overseas accommodation.
You could even check out check out the Google Earth street view option to actually see the location of the hotel (is it next to bar or train station?)
If you are concerned about booking online you can always call the hotel to confirm you’re booking after it’s made through their website (or reuest a cofirmation email).
When looking for a bargain consider not only the time of year (is it peak or shoulder or low season?) but the day of the week you plan to arrive. There can be big hotel discounts if you arrive or book late in the week in world cities like London or New York. If you are flexible do a search for both mid week and weekend arrival. There might be a large difference in price.
Check out other accommodation options like Couch Surfing and Hostels back in the tarvel advice section.
www.aisahotels.com and www.HotelClub.com
Asiahotels has more than 4,500 hotels listed in Asia, Australia and New Zealand. There are always cheap deals on offer and a good feature of the site is the reviews posted by other travellers, allowing unbiased advice on your options. Highly recommended!
Hotel Club is owned by the same company as Asiahotels and boasts over 21,000 hotels in 2200 cities around the world. Cheap deals abound.
This site is growing in popularity due to its cheap deals on hotels in North America and Europe. Worth a look.
This is the first site many people check out when booking accommodation overseas. It sells beds at hotels in Australia and overseas for the next 28 days. It’s competitive on price, but does not have as extensive a range of international options as some of the other sites listed here. Well worth a look though.
An online travel agency that bills itself as the Asia-Pacific’s most comprehensive online travel company. Like the flight centre website you can’t book online, rather you will be directed to call or be called by a consultant to book (usually the point of up selling you on every aspect of the trip). The offices are open 9am-6pm. This site is owned by Travelocity (the home of that annoying gnome sometimes carried by contestants in the TV show the amazing race).
Absolutely huge in America, expedia is growing in popularity in Australia. You can book every aspect of your trip online. It does not always have the most competitive rates, but the site is fast, efficient and reliable (the owners invested over 100 million in technology every year (humble aussietraveladvice.com has spent perhaps .0001 percent of that, but we are just keeping it real). If you want to book everything in one go without dealing with salespeople expedia is a good option.
More of an online agency, lastminute has beds targeted at ‘lifestyle’ travellers who tend to make snap decisions and book, as the name suggests, at the last minute. The section called ‘secret hotels’ is a popular feature of this site. It allows you to book a top hotel at low cost without you knowing where in the city it is. This site is almost wholly owned by www.travel.com.au.
Operated by Flight Centre, this site lets you book up to 12 months in advance. Like Flight Centre, this site offers to beat any offer on competing Australian registered businesses and websites. It has links to sites that offer hotels internationally. Good for domestic bookings but for international other websites are easier and cheaper.
