Hotels.com’s latest Hotel Price Index (HPI) has revealed that despite hotel prices in London falling by 12% in the first half of 2009, as compared with the same period in 2008, the capital still remains the second most expensive city in the UK for hotel rooms.

The new HPI has shown that the average price of staying in a hotel in London now costs just £101 per night, which is down from £115 a year ago. This means that a couple from the UK would be able to save an average of £98 on hotel rooms for a week’s break in London, compared with 2008.

This reduction has come at a time amid the worldwide economic turmoil when London hotel owners are striving to highlight to travellers that now is the ideal time to take a break in the capital.

Whilst across the UK the average hotel prices for UK travellers fell by an average of 16%, providing good news for those looking to holiday near home, the news was even better for overseas visitors to the UK. The weakness of the Pound coupled with hoteliers lowering their rates to stimulate business meant that the average price paid by travellers from Europe or the US were even lower, down by as much as 39% for US travellers in one UK city.

Prices paid were down in every major UK destination, with Southampton (down 33%), Belfast (down 29%) and Aberdeen (down 25%) experiencing the steepest price falls for UK travellers.

The Hotels.com Hotel Price Index tracks the real prices paid per hotel room (rather than advertised rates) for 78,000 hotels across 13,000 locations around the world. The latest HPI looks at prices from January to June 2009, compared to the same period in 2008.