Hyatt, IHG and Marriott hotels all offer two paths for their most frequent guests to upgrade into suites: they can be confirmed in advance a limited number of times each year, or hotels should offer them suites that are still available on arrival. (The Hilton Honors program allows hotels to upgrade members to suites but does not require it, and 44% of their brands do not have to offer upgrades at all.)
The details of suite upgrades vary, for instance Hyatt lets Globalist members confirm suites at the time of booking, and any standard suite for sale can be used for an upgrade. In contrast, Marriott only starts upgrading into suites 5 days prior to check-in, and will only allocate standard suites they do not expect to sell.
Nonetheless, some hotels play games with their inventory (such as creating a category of limited rooms eligible for upgrade) and also refuse to provide upgrades at check-in. This is especially prevalent at Marriott, though Hyatt is not immune to the practice.
The general manager of a premium Los Angeles-area chain hotel writes to me, explaining why his hotel will not offer top tier elites to suites even though the chain requires them to do so.
[O]ne thing that has begun to impact upgrades are the housekeeping ordinances that are starting to pop up in major cities like Los Angeles. Where the room attendants can now only clean 3,500 sqft in a given day, and the hotels are now required by law to offer stayover service. Costs of hskp has increased so much that operators are having to figure out how to make things more efficient, which means not providing complimentary upgrades into suites because the cost to clean has doubled. So we will only upgrade to a higher floor + view.
Since the pandemic hotels have been cutting costs, trying to take advantage of high room rates to generate outsized profits after losing money in 2020 and in many markets also in 2021.
One way they’ve tried to do this is by eliminating daily housekeeping. Where it’s required to be offered it’s often only ‘on request’ and they sometimes make it difficult to request. When housekeeping is requested, the service may be limited to just making the bed (not changing linens), emptying trash, and swapping out towels left on the floor.
Hotel housekeeper unions have fought back, since their members have fewer jobs, fewer hours, and more work to do – a room that doesn’t get cleaned daily is more work to clean after check-out. Where this general manager oversees a hotel, in Los Angeles, they’re required to offer housekeeping to guests during their stay and the amount of work they can require of housekeepers is limited. A suite isn’t just more work to clean, it takes up more of each housekeepers allotment of work. Occupied suites mean more housekeepers they have to keep on staff.
Put another way, the hotel views offering upgrades into suites they haven’t sold as expensive rather than free. And the general manager views his job as limiting costs (“making things more efficient”) even if that means “not providing complimentary upgrades into suites” despite this being an express requirement of the chain his hotel is a part of.
What next: no restaurant because cleaning a kitchen up to food and health code standards is too much? I mean, I guess we’ve seen this before when some hotels decide maintaining a pool isn’t worth the expense. Many hotels have eliminated sit-down restaurants for bar-centric restaurants that require fewer staff.
The reality is many hotels have long avoided suite upgrades by making suites only available for booking through the hotel itself. I know of several Marriotts that do this.
Damn that sq ft limit is the dumbest metric I have ever heard — I can’t believe hotel operators agreed to that or haven’t sued in court. A 500sq ft standard room does not take 100% more time than a 250sq ft standard room. It maybe takes an extra minute for a little extra vacuuming. The real effort should be based on beds and bathroom. A second beds probably adds more time than anything.
Don’t believe it one bit! Worked at hotels and I have given upgrades all the time, but it seems more want to sell those rooms. Sales managers have even been told to put them as OOO till after 5pm to increase the revenue.
1) Housekeeping on request / not daily is a guest-friendly improvement over daily housekeeping
2) Suite upgrades are meaningless, it’s just empty space I won’t use. All I’m using in a typical hotel stay is the bed, desk, bathroom and television.
The stuff the bloggers rant about just doesn’t matter to a lot of the actual travel clientele. Your preferences may differ.
Signed, a business traveler with 100+ hotel nights a year.
I opt out of daily housekeeping for two reasons:
1. I feel it’s a huge waste of energy and water to launder items I’ve only used once.
2. I sometimes react badly to cleaning chemicals and don’t want my room cleaned unless I, ya know, actually spilled something.
The notes here make me think I should leave a larger tip on the last day for what extra work I’m making for housekeeping. I really do NOT want to be walking into my room right after they use something with a powerful scent in the bathroom…usually when I check in it’s been enough time for anything they use to dissipate.
I need to chat with my husband. When on my own I *have* been tipping as if they did come in every day to clean.
As a side note, I really wish that if hotels use a common allergen, such as almond oil, in their toiletries they’d post it on the website so if somebody’s allergic they can make a request for a substitute at the time of booking or know to bring their own soap…
Blame the LA city council for the nonsense square footage based metric
https://wagesla.lacity.org/sites/g/files/wph1941/files/2022-07/Hotel%20Worker%20Protection%20Ordinance.pdf
“For hotels with 60 or more guest rooms, a hotel employer shall not require a room attendant
to perform room cleaning amounting to a total of more than 3,500 square feet of floor
space in any eight-hour workday, unless the hotel employer pays the room attendant
twice the room attendant’s regular rate of pay for each and every hour worked during
the workday.”
“A hotel shall not implement any
program or policy whereby guest rooms are not sanitized and cleaned after each and
every night that they are occupied, including a program under which guests receive a
financial incentive to not have their guest room cleaned on a daily basis. This
subsection does not prevent a hotel from continuing, modifying or establishing a
sustainable environmental program, such as a “green program,” under which guests are
encouraged to re-use linens, bath towels or similar items, nor does it require a hotel to
have any guest room cleaned when the occupant has opted-out of such service without
solicitation by the hotel or when the occupant informs the hotel that they do not wish to
be disturbed.”
@ Gary — Through this nonsesnse, hotel operators/owners will drive off their elite customers and then they won’t have any wages to pay.
Noticed this at Grand Hyatt, Athens, Greece. I went to book 9 months before a stay and hotel shows they do not honor upgrades even for Globalists. As to cleaning… much also has to do with number of occupants in the room – single business person that is gone much of the day vs. family of 4 that is on vacation.
Really good point. If I had young kids I probably *would* want daily housekeeping.
I’m on my own or with my husband and we’re both very clean guests who do our best to make as little work for housekeeping as possible. I rarely eat in my room and when I do I try to clean up after myself. It’s only polite, to me.
But if you have toddlers, they make messes.
My goal is to leave my room looking as close as possible to like nobody actually stayed there.
As a top tier member of 3 of the 4 major hotel chains, I’ve seen this play out. Hilton Atlanta, for example, where I’ve stayed 30+ nights so far this year only upgrades me to a higher floor! Bonvoy hotels generally give me an upgrade to a suite if I burn my suite night awards. However, last night at a Westin near ORD the agent politely asked if I’d like an upgrade. My response: ‘it’s only one night and I’m leaving early so it doesn’t matter that much.’ Result: gave it to me and a few other perks too. Bottomline: it’s a crap shoot!
Government ruins everything – Example #41401348290852
Very interesting. It doesn’t excuse their failing to fulfill their obligations to guests, but at least it helps to understand the malign incentives imposed by bureaucratic central planning which create a system where there is simultaneously 1) less consumer satisfaction; 2) fewer jobs for housekeepers (a group that might not easily find alternative work); and 3) wasted assets in the form of empty hotel suites. Government might have the best of intentions, but still produce harmful results.
Its been a racket loge before covid too. I’ve been a Centurion card holder for about 15 years and despite the “cache” that supposedly comes along with that card, I can count on about 1 hand the number of times I recieved a seamless upgrade upon check-in at a Marriott (worldwide). More than once I had to do my own on-the-sly investigation to discover that there were higher room categories available and then reapprach the desk/management about it. Hilton’s were a tad better about it, but I still had issues many times. Forced to be overly proactive with my request , often made to feel like a homeless beggar looking for shelter.
I always wondered why properties were so averse to upgrading loyalty members. A Manager at the Conrad in Tokyo told me once that so many people have joined loyalty programs that its become cumbersome for the properties to deal with all the upgrade requests (used to be more of an exception than a rule), he also mentioned the extra costs associated with servicing the higher room categories, espicially in bulk. So basicllay it all feels liek the secret menu at In-N-Out.
Can you drop a hint as go the hotel?
Living in the communist city of Los Angeles and State of California I can completely understand their reasoning. Trust me, my neighbor has been a GM of a major hotel here, and he’s equally frustrated he can’t provide these benefits, but the unions have him by the Ba**s!
To battle the last (of many) strikes, he literally took rooms out of service even when he didn’t want to, but by doing so he needed less full time staff and in return kept his cost down which had less impact on us.
I’m not going to debate anyone on union vs non-union, we all have our own feelings which is what makes this world. I’ll just say paying a McDonald’s worker $25/hr just raises the cost for all of us and degrades the quality of service since someone has to pay for it and it’s not going to be corporate.
To those saying they will drive away our business, in some cases that’s true, but in others it’s not due to the way corporate travel policies work. Plus for every one person they lose there will be 10 others still booking that room
Or maybe you did already and it’s a premium Marriott. Was it confidential?
Time to name names, Gary!
So the cause is an inane city rule that makes cleaners much less productive (an arbitrary square footage limit). This is a predictable result. It makes cleaners and customers worse off. This is likely widespread. The name of the hotel is irrelelevant.
Keep voting in kooks that don’t understand business. Your liberal policies at work. Everyone suffers.
The hotels should hire more folks and do the upgrades.
When you get past the cost, the cost is lost goodwill, credibility and business is worse.
I’m highest level at Marriott.
Almost never get upgraded.
And my loyalty has gone down.
And look not to eat there unless it’s a convenience of true need.
Why should I care about being loyal?
Marriott has ruined their brand with the lack of control over franchises.
We’ve had more theft in our rooms from hotel maids this year than ever before & their managers are doing nothing. Lock up your stuff & don’t leave anything laying around.
“and the hotels are now required by law to offer stayover service.”
What is “stayover service”?
There are guests that are human barnyard pigs along with their family members in a room or suite and others who are neat and clean.Some may take more labor payroll time.
With some guests you would never know they stayed in the room shy of seeing wrinkled linens and towels on the floor.
At the end of the day GMs can come up with all the random obscure excuses they want but in my decades of conversations with GMs & Rev managers all over the world primarily that are ownership selfish despite how a program is written they want them open to sell for revenue or help them recover an issue with a high revenue VIP guest.
Not a free status credit card holder enriching American Express pie in the sky status that gets devalued.
Programs can give away status all they want and make elite status illusion promises but you will always know quickly upon arrival @ a property if they are the real deal.
You can almost always point the finger @ the non compliant properties and almost always find that ownership and the general business culture are at play.
These are the same ownership folks that consider a lavish elite breakfast as a cup of yogurt and a banana.Sorry tea,coffee or water are extra 😉 Notice that temperature control on the wall that never cools or warms the room properly stuck at the same cost effective temperature ?
Its all in the same mind set.So though you may be paying a premium rate at the end of the day ownership sets the bend the guest over policy or not. They have your money and may genuinely offer a lack of hospitality and recognition or wow you.
The programs are typically a cash cows driving revenue directly to the hotels.
As a famous philosopher/blogger once said “Your mileage may vary!” 😉
Globalist at Hyatt gets the free upgrade to the suite at the moment of check in, upon availability. When they book the room, if they have a suite upgrade award they can apply it and they will have the suite guaranteed.
Reposting…this is all on the city council of LA taking the unions at face value with no compromise or common sense. The square foot metric is absurd. There are other ways to balance workload without such a clumsy cutoff.
“https://wagesla.lacity.org/sites/g/files/wph1941/files/2022-07/Hotel%20Worker%20Protection%20Ordinance.pdf”
“For hotels with 60 or more guest rooms, a hotel employer shall not require a room attendant
to perform room cleaning amounting to a total of more than 3,500 square feet of floor
space in any eight-hour workday, unless the hotel employer pays the room attendant
twice the room attendant’s regular rate of pay for each and every hour worked during
the workday.”
They also explicitly forbid offering incentives to skip housekeeping during a stay.
So, that’s in Los Angeles … how about everywhere else in the world as playing games with inventory and availability by hotel management and some egotistical FD staff is not restricted to “the communist city” of LA!
Marriott and other “Large” chains are just too big to manage. Too many rules and regulations. Marriott Corporate has taken their eye off the ball so to speak. Offering elite to every Tom, Dick and Harry yet they cannot manage the elites that were there previously. Revenue and warm bodies and it doesn’t make any difference how you get them. I’m Lifetime Titanium and can’t remember the last time I was acknowleged nor get an upgrade. Don’t come to me with a problem unless you have a solution….problems, problems, problems and NO SOLUTIONS. Actually, I don’t have a solution either as the Genie is outta the bottle.
Considering that those claims were thoroughly debunked just a few days, their being recycled as if they were established facts is of such intellectual dishonesty it’s breathtaking.
Follow the link below to see clear evidence of how Hilton Honors has automated HH Diamond complimentary room upgrades, including to suites, globally to potentially prevent individual properties from “playing games” with availability, or issues like the one described by the GM in this post.
Shown at the link below is an airline-like automated notification of my upgrade to a King Executive Harbour Suite at Conrad Hong Kong in late January 2023, sent to me on the HH app fully 3 days before I arrived at the hotel and inviting me to check in automatically into the suite.
Features of the HH new upgrades scheme are that (a) they can be confirmed up to 3 days before check-in, (b) they are unlimited, and (c) they are automated globally and prioritized (Golds < Diamonds < LT Diamonds) like airline cabin upgrades, meaning that they combine the best features of other programs' schemes, without their disadvantages.
Here's the notification message I got on the HH App:
Look at it carefully because, @Gary’s continued denial notwithstanding, that is real-life experience of how Hilton’s new global automated upgrades work in practice, subject to availability.
https://bit.ly/3DBAYAG
If you want a suite, pay for it like the rest of us. I’m sick of rich people expecting handouts.
I don’t care what the local law says.
This is a credibility issue with the hotel and is and has been a bait and switch.
“Costs of hskp has increased so much that operators are having to figure out how to make things more efficient, which means not providing complimentary upgrades into suites because the cost to clean has doubled.”
Well, assuming the manager who explained why they don’t upgrade to suites is not exaggerating about costs, first, glad the housekeeping staff is making more than the minimum wage or so they were for years and had to rely on tips left by customers to supplement their low wages.
Second, that means whenever I’m staying at hotels in California now, I don’t have to leave tips for housekeeping anymore. I was ALWAYS very generous with tips knowing the awful wages the housekeepers were being paid.
Sometimes a hotel will go the extra mile to make a Titanium Elite Lifetime member feel special. I just had a wonderful experience at the Charleston Marriott Downtown (SC). They upgraded me to the top (Penthouse) Floor so that I would have a great balcony overlooking the water; and then the icing on the cake, they comped my daily self parking, just to be extra nice !!
@peter, Hotels can’t just hire a bunch of staff to provide everyone with their bait and switch benefits as you say.
Hiring more: Do you understand how much it cost to employ someone, let alone a union employee? In Los Angeles your $300 a night room now just jumped to $450 to offset that employee.
Bait and Switch: I’ve got top tier status with more hotel, airline, and car rental companies. Have you read the little 5 point font fine print? I have and 99% of them state it’s based on availability. So like IHG will give you points if they can’t upgrade or offer breakfast, but the attorneys wrote these rules really well.
My take has always been and will continue to be, I’m entitled to what I book and anything more is a plus. Want a suite, book it, want first/business class, book it
It’s time for the FTC to step in. Non-honored rewards programs constitue false advertising.
It doesn’t matter what the cost basis is or why they don’t want to do it. They have to change the terms or honor them.
What they’re doing right now is illegal.
So sick of the whining from hotels.
Yeah, it’s hard. Somehow everyone managed upgrades, breakfast and daily housekeeping before Covid when rates were 30% lower than they are now.
I do sympathize with well-intentioned managers who who are stuck between REIT asset managers and guests. But lots of owners are just lazy. I’m amazed how many allegedly “midscale” places that still have no breakfast and closed pools.
P.S. it’s rich how some people complain about both big government AND degraded service. Guess what, the free market apparently doesn’t think you should get elite giveaways!
My $300 room from before the pandemic is already $450 now.
Prices have skyrocketed and what is received in return has declined. Significantly.
@pilotguy.
It’s interesting you have no clue who I am and think you have more status at hotels and airlines.
Maybe that why you have no clue at all.
I also know what it costs to hire, union or not.
For what we’re talking about, a hotel can and should provide what they promise, especially to their best customers.
“Only if available at check in”?
No kidding, like I didn’t know that and also understand it.
It’s that it’s available and not provided.
A tad off topic, but my issue with ”housekeeping on request” is that the request often doesn’t work. It might just have been bad luck, but roughly 60% of the times I’ve requested housekeeping the next day at Hilton and Marriott properties in the US the last year, I’ve not received any housekeeping. Very annoying.
The most surprising fact is why travelers bother with hotel loyalty programs at all. I’ve been top tier in two of them. Been a free agent since 2017. Price and location are my criteria.
The Los Angeles ordinance is going to have the effect of reducing room size in the design of new construction. Yuck!
We travel a lot—210 days this year—and are in the category of guests who are neat, tip well, and actually prefer not having to vacate our room every day for cleaning. But there is a bigger picture to observe when discussing what’s going on with staffing in the travel and hospitality industry. It’s much bigger than only lodging.
We just returned from our annual visit for a family reunion in a resort/vacation/rural area of the upper midwest. And oh, what a change from even last year! Three of the best full-service restaurants have closed and a third has switched to buffet only. A better-than-a-diner meal is now at least 10 miles away and you can’t get in because of the demand.
The reason? The restaurants can no longer find staff to work at low pay rates which used to enable the restaurants to charge prices that the locals can also afford. And the restaurants can’t make enough money during the lucrative tourist season to support themselves through the year. All of the costs of running a restaurant have gone up. Yes, the tourists can pay the higher menu prices for a few months, but the locals (large retirement population) can’t pay those prices all year long. And the tourists are only around to pay in the summer. So the restaurants fail during the winter.
Most of the available housing, including rentals, has been bought up in the last few years by people from higher-income areas looking for second vacation homes that they can also offer as short term rentals. Now the traditional local service workforce can’t find affordable places to rent long term, and are moving away to urbanized areas which have long-term rentals and the types of jobs that pay living wages. This dynamic is now affecting all local businesses and not just restaurants. As the workers migrate away, the local grocers and personal services businesses are also failing.
It’s ironic that the holiday newcomers bought their vacation homes in order to get away from the stresses of their jobs and lives in urban areas, but now they have to shop for food and cook their own meals on vacation because the restaurants they were counting on serving them are vanishing.
At the resort we were staying, they also closed the restaurant and bar due to lack of staff, but at least our suite had a kitchen and we enjoy cooking. I don’t think the moms (typically) of the families with children, who were also staying there, were delighted to find that they would have to prepare all the meals on their vacation. So maybe next year they don’t return and go on a cruise instead?
I don’t have a solution—I’m just observing the trend. A very few of you whine about the workers you think are selfish because they want more money. Yes they do which makes them just like you. The labor supply disruptions are an inconvenience, but I’m not entitled to convenience. The rest of people in the world are not my personal concierge service.
While this article is well intentioned, it’s contextually irrelevant because it’s based on the micro niche of what the LA market supposedly is and honestly, that doesn’t matter or apply to the other 99.999999% of properties in the US.
The overriding facts are this:
Like it or not, the industry as a whole is in a race to the bottom in terms of staffing, controllable costs and guest amenities/benefits and no, it’s never coming back. The staffing levels that existed at properties back in 2019 are gone the same as the staffing that existed prior to 9/11 will never come back. It’s been a 20+ year purge and all the pandemic did was give the parent companies and their franchisees the cover to speed things up.
The oldest game in the industry that has existed forever is that the parent company wants the appearance of standards, because they boost their top line and the owner/management company wants to subvert as much of those standards as possible because doing it helps their bottom line. The game is how far can you push it, and then still maintain appearances for the one time a year you have a QA audit and an actual parent company employee is on site versus the rest of the year when they have no clue what’s going on since so few people fill out post stay surveys in any form. Each side knows what the other is doing but it’s like the see no evil/hear no evil monkeys.
Labor costs are such a big issue because the franchise owner can’t control many things like franchise fees, insurance, utilities and F&B costs but you can always control labor and that’s why the parent brands push so hard for app use, F&B credits and opt in non-daily housekeeping. It’s 100% cost containment-job riffing tools, no more-no less, period.
Also don’t believe the MSM that hospitality companies are having hardships due to labor costs. Big BS on that one. Chances are the staff that got these places through the lockdowns and pandemic either burnt out and left or they got a big fat nothing while the layoffs during ’20 & ’21 were brutal. If you were lucky enough to get paid a bit more, it probably came at the expense of overall decreased staffing in that department/property/etc. so sure, you got paid, but you’re also doing a hell of a lot more work for it.
Overall it amazes me that people stay in the industry. Between the low pay, little to no benefits and irregular work schedules, why would you? You would have to be out of your mind. It’s why so many frontline employees are the way they are. You would be too if you’re wages were stuck in 2018, you’re treated by local management/the management company as disposable and the parent company is an absentee landlord to all of this because it’s not their hotel.
What this comes back to is, the industry is hell bent on cost containment. It’s not about growing your way to prosperity, it’s completely about cutting you’re way there. Almost every situation where something that is guaranteed, promised, etc. falls apart it’s usually due to something relating to a written or implied LSOP that the owner/management company has in place that knee caps things from happen the way they should.
The beauty for them is that they’re untouchable in this equation and never really fee the heat from the travelling public. If any problem ever does arise that somehow gets to them, the LSOP doesn’t change, they’ll just terminated the local staff or management and keep the revolving door spinning.
Rant Over.
@InLA You are most certainly correct, and it all has the fingerprints of exceptionally harmful government action which has banned low skilled migrant labor from the US workforce to placate the labor unions which are the biggest campaign contributors to the ruling political Party, as well as the Trumpist wing of the opposition. There are many people in Central America and Africa who would love to have a $10/hr. housekeeping job and who could improve the quality of their lives (and ours) by doing so, but that is forbidden – purportedly for their own good, but not really. Liberalizing immigration and allowing migrants to bargain for their own wages would solve a lot of these problems.
@Ella: He did. What did you think staus was if not a prepay?
There is no upgrade fairy.
Upgrades are based on the management culture of the property. I’ve been to properties where there is a huge push to upsell ocean front or swim out rooms while simultaneously saying there are no “upgrades” available. I’ve seen this at Hyatt, Hilton and Marriott resorts
@ 818Pilotguy says:
“Living in the communist city of Los Angeles and State of California …..I’m not going to debate anyone on union vs non-union, we all have our own feelings which is what makes this world.”
You don’t need to – you’ve made your “political” position clear enough for any reasonable person to question the impartiality of your judgement. No doubt your Hotel GM neighbour will feed your biased prejudices.
There is another approach – to question the facts and figures.
So, given I’m reading online that the hourly wage for hotel housekeeper is averaging USD15.50 perhaps your mate can explain exactly why he / she is whingeing so much. Can any of this anti-union, anti-LA CC, anti whatever it is Gary Leff is ranting about today on his blog has any actual validity.
Back-calculating the 3500 sq ft limitation in an 8-hour shift and applying generous room size (based on Card LA) of 350 sq ft per room, the worst case scenario for the GM is paying only for 30-40 minutes of staff time for a room (USD7.75 to USD11.60) – let’s take an average of USD9.
Now let’s assume that a suite takes twice as long, thus, let’s give the GM the benefit fo the doubt and round up to USD20.
Now the DIFFERENCE between providing a cleaned room and cleaned suite in the scenario of an upgrade is the extra cost of cleaning the suite over the room. In our back of an envelope estimate that’s now USD10.
But wait, I hear you cry, what about the on-costs – well, if the choice is to upgrade to a elite or don’t upgrade, they should already into the mix – if, not we would need to do an audit into the competence and efficiency of that GM running the hotel in question.
Remember, those rooms / suites are only available for upgrade if they haven’t been sold. If they have been sold then the staffing / operation should already be geared for that level of operation. If they haven’t been sold then we better go and check the effectiveness of the yield management process.
The next question how much benefit does that hotel accrue from being a member of the chain loyalty program. Short changing program members on their benefit has some sort of negative impact, that may be trivial or great, either way needs to be considered. Save on the cleaning of the suite but remember the cost of alienating loyal members.
Whilst your’e checking all of this with your mate, perhaps ask as well, what reimbursement the hotel accrues from providing the upgrade (which may be more depending upon the occupancy rate of the hotel – right? That is turn rewards better managed hotels (more rooms / suites sold)).
No doubt there are many other factors in play – without greater clarity and some representative figures I’m not sure anyone herein should be jumping to conclusions and pointing fingers.
That said, as a customer and elite program member, I wouldn’t be that sympathetic to benefits being denied based in the case put forward by the (anonymous) letter quoted by Gary Leff and the off-record rants by your neighbour. It would concern me if such a GM was trying to deny benefits to save apparently trivial amounts of expenditure without due regard for the safety of employees (a significant part of that ordinance) or over working their staff with attendant low standards of cleaning in their hotel accommodation.
One assumes that the competency of hotel GMs varies to a greater or lessor extent.
I’ll just say paying a McDonald’s worker $25/hr just raises the cost for all of us and degrades the quality of service since someone has to pay for it and it’s not going to be corporate.
To those saying they will drive away our business, in some cases that’s true, but in others it’s not due to the way corporate travel policies work. Plus for every one person they lose there will be 10 others still booking that room
Of course you and nearly everyone who plays the mile/point game have seen it at all the major hotel chains because they all tell you exactly the same thing: upgrades depend on availability as determined by individual properties at the sole discretion. @Gary’s claim that there are programs that “guarantee” (suite) upgrades is simply nonsensical and everyone knows that it is nonsensical. His gullibility and that of his sycophants in pushing the utterly ridiculous notion that there are programs that “guarantee” suite upgrades is quite simply tough wrap one’s head around. Here are some of my favorite posts over the years that epitomize this gullibility:
2012 — I am Sick of Arguing for Starwood Upgrades. (travelcodex)
2013 — Platinum SPG, best room upgrade: please change the language. (FlyerTalk)
2014 — Starwood Platinum Suite Upgrades: Why Does It Have To Be A Fight? (OMAAT)
2015 — Destroying Loyalty: Starwood’s Lies & Expectation Management. (gamification)
See? Even SPG never “guaranteed” suite upgrades, as the “thought leader” repeatedly claimed as far back as a decade ago, using almost exactly the same words that he used in this post to claim the same thing about existing programs!
It is very tough for properties to “confirm” suite upgrades weeks or months before of a stay when the possibility remains high that they might sell the suite for cash.That is why Hilton coming out with the policy of confirming room upgrades (including to suites) within 3 days of a stay makes perfect business: around that time, properties have a pretty good idea, based on past trends and statistical data/modeling, about whether or not that they might still be able to sell a room or a suite for cash, and will be comfortable releasing it as an upgrade if the chances of selling it seem low.
The thing is (former Rooms Controller at a major convention hotel with Marriott that’s also a Titanium Elite myself) that a lot of Elites think that they are the ONLY Elite member staying at the hotel at any given time which is SO far from the truth… especially for a major convention where there are 100 times more Ambassador, Titaniums, and Platinums than the total number of suites that I even had in inventory. What people also don’t realize is that the Suite Night Award system does things automatically, based on what the Finance department allocated to the system and what it THINKS is available however the Suite Night Award system and the actual hotel operation system actually DO NOT COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER, and the system would CONSTANTLY upgrade people to suites in advance when we actually didn’t have suites available – I had ZERO say on whether you got an upgrade or not and maintaining the hotel inventory was my actual job. You don’t know how many times I would have to send an email to a Bonvoy member letting them know that system upgraded them and we actually didn’t have it – it made my job very difficult. Not to mention people book suites (yah, they actually do) so when I was sold out of suites I was actually sold out of suites because people are paying money to book them.
Also, when I did have suites available I would be upgrading Ambassadors and Titaniums the morning of over Platinums. However again, people tend to forget that they aren’t the only ones with status and I always upgraded repeat Guests that had higher status when I had suites to upgrade folks to – though I would leave a few for the Front Desk agents to upgrade folks to. I also took room category booked into account as well and even how long you’ve been a member with status.
Also, even myself as a Titanium member, I know that the “Enhanced Room Upgrade (based on availability)” does not state at ALL that your upgrade HAS to be a suite – so yah water views with balconies (we had a limited number of rooms with balconies) and such were fair game. It really irks me when sites like this states that Marriott Elite members are guaranteed suites – it states “Based on Availability Including Select Suites” when NO WHERE does it state that you are guaranteed a suite. I can’t even count how many times I had to go out to the desk myself (and I did quite often as a Rooms Controller) to explain to someone we didn’t have a suite upgrade for someone because #1 it wasn’t guaranteed to begin with and no tier states that suites are guaranteed and #2 unfortunately I don’t have any because they were all booked or Suite Night Awards took them all and I don’t even have any for people that want to pay for them.
Fun fact for those that flaunt their status but booked third party, group rate, or a wholesale package – you know that in the terms and conditions if you book that way you aren’t eligible to earn points or miles, and you aren’t entitled to your membership tier benefits? Yah, my property never really enforced that (could you even imagine trying to explain that to someone that they can’t have lounge access because they are here with a group and booked the group rate) but yah. Thankfully at my property we didn’t enforce that even though we were mainly a convention hotel because no one knew that was in the Bonvoy terms and conditions… well, until I discovered it right before my transfer to a different department. LOL.
The more I read in your blog/newsletter, the happier I am that I don’t travel in the US, either on US airlines or stay in US hotels. And I don’t stay in US chain hotels in Europe either. Give me an independent hotel any day, and with no expectation of an upgrade.
Unite Here 11 is the hotel workers Union and it is really a major power player in the city and we are worse off for it. They even control a city council seat.
Americans want ever more government and imagine it has no cost. That’s why they are content to demand more spending from a country $31 trillion in debt. Tween they actually experience the costs it leads to resentment, whining, and scapegoating. Watch a country in steep decline due to irresponsibility. And hard luck.
Imagine, paying a housekeeper a livable wage instead of 6 dollars per room or 9 dollars per hour. A room generally costs 40 dollars per night to operate, regardless of the brand or context.
I’d love to at least know what chain the hotel was in, and if you won’t give us that then at least give us some context as to why the hotel GM would be emailing such things to you.
@DCS
“Gary’s claim that there are programs that “guarantee” (suite) upgrades is simply nonsensical and everyone knows that it is nonsensical.”
Oh no brother – surely, that can’t be right:
Quote Hyatt website: “3. Suite Free Night Awards: Free Night Awards for suite accommodation (“Suite Free Night Awards”) are subject to availability.”
And on TPG:
“Over the years, I’ve found that applying suite upgrade certificates can be very inconsistent due to Hyatt’s dated computer system.”
Such real world experience just can’t be true, surely.
Let’s check in with Lucky at OMAAT:
https://onemileatatime.com/insights/frustrating-hyatt-suite-upgrade-award-process/
“…The process of applying these upgrades sometimes leaves a bit to be desired. Not only do you have to call Hyatt reservations, but they then have to contact the property. Some hotels are better about picking up the phone than others, and this is now an issue I’ve had a few times…”
Sorry, @ DCS, bit your insights must be gaslighting – despite the evidence, Gary Leff ways so.
Of course confirmed suite upgrades are ‘subject to availability.’ If there is a standard suite for sale, it can be confirmed in advance as an upgrade. But the room type may be sold out.
I have never had to ‘call’ to confirm a suite upgrade. I either email my Hyatt concierge or send a twitter DM to @HyattConcierge. Yes, the process is manual on the back end but that doesn’t much matter to me as the guest.
@Christian – the hotel GM is a reader, I’ve given the city but they don’t want to be identified and I am honoring that. They shared their thoughts with me by email, they were happy to have me share them further, and we were discussing consistency of hotel delivery of promised benefits and why individual properties don’t execute on what the chain commits to customers.
Yet another fabrication. Not only is it not possible to book so-called ‘confirmed’ suite upgrades online, WoH Globalists must call customer support, who then must contact individual properties, which, of course, have the sole discretion to determine availability — a process that OMAAT characterized as “frustrating”, as my “alter ego” already mentioned above.
That being the case, the notion that ‘if there is a standard suite for sale, it can be confirmed in advance as an upgrade” is yet another “big lie”. The only programs where it is true that “if there is any room, including standard suite, for sale, it can be confirmed in advance” are Accord ALL and Hilton’s so-called “premium award” because in those cases, points and cash are treated as being exactly the same. It is why Hilton’s “premium awards”, like airline “Any Time Awards”, are exorbitantly priced. There is a fixed conversion factor or ration between cash and points at each property that makes the two currencies interchangeable, allowing “premium awards”, including suites, to be booked online with points if they are available for booking with cash.
One more time: nothing can be “guaranteed” if its realization is contingent on something else happening first — from my undergraduate Philosophy 101 class. Any upgrade that depends on availability, which is itself at the sole discretion of individual properties, cannot possibly be “guaranteed”, no matter how often the “big lie” is repeated. In fact, that is precisely why WoH Globalists’ suite upgrade awards cannot be confirmed online!
“…a process that OMAAT characterized as “frustrating” as @platy, my “alter ego”, already mentioned above.”
I hesitate using “@platy” in my comments because that usually sends them into the moderation queue…
As just happened… 😉 !
Your comments often go to moderation, too, because of the links and extreme length the computer thinks you’re a spammer 😀
Bollocks to the lot of you.
FACT: Hilton is the greatest, followed by the Beet Farm tours @Schrute Farms.
FACT: Everywhere else is crap, especially Hyatt (Hey @JBPritzker – We still on for 18 this Sunday?)
Hilton has never failed to upgrade lifetime diamonds such as myself, ever during sold out events (Hilton Davos during the WEF, The Hilton Garden inn at Epstein Island, Hanoi Hilton during the hostilities in Vietnam, etc.).
Your constant berating of the planets best hotel loyalty program are unnecessarily pedantic and boorish. I will be recommending your termination from the Hhonors program during my gold game with Pritzker this afternoon – if that fat moron actually shows up at t-time…
Not encourage you to start sending my comments to the moderation queue, but I would say that no more than about 10% of mine go there. However, nearly 100% of my comments that mention “a certain someone” have ended up in the moderation queue, regardless of their length, as my very comment above that went there, just illustrated… 😉
Speaking of spammers how about getting rid of this “DeeCeeEss” troll once and for all? After posting here for about a decade, I am already known quantity and do not need anyone to claim to speak for me. If there is a point that the spammer wishes to make, then come out and make it and let’s duke it out so that I can expose the unethical spoofing and “cyber identity theft” for what it is trying to conceal: stupidity.
I recently stayed at a luxury Hilton property in a city I visit fairly frequently. They upgraded me to a suite. I had previously stayed at a Ritz Carlton several times in the same city, about a block away. Never gotten upgraded to a suite. Guess which one I’ll book from now on? Service and accommodations were roughly equivalent.
The LA ordinance went into effect before the pandemic; it was driven by the unions and their politcal cronies in areas like LA, SF, and Long Beach. The staffing situation was much different then.
Read between the lines and you’ll find whining by owners and managers that they “can’t” accommodate their guest because labor costs too much. Whenever profits aren’t where they want them to be, the blame labor and regulations, forgetting of course that they pay that labor (much of it performed by undocumented workers – Americans don’t want to clean toilets – at minimum wages no one can live on). Greed is good.
The article should be titled Hotel General Manager Explains why Maximizing Margins is More Important than Brand Standards or Guest Experience.
If this mystery GM truly runs a premium hotel, then hire the amount of staff you need to deliver the experience your guests expect and your affiliated brand standards require when they book your property. Otherwise, maybe look into running a Super 8.
@ Gary – “why individual properties don’t execute on what the chain commits to customers.”
What they shared is applicable to their property only or maybe at best to properties that are under the same parent brand within their ownership/management situation in that city only. Past that, you realistically can’t say chain because each property has its own set of staffing issues and internal politics/LSOPS that dictate why these things do not happen. 99.9% of properties will never deal with unions and/or ordinances which is why this story is such an extreme outlier.
@ Brian – “If this mystery GM truly runs a premium hotel, then hire the amount of staff you need to deliver the experience your guests expect and your affiliated brand standards require when they book your property. Otherwise, maybe look into running a Super 8.”
That’s not how it works.
As a GM, you can only hire what the owner and/or management company allows you to hire in terms of dollars and FTE’s. They and they alone dictate what every hotel on planet earth can spend on labor/controllables and by proxy what services and amenities can be offered. Your paycheck as GM comes from the company you work for which is not the parent company but XYZ franchisee. You spend what they allot or else you won’t have a job.
@ DCS
“I hesitate using “@platy” in my comments because that usually sends them into the moderation queue…”
Interesting, assuming your observation has been reported with due regard for any confounding variables (e.g. the standard excuses of post length and links). Thanks, mate.
Ironically, Gary and other travel bloggers have completely missed the maths underpinning this loyalty lark.
Be well, dude, the revolution is close….;)
What I do for a living is “hunt for patterns”, and this one was easy to detect. The observation is solid and the evidence is right there in my comment
“DCS says:
July 30, 2023 at 6:42 am.”
which consisted of just a couple of short sentences containing no links or anything that should be flagged as spam by any AI-based cyber-filter. The trigger that sent even that innocuous comment into the moderation queue, which I predicted would happen, was the mentioning of the “unmentionable” moniker!
Your only “crime” was to lend a second voice challenging the “big lie”, whose effectiveness depended of my being portrayed as a “Hilton fanboy” and lone and misguided “crusader”. A second reality-based voice needed to be “moderated” (read: delayed as much as possible) because it was a threat to the “big lie”…
Now, the genie is out of the bottle and cannot be put back in, so, yes, the “revolution” is close 😉
The majority of branded hotels these days are owned by one group, usually large real estate trusts or corporations, and managed by a different group. The management group sets the hotel’s budget every year based on the owner’s expectations. Since most hotel ownership groups are publicly traded companies, they are under extreme pressure to maximize profit and shareholder returns.
Also, when using points for upgrades or free nights, the hotels are only reimbursed by the brands at a small fraction of what the hotel can normally sell the room for. This is usually the main reason hotels will restrict using points, especially if they have a lot of redemption reservations on the books.
Wait a minute here, people. Are you trying to tell me that voting Democrat has (really, really bad) consequences? But, but, but I’m still a little bit confused. Democrats always say they have “good intentions” Are you telling me that their ‘good intentions’ actually cause pain and misery to taxpayers and travelers? This is a valuable life lesson. America, take heed.
The hotel manager is misleading you. The labor cost to clean a hotel room ranges between 2 – 4% of the room rate, less on multi day stays.
@ DCS
Thanks, mate.
For the record, I don’t have a problem with moderation of travel blogs, including VFTW although some transparency would be welcome.
I applaud Gary Leff for purging much of the racism, sexism, etc. that used to infest this blog.
It must be quite a task to balance family time with a full time job and run a blog. IMO that Gary Leff achieves healthy hit rates relative to other travel blogs is a testament to his industry.
Gary has also entertained commentary counter to his traditional positions more than some other travel bloggers, which is worthy of note and respect.
I would choose to approach the task differently, but, hey, it’s not my website, it’s Gary’s to champion however he sees fit.
FWIW I’m about done with my research into the inherent weaknesses of the orthodox approach to engaging with loyalty programs and some denialism it engenders. There’s not much more to learn here.
On the positive side, there is a set of interlinked math equations universally relevant to all members of all travel loyalty programs. The revealed pattens have profound implications for anyone with an open mind. AFAIK travel bloggers generally have missed the obvious for all of these years.
The genie lies in more than one magnum opus. The final chapter is all but complete. One can but imagine the histrionics once the magic is finally released from its bottle…..;)
Your only “crime” was to lend a second voice challenging the “big lie”, whose effectiveness depended of my being portrayed as a “Hilton fanboy” and lone and misguided “crusader”. A second reality-based voice needed to be “moderated” (read: delayed as much as possible) because it was a threat to the “big lie”…
Now, the genie is out of the bottle and cannot be put back in, so, yes, the “revolution” is close
@ Jim Worrall
“The hotel manager is misleading you. The labor cost to clean a hotel room ranges between 2 – 4% of the room rate, less on multi day stays”
That sounds plausible – we should also note that the true cost in this case is not the cost to clean the suite, but the additional cost (i.e. cost clean suite minus the cost of cleaning the originally booked room).
Pet peeve: “express requirement” should be
“expressed requirement.”
So, ask you GM reader what the actual extra cost is, and if offered in, say, cash, would that fix it?
Gunna break one rule might as well pick a few more?
R
Can’t fight the value of confirmed suite upgrade, so some of you guys spend your time debating the semantics of what “confirmed/guaranteed” means.
I don’t know who was arguing that it was guaranteed you’d have the ability to apply the suite upgrades, or who was arguing it was a simple and straightforward task, all the time, every time… to me, it all sounds like strawman to try to convince people of your position that Hilton is superior.
The argument has always been that once you book those suites with the SUAs, they are confirmed/guaranteed in advance. Awards that Hilton DOES NOT offer.
For my part, I’ve always been able to use up my SUAs… in the past with a phone call, but recently did one through MHC for the first time.
Meanwhile, of my next 18 bookings, 10 are pre-confirmed in premium suites with the 9K points option, 1 is a standard suite with the 6K points option, 3 more are secured with SUAs, and 4 are in standard rooms.
You may all have your luck at Hilton, but over here in the World of Hyatt, I don’t need to rely on luck.
Meanwhile, the academic talk here on a travel blog comes across like a circle-jerk. I already know DCS isn’t going to stop, but maybe there’s hope for Platy.
Gary: This is just a test to see whether I can use HTML code to display images directly in my comments, rather than linking them. I suspect that the functionality is disabled, but I just want to be sure.
Yup, bummer! The functionality to display images in comments using HTML code is disabled, leaving disqus-powered sites like LoyaltyLobby and TravelCodex, which enable posting of images in comments, to be much more “enlightened.”
No one can possibly have followed this “debate” and think that my goal here to “try to convince people of my position that Hilton is superior”, when every single post that’s been written for at least a decade either here or at OMAAT has claimed the complete opposite, and my position has simply been to share my real-experience which debunks their claims!!!
So, at @JoePro, why are you here? Missing me at OMAAT? Your diatribe will not change the simple fact that there is no loyalty program that “guarantees” suite upgrades as this site and OMAAT claim because they all depend on availability, which is at the discretion of individual properties. Period. There are no “superior” programs. There is only the ability of each individual to make the most of the benefits that their preferred program offers. Does that sound to you like I am claiming “superiority”?
You’ claim to have had a great experience clearing Globalist SUAs, but so have I clearing Hilton Honors global automated upgrades, for which I am perfect over the last year as a LT Diamond, after a “batting average” of better than 80% before that for 12 years as a Diamond. See? You have no point, so please stop regurgitating logically untenable claims that have led to posts like these of the years:
2012 — I am Sick of Arguing for Starwood Upgrades. (travelcodex)
2013 — Platinum SPG, best room upgrade: please change the language. (FlyerTalk)
2014 — Starwood Platinum Suite Upgrades: Why Does It Have To Be A Fight? (OMAAT)
2015 — Destroying Loyalty: Starwood’s Lies & Expectation Management. (gamification)
Even SPG , the program where claims of suite upgrades “entitlement” started, never “guaranteed” suite upgrades. Self-anointed “travel gurus” simply misinterpreted, willfully, the T&Cs to claim suite upgrades “entitlement”. The blog posts listed above are a clear evidence of the rude awakening to reality that no program “guarantees” suite upgrades. You and your ilk should wake up too…
@ JoePro
“some of you guys spend your time debating the semantics of what “confirmed/guaranteed” means.”
No. It comes back to the reality of availability of room type.
“to try to convince people of your position that Hilton is superior.”
No. Just that it should be honestly represented.
My position: (1) consider the evidence (T&Cs and real-world experience); (2) harness the strengths of each loyalty program; (3) calculate the value out for the effort put in.
“The argument has always been that once you book those suites with the SUAs, they are confirmed/guaranteed in advance. Awards that Hilton DOES NOT offer.”
The pervasive argument was that Hyatt offered more in terms of elite tier upgrades.
“For my part, I’ve always been able to use up my SUAs… in the past with a phone call, but recently did one through MHC for the first time.”
That’s great. Good for you. From what I read, Hyatt refers back to the individual hotel, where availability is determined locally both for SUAs and top tier upgrades.
“You may all have your luck at Hilton, but over here in the World of Hyatt, I don’t need to rely on luck.”
Now you cite 11/18 cases of points-paid upgrades (6k/9k) with Hyatt.
I hope you did your maths on those. I just found examples at Hyatt Regency in Lisbon of such “suite points upgrade” in which those Hyatt points have NEGATIVE VALUE. Yay, what?!
On one night – the member rate (with equivalent 72 hr cancellation) is EUR511. The upgrade rate is EUR537 plus 6k Hyatt points. You’d pay an extra EUR26 to use up 6k points: redemption value -0.43 US Cents per point.
On another night – room cost EUR398 versus EUR418 plus 6k Hyatt points. You’ pay an extra EUR20 to use up your 6k Hyatt points: redemption value -0.33 US Cents per point.
“Meanwhile, the academic talk here on a travel blog comes across like a circle-jerk.”
The “academic” talk is a plea to all to get the facts right and do the math: the negative value of Hyatt points in the examples above should provide compelling evidence to any reasonable person of the merit of such an approach.
“I already know DCS isn’t going to stop, but maybe there’s hope for Platy.”
Oh thanks, big hugs, bro. Maybe there’s some hope that you’ll stop shooting the messenger…;)
I guess as a curious traveler I’m grateful to get an honest answer at the very least.
@ DCS
Grab the popcorn – I’m finding negative redemption values for Hyatt points in some cases of point paid upgrades compared with fully cash members rates with 72-hour cancellation terms.
“Missing me at OMAAT?”… you probably really think that. But no, happened across this page elsewhere and regrettably didn’t stop before reaching these ridiculous comments.
Again, you’re arguing semantics that nobody is interested in. I don’t recall ever trying to argue the semantics about your ludacruous claims that Hilton Offers “Unlimited Complimentary Upgrades”, a claim that was no more or less true than with Hyatt.
The guarantee with Hyatt has always been that you can confirm a suite upgrade in advance with the SUA’s…. nobody has ever claimed that such a guarantee applies to every hotel for any day. The “based on availability” is inherent, just as the exclusions spelled out in T&C are inherent.
Why do you need to repeatedly call out the inherent limitations of what these guarantees are if not to try to discredit their value? It’s like saying “well, there’s not really a money back guarantee, because you might die before you can get your money back.” Nobody cares.
___________________
“There are no “superior” programs. There is only the ability of each individual to make the most of the benefits that their preferred program offers. Does that sound to you like I am claiming “superiority”?”
No,THAT does not sound like claiming superiority. Rather, it’s the last 7+ years you’ve spent making these same arguments about what “guarantee” and “confirmed” mean… and arguments about the minutia of wording in T&Cs to try to prop up Hilton and disparage Hyatt… THAT’s what makes it sound like you’re trying to claim superiority. And now you’re flat out claiming Gary is a liar that SUA’s can’t be applied online? A “fabrication”— you called it. After sending an e-mail to my conceirge to apply an SUA, I got the following response “I am happy to confirm the one bedroom corner suite for your reservation at the Park Hyatt Toronto in Canada”. So yeah, no, not a fabrication.
Last, you’re actually wasting your time trying to claim you’re not a Hilton fanboy? Wow. Yeah, I’m gonna go ahead and not buy that. You’ve emphasized your importance as someone with LT Diamond status too hard and too frequently to ever be convinced of that.
@ JoePro
FWIW in the years I’ve followed this and certain other sites, including OMAAT, I’ve never read anything that @ DCS has written that has been ill advised. Maybe hard to understand at times, but never misdirected.
I’ve certainly seen plenty of commentators completely misunderstand what he has written.
I’ve seen too many commentators making personal attacks rather than mount ANY evidence to counter the content (including your own herein and IIRC your posts on OMAAT).
I’ve seen too many commentators blindly accept blatantly incorrect information fed to them by certain travel bloggers, including Gary Leff’s recent article claiming 44% Hilton brands refuse upgrades, which we have demolished if you read the comments with a clear and unbiased mind 0 you might even notice Gary Leff incorrectly calling me a liar.
Now I suggest you read my post (yet again stuck formal many hours in moderation), wherein I provide you with the evidence that you can end up with negative redemption value with Hyatt points in the course of booking your precious Hyatt suites.
There you go – congratulations those suite upgrade was available BUT you PAID MORE in both cash and points, than you would have done using just cash.
Of course no blogger I’ve ever come across does the maths.
We’re not arguing semantics but a systemic failure in the way bloggers and evidently many if not most or all of their readers approach this loyalty lark.
For the record the exclusions claimed in the T@Cs are not necessarily verbatim – see the posts in the article on 44% Hilton brands refuse upgrades.
“And now you’re flat out claiming Gary is a liar that SUA’s can’t be applied online?”
Eh? If I read his post correctly, Gary used the human intervention of a concierge, who used the human intervention of a rep at the hotel, so no, I don’t think most people would regard that as a valid interpretation of an online facility.
Come back to us when you’ve checked those 11 points plus pay suite upgrades bookings you cite and reassure the Hyatt fan club out there that you weren’t inadvertently ripped off.
If Hilton did that – this blog would light up like a fcking Christmas tree.
@JoePro — You really can’t be that dense. With that a statement, you flipped everything on its head. What do you think the whole ongoing debate is about?!!! It’s about this site and OMAAT and others travel blogs parsing the T&Cs of various programs and then willfully (mis)interpenetrating them to claim, for a least a decade now, that their preferred programs “guarantee” suite upgrades while Hilton Honors does not, which total nonsense.
Here’s what’s claimed in this very post:
And here is what OMAAT, undoubtedly feeling left out of the vigorous activities here, wrote yesterday:
What is their factual basis for making those claims? None. Take OMAAT’s nonsense, for example, that
“However, upgrades are offered at the hotel’s discretion, meaning that a hotel doesn’t have to make a suite available for an upgrade, even if it’s empty”.
Here’s the reality: upgrades in every program are offered at individual hotel’s discretion, which means that in every program “a hotel doesn’t have to make a suite available for an upgrade, even if it’s empty”. No one knows that better the OMAAT host, who has reported challenging front desk agents of his preferred program with evidence showing that suites were available for booking online while he was being told that none were available for upgrades. Check it out yourself:
2014 — Starwood Platinum Suite Upgrades: Why Does It Have To Be A Fight? (OMAAT)
While at it, check out the other posts I listed earlier. They all call it “hotels playing games with availability”, but the reality is that the T&C of every program allow hotels to “play games with availability”!!!
Bottom line:
They argue semantics while I provide factual evidence that has again and again demonstrated why their semantics game holds no water!!! It’s what my “alter ego” and I have been urging everyone to do: rather than getting hung up on semantics, report real-life experiences !
Unless you understand the preceding, you and have nothing to talk about because pretty much everything in your post is based on wrong premises. I have never claimed not to be a Hilton “fanboy”, but being a “Hilton fanboy” is NOT the basis of my arguments, which you and everyone else, but my “alter ego”, believe they are. You get offended that “I emphasize my importance as someone with LT Diamond status too hard”, but ignore the deluge of blog posts about how WoH Globalist is the most valuable top-tier elite status, while HH Diamond is no different than HH Gold. See? with your blinders firmly on, you fault me because I apply Newton’s Third Law to counter the plethora of bogus claims:
In simple English: I push back, and you fault me for it.
platy — Welcome and great posts!
Wonderful illustration of how everyone hops on the bandwagon of how great WoH is, but never does the math to assess whether the cost-to-benefit ratio justifies the “euphoria”!
Cheers, mate!
DCS says: “but never does the math”— another self-gratifying claim with no basis.
Platy says: “I hope you did your maths on those. I just found examples at Hyatt Regency in Lisbon of such “suite points upgrade” in which those Hyatt points have NEGATIVE VALUE. Yay, what?!”
Please, I ALWAYS do the math.
The peak for me was a few years back at the Park Hyatt Beijing, where I paid $250/nt for a standard room. 9,000 points/nt locked me into a 2-Story penthouse suite running $2500/nt. Contrary to a negative redemption value, that’s a rate of 25cpp. You ever get half that, or even a quarter of that over at Honors? Heck, I’d be impressed with an 8th of that.
To be fair, that was right when they introduced that option. Did the same with some other Asian properties for spectacular value, but more recently I have experiences like the following:
PH Auckland– Harbour Suite. Rate difference $900
PH Canberra- Diplomatic Suite. Rate difference $755
HR Embarcadero- Presidential Suite. Rate difference $700
Among many other upcoming bookings, at the lower end, I’ll get around 3cpp, and probably average about 5cpp.
@ JoePro
“Please, I ALWAYS do the math.”
Most excellent. Well done.
Using some of the properties you cite, I can find examples of near useless redemption value for suite upgrades using points plus cash (6k Hyatt points offsetting USD8 at HR SF) and very tidy redemption value (6k offsetting NZD800 at PH Auckland) to add to the examples of negative redemption rates cited in my earlier post.
I can also find many dates wherein such bookings could not be made at all – back to the availability issue.
“You ever get half that, or even a quarter of that over at Honors? Heck, I’d be impressed with an 8th of that.”
Firstly, I wouldn’t typically be spending USD700-USD1000 on a hotel night to be able to access the points plus cash upgrade opportunities you cite at high end Hyatt properties (PHs etc): the opportunity cost is too high. Perhaps for a very special occasion since I have some orphan Hyatt points to use up.
Thus, in Auckland, I’ve stayed at the Hilton for about USD250 per night and been upgraded on the back of my elite status to waterfront suites worth several times that, no points required. At a USD500 per night I’d rather save the cash. Given my Hilton Diamond only required one night to secure I’ll take the upgrade as a nice to have – I’m not overly invested over dozens of nights / 10,000s bucks credit card spend for status accrual per Hyatt Globalist.
Secondly, I’ve certainly redeemed Hilton points at their high properties for very tidy redemption rates that would be similar to your own experiences at Hyatt, given that the two points “currencies’ are set entirely differently when you only consider the net return.
In short, you have to factor in the earn rate as well as the redemption rate. Hyatt points are only worth three times (or whatever Gary or others claim) Hilton points when you have earned them at the same rate. Hint – on the average Hyatt isn’t somehow giving up three times more value to its members! Typically, averaging ti all out, your earn rate will offset the redemption rate giving. broadly similar net returns (opportunities for outsize value in any loyalty program notwithstanding).
And ultimately that is what we mean by “doing the math”, not just looking for the better redemption rates within a given program, but also factoring in the earn rate in any strategic choices in this loyalty lark.
@ Gary Leff
Trying to enter discussions herein when it takes up to a day or more to get posts through moderation and some “go missing” and that my posts are apparently sent automatically to moderation based upon my “name” rather than other obvious reasons length of post, links, etc, may I respectfully propose that you either fix the issue or un-invite me from your blog. I’ll graciously respect either choice.
@platy – it does not take “up to a day or more” for me to clear the moderation queue, in this case it took 43 minutes, but from Oz you often post while I am asleep.
LOL. Above, I wrote: “pretty much everything in your post is based on wrong premises.” Add your comment I just quoted to the list, and then understand this: you follow me around, objecting to my every comment, but it’s clear that the person you think you are after is just a figment of your imagination, a straw man you created. You don’t know jack about me, JoePro. Really
Goodbye “DeeCeeEss” or fake ‘DCS’.
They are, because there was no reason for my very short comment “DCS says:
August 1, 2023 at 5:03 am” that was sent into the moderation queue be to sent there other than it contained “The Name”.
Delaying a reader’s comment by 45minutes essentially prevents them from participating in discussions. People who have been posting here for a long time are known quantities and should not have their every comment sent into moderation other than for use offending words, links, and other common criteria. Comment length can be one of the criteria but should be relaxed for known commenters…
Correct, but in practice you do not earn HH and WoH points at the same rate, therefore, in general comparing points values across programs is meaningless without adjusting for differences in base earn rates.
For a $1 Hyatt stay paid for with the Chase WoH visa (4x), a WoH Globalist earns 10.5 WoH points
For a $1 Hilton stay paid for with the AMEX HH Surpass (12x), a HH Diamond earns 32 HH points
Because $1 = 1$
32 HH points/$ = 10.5 WoH points/$
Dividing both sides by 10.5, we get
3 HH points/$ = 1 WoH point/$
Now, dividing both side by 1 WoH point/$, we get
(3 HH points/$)/(1 WoH point/$) = 1 [ the number ONE]
See that?
(3 HH points/$)/(1 WoH point/$) is not = 3 but = 1 !!!
Because
(3 HH points/$)/(1 WoH point/$) = 1
It is known as a unit factor or conversion ratio.
(100cents/$1) = 1 is also a unit factor or conversion ratio.
Any number multiplied by 1 does not change its value, even though it may change the “unit of measurement.”
So, to convert $50 to cents, we do this:
$50 * (100cents/$1) = 5000 cents.
We did not change the value of $50, because $50 = 5000centts, but we changed the “unit of measurement” from $ to cents by multiplying $50 by 1 or (100cents/$1), the unit factor or conversion ratio. $50 and 5000 cents are “worth” exactly the same.
So, if you value a WoH point at 1.5cents each, how much is that “worth” in terms of HH points?
We just need to use the unit factor or conversion ratio above (inverted):
1.5cents/WoH point * (1 WoH point/$)/(3 HH points/$) = 0.5 cent/HH point.
We went from 1.5cents/WoH point to 0.5cent/HH point, i.e., we changed the “unit of measurement” from cents/WoH to cents/HH without changing the “value” cents/WoH, since all we did was to multiply 1,5cents/WoH by 1, the unit factor.
Bottom line:
1,5cents/WoH are “worth” exactly the same as 0.5cent/HH
It is legit math and it even has a name: dimensional analysis
My redemption value at W Maldives this January was 3.9cents/HH points. In terms of WoH points that is equivalent to getting:
3.9cents/HH * (3HH Points/$)/(1 WoH point/$) = 11.7 cents/WoH point = ~12cpp
“Another self-gratifying claim with no basis”, ey, JoePro? Right…
@ DCS
“Delaying a reader’s comment by 45minutes essentially prevents them from participating in discussions.”
IME 45 minute is not typical or representative of the moderation delay, indeed that statement infers misinformation. Please PM me on FlyerTalk for a heads up on the revolution. You alone herein will appreciate the math.
@ Gary Leff
” it does not take “up to a day or more” for me to clear the moderation queue, in this case it took 43 minutes, but from Oz you often post while I am asleep.”
Whilst I applaud your industry and effort, the misdirection and misinformation are troubling. I wish you well.
Unfortunately, I have not posted at FT since around 2011 and I do not even have an account there. I tried commenting there and quickly knew that it was not my kind of forum for one obvious reason: my views challenged established travel blogosphere dogma and rubbed too many people that did not understand my reasoning or math the wrong way (viz., what I have encountered here and at OMAAT, but on steroids.) Let me know in these forums when the ‘revolution’ arrives.
I have voluminous PowerPoint files that I have maintained for many years in which I have thoroughly modeled various aspects of hotel loyalty points currencies, with figures, charts, tables and equations, which I put out from time to time (as above), and I am planning to put out in the promised opus magnum when time permits, to demystify, once and for all, concepts about hotel points currencies that have eluded and continue to elude folks who write about them all the time and should know better.
Cheers. mate!
@Platy: “In short, you have to factor in the earn rate as well as the redemption rate. Hyatt points are only worth three times (or whatever Gary or others claim) Hilton points when you have earned them at the same rate” —indeed, and fair enough. I got caught up in that I’d be impressed with a 3CPP redemption at Hilton, so mistakenly asserted that 1/8th of a 25cpp redemption would be impressive. The actual equivalent would be 8cpp, so an 1/8th of that would be 1cpp, something quite attainable in the Hilton realm. Whereas 8cpp is not. (Personally I’ve capped at around 1.25cpp for a 5 night stay at W.A Maldives, when factoring 5th night free, so I’d guess that’d be 3.75 Hyatt CPP equivalent).
It’s apparent that we’re after different things in our travels, and indeed Hilton may work better for you than Hyatt.
DCS says: “You don’t know jack about me, JoePro. Really”
Granted, our internet personas may stray greatly from who we are in reality. As far as “DCS” goes, I’d be far from the first to recognize and call out that a good 90% of comments posted by him contain an overt air of superiority and condescension. No more consistent/repetitive an example of this than his denigration of the value of blogs like this and OMAAT and their authors vis-a-vis calling them “self-anointed travel gurus.”
If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck…
Alas, he knows even less about me, as he continues to falsely assert that I post/have posted under names like “Mikey” and “DeeCeeEss”. This, despite already having clearly stated that in 5 years of wasting our breath commenting back and forth, I have only ever gone by “Joe” and “JoePro”.
Also @Platy: you tell me (because I’m sure DCS is now on another selective boycott)… does not a statement that DCS made like “WoH is the only major hotel loyalty program that does not offer its members the 4th or 5th award night free, which is quantifiably the single most valuable perk in hotel loyalty.” —does that not run directly in the face of another statement he made: ““There are no “superior” programs. There is only the ability of each individual to make the most of the benefits that their preferred program offers. Does that sound to you like I am claiming “superiority”?””
Because the way I read it (and I’m confident the way most of the Travel-Blog readership reads it), DCS is implying WOH is inferior since it doesn’t offer 5th night free.
Couple of thoughts on this topic and these comments.
Step back and think about what has been written and the whole “points”/loyalty concept.
Loyalty programs have become hideously complex and frankly unfair to the traveler. As they currently exists theyre at best false advertising and at worst a bait and switch. And they have the effect of alienating the best customers which is one part stupid and another part bad for business.
For obviously intelligent people to write over 100 comments on this proves a couple things:
One, the loyalty programs are as I describe and people should relax, expunge the negativity and spread your business around until they get the message.
I’m top level AA, Marriott and IHG and pretty high status at Delta and decent at UA.
I wouldn’t give you a dime for any of them as they’ve become much like our political choices:
The better of the bad.
Relax and enjoy your summer.
@ JoePro
“ Hilton may work better for you than Hyatt”
Like I said, dude, it isn’t a competition between different hotel loyalty programs. As we do, we need to play to the strengths of each, I’ve leveraged such to stay in PHs and WAs plus other program equivalents, just as you have.
“call out that a good 90% of comments posted by him contain an overt air of superiority and condescension.”’
Please stop shooting the messenger. Smart folk and those taking an evidence-based position are typically denigrated by those threatened by intelligence, especially when their personal perceptions are challenged. FWIW the refusal of folk to accept evidence and alter their position accordingly is subject to extensive psychological research.
“No more consistent/repetitive an example of this than his denigration of the value of blogs like this and OMAAT and their authors vis-a-vis calling them “self-anointed travel gurus”
Credit where credit is due, for sure, and yet travel bloggers have their limitations. This very blog constantly churns out material which is factually incorrect. Doesn’t that concern you? Where’s the value in that?
“If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck…”
It looks very much like you may have lost perspective yourself.
“Alas, he knows even less about me, as he continues to falsely assert that I post/have posted under names like “Mikey” and “DeeCeeEss””
And yet that is so easily resolved, if the website operator in question manages and moderates efficiently. Why aren’t you blaming the blog owner?
There are readers herein who totally and utterly believe that @ DCS and myself are same person. Do you hold them accountable with equal contempt? Nothing I can say apparently can change their mind.
All of my posts herein go into a moderation, that in itself isn’t necessarily a problem except Gary Leff is not transparent on the matter.
“… does not a statement that DCS made like “WoH is the only major hotel loyalty program that does not offer its members the 4th or 5th award night free, which is quantifiably the single most valuable perk in hotel loyalty.” —does that not run directly in the face of another statement he made: ““There are no “superior” programs. There is only the ability of each individual to make the most of the benefits that their preferred program offers. Does that sound to you like I am claiming “superiority”?””
Look, mate, I’m not a philosophy major, only attended lectures by Sir Karl Popper (the “father” of modern scientific logical methodology), but IMO those two statements are not contradictory.
The simple reason is that the quantifiable perks in hotel loyalty are not limited to one perk or its absence.
Note that Gary Leff does not set out a robust framework to base meaningful comparisons between loyalty programs. He provides no direction to the debate other than the tiresome Hyatt best mantra.
If you refer back to the context, you’ll find that Gary Leff typically ignores the 4th / 5th night free features of non-Hyatt programs in comparative discussions, not just Hilton Honors but also Marriott Bonvoy and IHG.
IME such obfuscation is typical of Gary Leff. The recent article claiming that Hilton refuses upgrades at 44% of brands is a classic case of wanton misdirection.
It took me multiple attempts to get Gray Leff to state whether or not he included such features in his point valuations for hotel loyalty programs – even now he has avoided providing any detail. Why the secrecy when asked? Hint – it’s a house of cards waiting to fall apart.
“DCS is implying WOH is inferior since it doesn’t offer 5th night free.”
Hilton, Marriott and IHG offer a feature (4th / 5thnight free), which Hyatt does not. In that regard Hyatt is inferior. The point being made is that Gary Leff omits such in his comparative discussion.
I cited negative redemption value on some Hyatt cash plus points upgrades a couple of days ago and that little revelation was met with silence. Funny that.
Now, I‘ve got more pressing tasks than continuing to post on this particular blog, let alone the constant negativity and personal abuse, which is beyond tiresome, there’s just too much misinformation and misinformation in the articles herein to take them seriously – you’re obviously smart and have a sense of enquiry, two traits I respect and applaud. Keep your focus on those positives, dude!
As for having lost perspective… I’m nothing if not adaptable. But in making judgment calls, I rely not just on myself but on the views of others. Clearly, I’m not the only one who is highly critical of DCS and his penchant for extolling the virtues of Hilton (as he has experienced it). I’m also not the only one to point out how narcissistic he comes across, even if he’s not actually a narcissist.
Can’t really offer my agreement/disagreement when it comes to Gary. If there’s factually incorrect information, it should be corrected.
I don’t know what you want anyone to say about the negative redemption values on Hyatt. For better and worse, I don’t think they keep a tight ship on those points upgrade rates. So while I find exceptional value, you seem to have found negative value. Easy peasy is that you don’t book a rate that has negative redemption value.
When Lucky described why he likes Hyatt best, he too omits lack of 5th night free as a Con of the program, something DCS said was done “conveniently”. Hot take, but I don’t necessarily think it is a con. I stayed at the Al Maha last year, and if not for the 5th night free… which encouraged me to stay for that 5th night… I might’ve made different/better use of my time. I didn’t really need a 5th night there, and might’ve found being in Dubai doing something new more enjoyable. I can count on two hands how many hotel stays I’ve had in a decade that were 5 nights or more.
Cheers mate. FWIW, it’s pretty clear to me you’re not DCS.
*can’t offer agreement or disagreement when it comes to Gary, because it’s rare that I find myself on VFTW.
@JoePro
“As for having lost perspective… I’m nothing if not adaptable.”
Most excellent – celebrate that part of yourself.
“I rely not just on myself but on the views of others.”
Views can be powerful when guided by evidence. An incidental collection of commentators on a blog site can’t be presumed to be a panel of experts any more than a blogger becomes an expert by claiming that they are.
Estimates from surveys infer that only 22% Americans support the theory of evolution (40% are creationists and the remainder think it deity-directed). So, clearly, given the majority view point, we can reject the scientific evidence for evolution and join the belief driven position? Not in my world view.
Hint – people don’t like a safe and conventional position being challenged. IMHO you’ve proven that have the capacity to be smarter than that and apply a sense of inquiry.
“ I’m also not the only one to point out how narcissistic he comes across, even if he’s not actually a narcissist.”
Surely, it would be more productive to debate the ideas rather than facilitate an ugly case of online group bullying? Poke the dog, the dog bites bite, and that’s the dog’s fault, right?
“ If there’s factually incorrect information, it should be corrected.”
Yes, indeed – I’ve seen Lucky fix stuff, but sadly not herein.
“I don’t know what you want anyone to say about the negative redemption values on Hyatt.”
I don’t care whether they pick that up or don’t. For me it illustrates the absurdity of the trivial level of what passes for content and debate on these blogs, despite their potential to offer value to their readers.
If nothing else, that could be a cue for a timely blog article on why we always need do the basic math on the redemption value of points / miles, agreed?
“Easy peasy is that you don’t book a rate that has negative redemption value.”
Absolutely – the lesson for all readers is to do the math.
“When Lucky…too omits lack of 5th night free…but I don’t necessarily think it is a con”
Let’s not conflate a blogger writing a publicly published article comparing loyalty programs with obvious omissions with our own personal travel choices.
Let’s also not confuse a mathematically calculable value for such a facility with our own personal and highly subjective perceptions of value.
Those 4th / 5th night free features of some hotel loyalty programs exist and have the potential to offer members a significant elevation in the redemption value of their respective points, whether certain individual members avail themselves of that facility or not.
Omitting them from a comparative discussion inevitably shifts the comparison in favor of Hyatt over Hilton, Marriott, and IHG. Why not give the reader the full information and then let the reader decide what works for them?
As a concluding thought – @ DCS has run the math for hotel loyalty programs, that certain travel bloggers appear not to have done – for that reason alone I choose to take the curious position on what insights such math holds. To me that’s more important than any hits or misfires in how that information is delivered.
I have run some math for members of airline loyalty programs, and can see some similarities to @ DCS’s own work on hotel loyalty programs. Suffice to say the math that inherently lies within the loyalty system has implications that would be very challenging to the conventional and orthodox approach to loyalty espoused herein and by travel bloggers generally.
Hopefully, we will count your good self as an erudite ally in due course.
Be well, my friend….;)
“Alter ego” absolutely destroys @JoePro. Great minds think alike!
Some gems…
JoePro:
Alter ego:
AMEN!
JoePro:
Alter ego:
JoePro (previously)
Alter ego:
AMEN!
The jury is still out on “Mikey” because the resemblance is uncanny; JoePro may have simply learned from “Mikey”. However, you are “DeeCeeEss” and the fake “DCS” (at least one of them) because (a) when the fake “DCS” appropriated the moniker over at OMAAT for weeks, I noticed something very curious: JoePro was nowhere to be seen or, uncharacteristically, did not get in on the act until I said I was boycotting OMAAT over it. Then suddenly the fake “DCS” disappeared and JoePro returned.
More conclusively, it’s what the fake “DCS” or “DeeCeeEss” wrote repeatedly about that gave you away: constantly spoofing my purported sense of “superiority” as a LT Diamond and a “Hilton fanboy” — a theme that is pervasive in your comments here that ‘Alter Ego’ just utterly destroyed, and was in one of your very first comments up-thread after “uncloaking” from posting as “DeeCeeEss”
It’s the “sin” that “DeeCeeEss” or fake “DCS” is/was determined to make me pay for.
Last by not least, while I have many detractors, only one, you, is unhinged and dogged enough to follow me from forum to forum under a fake moniker to do nothing but post variants of the above.
Goodbye “DeeCeeEss”. You (either as “DeeCeeEss” or JoePro) and I are done. It’s just too personal without contributing to or advancing the case of the miles/points game.
Platy effectively compares DCS to a dog, but DCS thinks I’m the one who has been destroyed.
“Goodbye “DeeCeeEss”. You (either as “DeeCeeEss” or JoePro) and I are done.”
You’ve already said that about 8 times. Just like you keep saying you’re boycotting OMAAT.
I beg you to fulfill your promise once and for all, but I get the feeling you enjoy the attention too much.
To Platy: wait, what happened to having better things to do
To the point of “group bullying”… I don’t see any of this as a case of group bullying. DCS comes into the room, touts off his superiority, and people call him out for it. To soothe his own ego, he then makes ridiculous references to himself comparing himself to Wes Anderson, reemphasizes in big bold letters his lifetime Diamond Status, and then tells himself that the people responding to him are trolls who use alter Usernames. (Again, I’ve stated point blank that I only ever go by JoePro or Joe, and he demands I must be DeeCeeEss). Further, I pointed out that I landed on this forum from elsewhere, but he’s insistent that I’m here to follow him around. (I’m sure I’ve commented on Garys blog before, but couldn’t tell you the last time).
Could Gary/Ben verify it… sure. But then DCS could just go and accuse Ben/Gary of lying, or being those users themselves. I do think I once said you guys were the same (even though that’s not actually what I thought)… and I’ll tell you, that’s my problem, not Ben’s/Gary’s.
“Poke the dog”— comparing to DCS to a dog may be harsher than what I’ve written. This is an online forum, we have ample time to compose responses and choose how to respond. He responds like he’s superior.
As to fighting the ideas and not the person… well, we’ve been around that carousel. The math that DCS presents may be interesting at best, but as to whether it provides a valuable contribution to the points and miles world, I’d be surprised. If it were that special, it’d be headlining DCS’ own blog, not filling the comments of other’s. At the end of the day, I choose Hyatt because of the superior experiences I’ve enjoyed at them. I’d take a guess that travel bloggers (who you know, travel for a living) feel the same.
Anyways, Platy, I’d be happy to re-engage with you on these matters over at OMAAT in the future, where hopefully DCS fulfills his boycott and his promise to be done with me, and we can discuss/debate like two equals. You certainly seem like someone I would be willing to learn from.
Cheers again. (I think we’ve both exhausted our energies here, and I’m not returning to this particular post, FYI, so no need to respond here).
Don’t expect upgrades in North America and Europe. Best chance I had was almost always upgrade success in ASIA.
If you’re an American, just pay for the room you want. Nowadays, there are dozens of ways to fast track yourself to elite status ( i.e. shortcuts ). It’s not like you really “earned” that elite status with actual paid nights, so keep your expectations realistic. The savings you got for not paying actual nights can be used to book a better room. Still less costly for you over all.
So many excuses for hotel managers. They won’t upgrade you because of Corona, now we can’t upgrade you because of housekeeping. What’s the point of having a suite then? Why are you no hiring housekeeping? Because you want to reduce the your cost and you wont hire housekeeping.. Is all playing game.