IHG launched new elite benefits that include free breakfast for Diamonds, confirmed suite upgrades (as a choice benefit, starting at just 20 nights!), and club lounge access (another choice benefit).
This makes the rebranded IHG One Rewards far more competitive with its benefits. It also gives real meaning to member benefits even at Intercontinental and Kimpton hotels which have had their own separate benefits offerings (and still do).
There was just one problem I flagged. Not all benefits apply on award stays. The program changes are an improvement for everyone, to be sure, but not for everyone equally. And IHG One Rewards is addressing this.
I pointed out that,
- Confirmed suites (for up to 5 nights, bookable up to 14 days in advance of check-in with no capacity controls) aren’t available on award stays, or even prepaid stays.
- Club lounge access didn’t seem to be available on reward night stays. IHG was saying that lounge access would apply, but that didn’t seem consistent with the program’s published terms.
- Diamond breakfast (hot breakfast, not continental!) didn’t apply at all Kimptons, per program terms.
I was disappointed by the fine print here on award stays, since those are often the stays that matter most. Road Warriors, certainly, often slog it out and earn their status on their own and care about how they’re treated only on the special getaway they can take with their family.
Well, IHG tells me they are already updating its program terms:
- It will be clear that club lounge access will be available on reward nights, for those members that choose the benefit.
- And the exclusion for breakfast at certain Kimptons will not actually be in place. (Diamond breakfast is, in fact, available on award stays.)
Confirmed suites still aren’t available on award nights. That was even true at Hyatt for 8 years, before introducing World Of Hyatt changes. This isn’t unprecedented, changing this in the future is something I’ll hope for. If you want to confirm a suite as an upgrade you will have to book a (non-prepaid) paid rate in order to do so.
Still, this is better than I’d hoped for. And that’s on top of offering great new benefits without taking anything away from members. IHG is still too Holiday Inn heavy for my personal stay tastes, but they have luxury brands as well, something for many different travelers now tied together by the loyalty program in a stronger way.
On my wish list is still the opportunity to spend more points for better rooms, something I’ve been writing about for more than 15 years, and guaranteed late check-out. But they now arguably have the best top tier breakfast benefit and best upgrade benefit of any hotel program second only to Hyatt.
If only Marriott would listen and respond positively.
Don’t the basic literary ethical standards apply to travel bloggers?
IHG clearly and correctly refers to their milestone suite upgrades as “confirmable”, and that is how everyone else should refer to them. Why then are travel bloggers referring to them oxymoronically as “confirmed” suite upgrades, which deceptively implies a ‘done deal’?
If upgrades must be requested, then they are not “confirmed”; they are instead “confirmable”, with a phone call.
Isn’t anything sacred in this medium?
@ DCS — Well, whatever you call them, Hilton still doesn’t have them.
@Gene: Don’t you know anything? At Hilton, suites are *confirmed* to exist at the property, which if you really think about it is miles better than any other program’s offering.
LOL. That is not quite true either. I would suggest to our “thought leader in travel” to refrain from engaging on his favorite pastime of calling winners and losers until we we’ve seen IHG’s new and improved program in actual practice for at least a year. This post is this site’s second “clarification” pertaining to the new program in just two days. Is it not “to jump the gun” to call winners and losers when the program is clearly still being tweaked?
In larger scheme of things, all IHG has done is to copy Hilton’s program, with a few changes here and there; but it remains an inferior program, if only because traditionally Hilton Honors has never made a distinction between paid stays and award stays when it comes to elite perks. IHG’s so-called benefits are a real maze to navigate just to determine which types of stays some benefits are good on.
BTW, as I have shown before, Hyatt’s breakfast is not at all the superlative affair that it’s been claimed to be. Really.
And, has anyone other than @Gene not heard that in addition to offering unlimited complimentary room upgrades, including to suites, Hilton now has innovative airline-like confirmable room upgrades, including to suites, that are automated (i.e., no need to call anyone to request or confirm) and have gone global, so they are called “global automated upgrades”? [1]
[1] This is for real. See next post for a link that provides a screen capture of an email I just got informing me that I have been upgraded for my upcoming 2-night stay at a Hilton property in Seattle.
@DCS makes the absurd claim “in larger scheme of things, all IHG has done is to copy Hilton’s program”
IHG is offering *confirmed* suites within 14 days of arrival, and upgrades at check-in that may (but do not have to) include suites.
Hilton offers upgrades at check-in that may (but do not have to) include suites.
Sure, that’s the same. Oh and IHG starts offering those confirmed suites after just 20 nights.
Ladies & Gents:
As promised, please follow the link below to be edified about how Hilton Honors has innovatively automated room upgrades globally, including suites.
You know those emails that you get from airlines (well, at least from UA) informing you that you’ve just scored a seat/cabin upgrade? Well, that is exactly what Hilton Honors is now sending out to Golds, Diamonds, and LF Diamonds at least 72 hours before stay. It is confirmed and it is guaranteed. One gets to select the room upgrade (like selecting an airline seat) when notified to do so:
https://bit.ly/3O5mj4J
What is intriguing about this particular instance is that I got two upgrades notification emails because I booked two separate rooms: one for a relative and one for me, and both have been upgraded! More on this when I check in tomorrow and find out how things transpire…
G’day!
@Gary Leff — IHG simply copied Hilton Honors, down to roller over nights, but too many of the benefits depend on reaching milestones or are not good on award stays, which is not the case with most of Hilton Honors’ ‘practical’ benefits.
Moreover, Hilton now has an innovative confirmable upgrade scheme that makes your so-called ‘confirmed’ upgrades seem like a crap shoot that they have always been, because one must call to confirm through an exasperating process that OMAAT lamented not too long ago, and often ends up with nothing. Please release the comment I just posted that is held in moderation because it contains a link that shows what I mean.
Roll Over nights…
Please check back here after @Gary releases my comment that contains a link to the screen capture of an email that shows Hilton Honors’ new automatically ‘confirmed’ room upgrades (correct use of ‘confirmed’ because the email notification comes only after an upgrade has been, yes, confirmed). It is guaranteed to wipe that grin off of your face and make you feel stupid for making the derisive comment.
@DCS “Hilton now has an innovative confirmable upgrade scheme ”
No, they don’t, they process upgrades automatically in advance of checkin but generally not to suites
LOL.There you go again making up stuff! Who said “generally” not suites?!!! That’s just wishful thinking on your part. You’d posted a statement (just partially, actually, leaving out the good stuff I bolded below) from a Hilton official that described the new upgrade scheme. Here’s the full statement:
See that? It is simply Hilton’s current complimentary upgrades scheme, which includes suites, but automated so that upgrades would be confirmed 72 hours before day of stay. The scheme is like airline cabin upgrades and is prioritized in the order Golds < Diamonds < LF Diamond, which I will be by the middle of next month after an extended paid stay in London that will put me over the 1,000,000 base points threshold after 12 years as HH Diamond. Becoming a LF Diamond alone should greatly increase my already remarkable success rate clearing complimentary suite upgrades.
You can no longer claim that Hilton does not have so-called 'confirmed' upgrades, including to suites. It does and you just saw how they work. The scheme is innovative and painless, unlike other programs', especially WoH's.
Please do not start making up stuff as you usually do. The evidence here is too overwhelming.
I am done here unless there is something worth addressing.
G'day.
DCS is big mad. We all have our hobbies, but I never thought I would see “defending the HHonors elite suite upgrade policy to the death online” as one.
@Gary: Homewood Suites exists is nothing BUT suites. QED HHonors is on top.
@Dan true, but then we have to evaluate against Atwell Suites, Staybridge Suites, Candlewood Suites… not to mention Holiday Inn Vacation Club!
[Eight-paragraph, tortured logic-filled tirade about how those aren’t REALLY suites and aren’t comparable goes here]
Ironically, no site has done more to improve Hilton Honors than this travel blog, because those running the program apparently listen. It seems that anything that this site (and others, to be fair, since most simply parroted whatever the “thought leader” peddled) criticized, HH has turned around and ‘fixed’ it, as if to take a talking point away from self-anointed “travel gurus.”
A few key examples:
— No free breakfast offered at WA hotels (only in the US actually) – fixed. Every WA was forced to offer free breakfast.
— Too many properties opted out of Hilton Honors global promos – fixed. Properties can no longer opt out of HH global promos.
— No ‘confirmed’ upgrades, especially so suites – fixed. Confirmable automated upgrades just demonstrated have gone live globally!
One criticism that the program has resisted and I applaud it for it is “guaranteeing” late checkout. Such move would be a downgrade of the current policy, IMHO, because it would become nearly impossible to request checkouts later than 4pm, which are the only kind of late checkouts I have ever requested and never been denied (e.g., 6pm, 4 times at Hilton Buenos Aires; or 5 pm at the Drake…).
So, please continue disparaging the program so that it may continue to improve !!! 🙂
G’day.
@ DCS — Keep living in your fantasy world where Hilton guarantees suite upgrades for Diamonds…The actual best program for suite upgrades is IC Royal Ambassador. It isn’t anywhere close to as great as it once was, but it is still superior to Hilton Diamond.
Apparently Hilton, like Delta, pays its shills by the word?
@Gene – That is simply more nonsense. Show me where I ever claimed that Hilton guarantees suite upgrade for HH Diamonds.
Au contraire, it’s been self-anointed “travel gurus” that have for years perpetuated the demonstrably bogus canard that their preferred programs — first SPG (R.I.P), and then WoH — guaranteed their top elite suite upgrades, while Hilton and Marriott did not. In fact, @Gary Leff just attempted to do it yet again here but could not because, with their innovative new “global automated upgrades”, Hilton has again delivered.
The reality, which has always been my position, is that there cannot possibly be such a thing as a “guaranteed” suite upgrade because they all (no exception) depend on availability and are at the sole discretion of individual properties.
G’day.
@ DCS — So Hilton has implemented a simple computer program to “automate” room assignments. BFD. Not impressed.
If you dislike Gary’s commentary on travel so much, why do you expend your energy reading his blog?
@Gene — I cannot help you if you fail to see the value in taking upgrades, even partially, out of properties hands and letting computers assign them. It still does not preclude my asking for suite upgrades at check-in as I have done, quite successfully, for years.
Traveling is my hobby and preferred occupation, second only to my biomedical imaging and neuroscience research. I have interest in providing like-minded hobbyists with a different — facts-based — perspective.
G’day.
BTW, it’s not only on this site that I am, shall we say, a “prolific” commenter. I am all over OMAAT or Loyalty Lobby or any other travel blog where I happen see to bogus claims being made. It is not about the bloggers; it’s about what they peddle. Big difference.
@ DCS — Please show me exactly where I said that I did not see value in something? Do not EVER put words in mouth.
@ DCS — Yes, I am well aware that you are an annoyance there as well.
@ DCS — Undoubtedly people find me to be an annoyance as well, so my apologies.
Cahn’t make this stuff up!
See “BFD. Not impressed” right there? Then when told why it is a BFD, there is this:
You’re a flake. Last time I addres you.
Good luck.
IHG’s program for its top stayers looks considerably better with at-hotel elite benefits than Hilton’s program.
Oh, no, another uninformed moron ponticating about something that has not even happened. Hold your horses. You will have plenty of opportunities to let us know how good ol’ IGH is now better than what is currently the hotel best program, IMHO, Hilton Honors. Just mark these words because they make all the difference about how the new IHG fares:
G’day.
Garbled!
Gotta go.
Responding to my comment that “Hilton now has an innovative confirmable upgrade scheme To my comment that “, @Gary Leff had claimed:
Now we know the answer for sure.
It turns out that while emails notifying members that they have received a global automated upgrade say nothing about the type of room upgrade, one can immediately determine the type of room upgrade by checking the “My Stay” tap of the HH mobile phone app. Had I checked the app yesterday, @Gary, I would have authoritatively refuted your claim that “they process upgrades automatically in advance of checkin but generally not to suites” because my very firstglobal automated upgrade is for a King Bed to a King Bed Studio Suite [1].
This is in the USA and I received an upgrade to a junior suite without having to do anything other than just being a HH Diamond. I cannot see for the life of me any other room upgrade scheme out there, “confirmed” or otherwise, that comes close to doing what Hilton’s new global automated upgrades do. Really. It is how hotel room upgrades should have been handled all along — like airline cabin upgrades!
[1] Link to mobile screen capture showing suite upgrade is provided in next comment.
Evidence that Hilton’s new global automated upgrades include ‘confirmed’ (correct usage) suite upgrades:
https://bit.ly/3xsREZd
Any questions?
@DCS – evidence that Hilton’s upgrades *allow* and do not *exclude* upgrades to suites,not that they require them or provide them more often than any other chain. Of course whenever I am traveling with my wife and daughter I look to Hyatt where I can book a suite at time of reservation for the price of a regular room. That is… orders of magnitude better. And IHG’s newe offering is better too though not in the same class as Hyatt.
Gary — There is no longer a comparison. These global automated upgrades are unlimited. just like they are now. So, I am not limited to just 2 or 4 crap shoots a year that often do not even clear. With every stay, if a property has suites, I have the chance to be upgraded to one.
I am sorry but your so-called ‘confirmed suite upgrade do not measure up.
My plane is landing in Seattle, so gotta go. I will write a post describing my experience getting global automated upgrades for two rooms at once.
Taxiing now.
The thing about these HH upgrades is that they happen smoothly in the background. You just book a room and forget about it as I did and get plaisantly surprised!
Automation may also mean properties are taken out of the equation, but this needs to be confirmed.
@ DCS — You are gullible to believe that Hilton’s upgrades are truly “automated” by a computer program somewhere and are somehow vastly different from previous processes. Humans are the ones who decide what upgrades get released to whom. Maybe if you tried venturing beyond your Hilton world, you would see that Hyatt Globalist and IC Royal Ambassador are quite similar, if not better programs, for delivering suite upgrades, Hilton is not special just because you believe their marketing bs.
One more enhancement they need is to put some of their best CSR’s on Twitter (and they have too many Twitter handles) and respond quickly. (Like Hyatt does)
@Gene – please do me and yourself a favor and stop addressing me. I have no interest in entertaining flakes, which you revealed yourself to be.
Goodbye