Marriott promises a lot to members, and frequently doesn’t delivery. Hilton doesn’t promise much, and so it rarely disappoints. Some Marriotts have even figured out a new way to avoid handing out upgrades, and I have to say that it’s really clever.

The Hilton Honors doesn’t promise to upgrade its Diamond members to suites. They just say that if a suite is available, hotels may upgrade Diamonds. They don’t have to. In contrast, Marriott offers two paths into suites for its elite customers.

• Nightly Upgrade Awards allow members to have priority for upgrades (including to suites), confirming those several days prior to check-in. Most of the time they don’t clear because only a limited number of rooms that are still available days ahead are allotted to these upgrades, and because Marriott has so many elite members competing for them.

• Complimentary upgrades at check-in for Platinum members and higher include suites if one is available for the entire length of the guest’s stay. Under the program’s terms, the member is supposed to “receive a complimentary upgrade to the best available room” and that “includes suites, rooms with desirable views, rooms on high floors, corner rooms, rooms with special amenities or rooms on Executive Floors.” Period.

However, some Marriott hotels just won’t upgrade elite members. It’s not even that they think they still might sell the room at 6 p.m. on the day of check-in. Instead,

• They may be afraid that the member uses their late check-out benefit for a room they have sold the next day, making it tough to clean in time to deliver to the next guest. From one Marriott G.M.:

  [T]his is why I don’t like upgrading plat and above into suites when it’s booked the next day. We have only one of each kind and if we upgrade you complimentary and then you ask for a 4pm checkout it [creates problems] the next day. I always just say it’s unavailable for an upgrade.
  

• Or they may be trying to save money on housekeeping since larger rooms take more time to clean. It’s better for them to leave the suite empty for the next paying guest! As one Los Angeles-area hotel general manager put it,

  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.

While some properties just refuse to upgrade, and Marriott seems to do little about it (when you contact Marriott customer service about a problem, they’ll tend to just defer to the hotel or refer you to the hotel), there are some tricks that hotels have figured out to deny upgrades while still staying within program rules.

• When I check into a hotel, I know that a suite is available for upgrade if it’s for sale. If I can book the eligible (‘standard’) suite as a paying guest when I am checking in, for the entire length of my stay, then they should be willing to upgrade me into it for free!

• But the trick is that the suite has to be ‘available’ and that doesn’t just mean not booked by another guest, it also means that the room must be cleaned and inspected.

• So some hotels just don’t clean the suites, unless someone books one!

A reader shared their experience with the St. Regis Washington D.C., a hotel that’s Marriott-managed (so should be better about honoring the terms of the program) and that has plenty of suites.

St. Regis D.C., Credit: Marriott

He’s an Ambassador member and was checking in at a low period for the hotel and for the city. He wasn’t able to confirm an upgrade using Nightly Upgrade Awards despite “select[ing] multiple categories of entry-level and mid-level suites” and despite those rooms all being available for sale. His Ambassador agent tried to get the hotel to confirm a suite on the day of arrival, but was rebuffed.

When the guest arrived at the hotel at 6 p.m., he asked about a suite upgrade at check-in. He was told that “the suites hadn’t been cleaned.” He could book one on the Marriott website, but they weren’t available for upgrade!

St. Regis D.C., Credit: Marriott

This is a hotel that I have a lot of affection for. It’s where I stayed (in a suite!) the night that I asked my wife to marry me. It disappoints me to hear stories about the property treating Ambassador members poorly.

Avoiding suite upgrades into clean rooms is one way to save on housekeeping costs. Not cleaning the suite at all until it’s booked, deferring housekeeping, is another even better way if that’s what you’re trying to accomplish.

The hotel didn’t fail to upgrade the guest into an available suite that as in-service, because the suites were not in service. Clever!