Best Western Rewards - LIST of 8000 Rewards Points/night BW Hotels

Let me start off by saying that I like Best Western, I truly do. But when I searched and searched for hotels that are the "8000" reward point range I could find none.

I found this one - Best Western Naples Plaza

http://book.bestwestern.com/bestwestern/US/FL/Naples-hotels/BEST-WESTERN-Naples-Plaza-Hotel/Hotel-Overview.do?propertyCode=10280

for which they currently charge about $50 bucks per night (yes I said $50). But when you click on reward points they have the nerve to charge 12000. Trust me, this is like the lowest grade BW that it gets.

Please satisfy my curiosity -- if the 8000 reward point hotels even exist. When I called BW, I was told that "the prices change and the points change" so they were not able to provide me a listing of any 8000 points/night hotels.

I am skeptical. Make me a believer, please. Do 8000 point BW's even exist? If so please post them here. Thank you for your support.

^

Hi BillyBaloney,

you are right i also not found Best Western Hotels for 8.000 Points in my Austria/ Germany Region first start from 12.000 Points.

I think the best way are the exchange to Best Western Travel Card.

Then you get also again Points for your stay and pay with the reward of the Travel Card.

Greetz,

Svenfly

They do exist.

Best Western of Meridian (Mississippi), for example. Or Best Western Dothan (Alabama) Inn & Suites.

In fairness, tho, how often do you see redemptions at the lowest level for any other program? Especially, say, a 7500 point Hilton property?

I bet it's about the same proportion.

They do exist.

Best Western of Meridian (Mississippi), for example. Or Best Western Dothan (Alabama) Inn & Suites.

In fairness, tho, how often do you see redemptions at the lowest level for any other program? Especially, say, a 7500 point Hilton property?

I bet it's about the same proportion.

SPG has a fairly good availability of lower cost points options - they also clearly list them as well ( cat 1 - http://www.starwoodhotels.com/preferredguest/account/starpoints/categories/popup.html?spgCategoryCode=1 , cat 2 - http://www.starwoodhotels.com/preferredguest/account/starpoints/categories/popup.html?spgCategoryCode=2 , etc)

I've stayed in a number of the cat 2's that were great value (paid 3000 points for the Sheraton Newark on New Years Eve and $15 for a 20 minute shuttle to times square last year)

Most are around the airports. With BW I find it much harder to earn points, and much harder to redeem them for good value. With some of the promos it's almost better to redeem for partner rewards (i.e. get 1000 aeroplan points per stay rather then the BWR points))

SPG has a fairly good availability of lower cost points options - they also clearly list them as well ( cat 1 - http://www.starwoodhotels.com/preferredguest/account/starpoints/categories/popup.html?spgCategoryCode=1 , cat 2 - http://www.starwoodhotels.com/preferredguest/account/starpoints/categories/popup.html?spgCategoryCode=2 , etc)

I've stayed in a number of the cat 2's that were great value (paid 3000 points for the Sheraton Newark on New Years Eve and $15 for a 20 minute shuttle to times square last year)
Darn --searched the Sheraton Newark, but it has become a Doubletree (Hilton family.)

OK, so I'm set if I want to go to Arkansas or Mississippi. They do exist, and I thank you.

If anyone can find an 8000 pointer in Florida I will send you a free drink ticket for Delta Airlines. This offer is for the first 5 people to find an 8000 point/night Best Western in Florida and list it here. Maximum one drink ticket per person. :p

OK, so I'm set if I want to go to Arkansas or Mississippi. They do exist, and I thank you.

If anyone can find an 8000 pointer in Florida I will send you a free drink ticket for Delta Airlines. This offer is for the first 5 people to find an 8000 point/night Best Western in Florida and list it here. Maximum one drink ticket per person. :p

I spot checked a bunch of Florida hotels, and I'm going to say looks doubtful that any exist. I pretty much ignored any Best Western Plus/Premier properties, anything with Inn and Suites, anything "Waterfront" or "Downtown", and any of the popular tourist destinations. The cheapest I saw was 12000 points. You may be hunting for the unicorn of hotels.

Thanks for checking. I think BW should have better system to let us know, like A LIST similar to Marriott or Hilton or even Club Carlson. I still can't believe that they don't keep a list. And that is actually a GREAT title for this thread - a Hunt for Unicorns

Time to change the terms, and up the ante...

If anyone can find an 8000 pointer in Florida I will send you 3 free drink tickets for Delta Airlines. This offer is for the first 3 people who find an 8000 point/night Best Western in Florida and list it here. Maximum three drink tickets per person.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3736785/beerchug.gif

If anyone can find an 8000 pointer in Florida I will send you 3 free drink tickets for Delta Airlines. This offer is for the first 3 people who find an 8000 point/night Best Western in Florida and list it here. Maximum three drink tickets per person.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3736785/beerchug.gif

Why Florida?

I checked for June 12th-13th, 2012 and found 2.

First one:
BEST WESTERN Brandon Hotel & Conference Center (http://book.bestwestern.com/bestwestern/US/FL/Tampa-hotels/BEST-WESTERN-Brandon-Hotel---Conference-Center/Hotel-Overview.do?propertyCode=10305&srcPage=SelectHotel&isMapOpen=true&selectedHotels=)
9331 E Adamo Drive,
Tampa, FL, 33619, United States

And since I don't need drink tickets on Delta, you can find some other way of giving them away. Thanks!

I did see 12K BW+s

http://book.bestwestern.com/bestwestern/US/FL/Jacksonville-hotels/BEST-WESTERN-Jacksonville-Airport/Hotel-Overview.do?propertyCode=10358&srcPage=SelectHotel&isMapOpen=true&selectedHotels=

BW doesn't have a list, but a least they have a special website:
https://goldcrownclub.bestwestern.com/hotelpointsearch.asp

Me wants drink tickets!!!

BEST WESTERN Jacksonville Airport
1170 Airport Entrance Road,
Jacksonville, FL, 32218, United States



A good way to search:
1. pick a starting city.
2. at the top of the results page, change "Hotels Found Within" to the maximum of 100 miles.
3. look at the area shown on the map... I searched all of Florida using only five searches.

I believe that this property, and the other property mentioned, are the only 2 in Florida. Good luck.


Thanks for checking. I think BW should have better system to let us know, like A LIST similar to Marriott or Hilton or even Club Carlson. I still can't believe that they don't keep a list. And that is actually a GREAT title for this thread - a Hunt for Unicorns

Time to change the terms, and up the ante...

If anyone can find an 8000 pointer in Florida I will send you 3 free drink tickets for Delta Airlines. This offer is for the first 3 people who find an 8000 point/night Best Western in Florida and list it here. Maximum three drink tickets per person.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3736785/beerchug.gif

Do 8000 point BW's even exist? If so please post them here. Thank you for your support.

^



OHIO: BEST WESTERN PLUS Dayton Northwest


So, that's like 3. And I've searched most of North America.

A good way to search:
1. pick a starting city.
2. at the top of the results page, change "Hotels Found Within" to the maximum of 100 miles.
3. look at the area shown on the map... I searched all of Florida using only five searches.

I believe that this property, and the other property mentioned, are the only 2 in Florida. Good luck.

Congratulations!

That is the method I used to find those 2 FL properties also.

jerry pm me with an address to send the tix.

thanks!

But the real question is how BW can market this program in the way that it does when clearly 8000 point redemptions are far from the norm. Seems a little deceptive, if you ask me.

They are scarce, that is for sure. I tend to agree with you.

I'm going to stay at a 12000 BW on Tuesday night. Have to stay in this location - it is for business and I have to be in that area. From reading the reviews of this particular hotel, you would think that they would GIVE ME 8000 rewards points for even considering it. But it is listed as 12K. Go figure.

I also don't think it is fair that the rewards fluctuate, perhaps daily. We will never know. Mostly all other brands have set lists that may change from year to year: Category 1, Category 2, etc., etc.

But the real question is how BW can market this program in the way that it does when clearly 8000 point redemptions are far from the norm. Seems a little deceptive, if you ask me.
What exact marketing are you referring to?

Please don't tell me it's a "from 8000 points" phrase. I've seen that in just about every hotel program, and in just about every hotel program the lowest tier is the one with the fewest hotels in it. Try it find Category 1 HHonors hotels. Try to find 6000 point WyndhamRewards hotels. If you frequent the various hotel forums on FlyerTalk enough, you've seen parallel questions in most of the other hotel programs, because (whether it's easy or hard to find them) the number of hotels in the lowest tier (which tends to be what's advertised when explaining how to turn points into nights) is the rarest.

Choice is perhaps the big exception, in that they use their second-lowest tier (8000 points) for their "free night" advertising, and it's not nearly as rare as their lowest tier (6000 points).

But BW isn't claiming that 8000 points is a "free night", is it? (They hand out free night certificates for that purpose, including in the upcoming SUMMER12 promo.)

I think that it is the marketing "in general."

8000 point nights are hardly obtainable and somewhat of an anomaly. Also as you point out, other brands have a searchable database that makes it easy for one to see exactly "how many" of the 8000 point nights actually do exist. Even the fleabag BW's with the absolute worst reviews on TripAdvisor charge 12,000/night.

I'll give you one even better right off BW website:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3736785/bw.jpg

When you look over that, does it state that a free night is obtainable for only 5000 points? Does it? I submit to you that it may lead one to believe so, in my opinion, and that's no baloney.

jerry pm me with an address to send the tix.

thanks!


Thank you!

I'll give you one even better right off BW website:

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3736785/bw.jpg

When you look over that, does it state that a free night is obtainable for only 5000 points? Does it? I submit to you that it may lead one to believe so, in my opinion, and that's no baloney.

No, because I can read English. If you parse it correctly, it's saying that the variety starts at 5000 points, not that awards start at 5000 points. And it's true that the variety starts at 5000 points.

In any case, it's got a link (thought that doesn't work on your snapshot) which I presume explains more clearly that the 5000 doesn't apply to free room nights.

Anyway, someone always finds something to complain about in every program. In BW, it seems kinda mild, I mean, how many people want to use their awards at any place that's just 8000 points, versus how many people want to use their awards at a specific place? (And every program has people complaining that the place they actually want to stay needs a whole lot more points than was advertised as "starting at", because the "starting at" hotels are of course not where they want to stay.) In Choice, people complain about the hard expiration (not present in BW), which btw happens a day earlier than claimed! Isn't that more serious? In WyndhamRewards they complain about not being able to see a list of your upcoming reservations online (you can do that on BW, you can do that on Choice, but you can't on any of the WyndhamRewards websites!). Isn't that more serious?

I'm not following your logic. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with your talking points on Choice or Wyndham, I just don't understand the logic.

I posted about BW rewards in the BW forum. What did I do wrong? As a result of the post, we learned that 8000 points/night really DO exist, but are very sparse and there is no way to know if there will be an 8000 points/night hotel unless you look them all up each and every day.

About being "more serious" offenses (for lack of a better word) it's like saying:

"He got arrested for smoking marijuana. But the guy on the other block is smoking crack. Isn't that more serious?"

Yeah, maybe, but the conversation that was started was about the guy smoking the marijuana. One can post about the guy smoking crack in the crack forum.

I posted about BW rewards in the BW forum. What did I do wrong? As a result of the post, we learned that 8000 points/night really DO exist, but are very sparse and there is no way to know if there will be an 8000 points/night hotel unless you look them all up each and every day.
That you already finished many posts ago. You then diverted to complaining about BW wording on their website misleading people about 5000 (not 8000) points, and that's where it seemed to be just picking on BW, far beyond how few 8000 point hotels there are.

I think there are things to pick on BW for, but I don't think that a statement that you can redeem for a variety of stuff starting at 5000 points is one of them.

Btw, Choice hotels also seem to change point requirements randomly instantly. Plenty of threads on that on the first page of the Choice forum (though the thread titles are so whimsical you might not guess that all those threads are about the appearance and disappearance and appearnce and disappearnce of 8000 points hotels!) So BW is not alone with instant category changes either regard either. (And I've seen it in WyndhamRewards too, but not sure how often, because I haven't been checking for reward levels there that often, you having to use a magical hard-to-find-by-yourself website to do it.)

And, btw, Choice hotels don't just go back and forth between 8000 and 12000, there are plenty of examples of them going back and forth between, say, 8000 and 25000 and 8000 and 25000. Does BW do swings that are that wide? And, btw, for non-elites, Choice has only a 30-day award booking window domestically and 60-day internationally, which can make it hard to coordinate cheap air travel (which has to be booked further in advance) with a sudden drop of a hotel to 8000 points. Does BW have such a limitation on when you can book award stays?

In other words, random unannounced point level changes seems to be a pattern with the "budget" hotel programs (BW, Choice, WyndhamRewards), rather than something specific only to BW. None of these programs have redemption tier level numbers. It's only the "midscale-and-above" hotel programs (HHonors, Priority Club, Marriott Rewards, Hyatt, Club Carlson, etc) that have redemption tier level numbers and tend to move hotels between tiers at most about once a year and usually with some advance notice.

Then we can agree to disagree. You seem to make very few points for all your words. The other hotels have their own forum. Good day to you.

No, because I can read English. If you parse it correctly, it's saying that the variety starts at 5000 points, not that awards start at 5000 points. And it's true that the variety starts at 5000 points.

In any case, it's got a link (thought that doesn't work on your snapshot) which I presume explains more clearly that the 5000 doesn't apply to free room nights.


I kinda agree with both of you. There are few hotels at 8K, but they do have them. Rewards do start at 5K, but not nights.

I'm not an English major, but I'm more likely to agree with BillBalony on the parsing of the sentence "BW Rewards offers a wide variety of rewards starting at just 5,000 points, including free room nights, airline/partner rewards, dining, shopping and entertainment." that it appears that the "including..." applies to "rewards starting at just 5,000 points", not to "wide variety of rewards". To have it apply to the "wide variety of rewards", I'd put a comma after rewards. Though maybe that still doesn't separate them enough. Separate sentences?

I do think it is marketing and buyer beware. They tell you how wonderful the program is and then you have to find the terms and conditions to find the limitations. Or search for the best redemptions. Probably easiest to do on FlyerTalk, especially if you offer drink coupons for folks to find them for you. :D

Though sometimes they may not be trying to mislead you, they may just not write well. I've found that on FT sometimes when they come back to explain what they really meant.

Though sometimes they may not be trying to mislead you, they may just not write well. I've found that on FT sometimes when they come back to explain what they really meant.
Indded, I think you've hit it on the head. BW promotions are typically not explained well in wriring, and promo after promo people have to call BW to figure out very basic things like, for example, does a multi-night stay straddling a promo start or end date count. The live BW agents have this info, yet the people who write up the promos never spell it out. If these same people are writing the explanations of how to use the rewards and how much rewards cost, no wornder there's missing and confusing (and thus to some people possibly misleading) information!

But again BW is far from alone in having pporely-written promo descriptions and poorly-explained redemption options. So I'm not sure which other travel company I owuld suggest BW hire writers from! :)

It's not in Florida but the

Best Western Plus Dallas Hotel and Conference Center,
8051 Lyndon B Johnson Freeway,
Dallas, TX

is available for 8,000 BW points for several nights that I am searching in October of 2013.

Normal cash price appears to be appr. $ 100 / night so a pretty decent redemption value for 8,000 points.

And that's no Baloney !

I've done a search of a few but not all BWs in Australia. Is any one aware of any in Australia?