Starwood Preferred Guest - Is it me, or are Free Fridays/Saturday awards...

...just about impossible to use? I can't get *anything* in the Chicago area except Smoking rooms, even at the least-desirable properties.

This promo reminds me of the Hyatt "Nights after Nights" thing in its redemption difficulty. At least with those, I could exchange the award for a few airline miles.

[This message has been edited by artiem (edited 07-02-2001).]

This means those hotels are just about sold out. They are NOT capacity controlled. Question? Are you booking/looking through the website? That is an exercise in futility. Good luck. I've yet to have a big problem booking these nights in the past, at prime properties.

i had no problem redeeming my free weekends in the past.. lots of people here reported the same..

Good luck

My experience with booking a room using the free Friday award was very successful last year. I booked one night at the Sheraton Biscayne Bay Hotel in Miami, Fl and another at the Walt Disney World Swan in Orlando, Fl.

Both were in Spetember and may be that was the reason of room availablity.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by artiem:
...just about impossible to use? I can't get *anything* in the Chicago area except Smoking rooms, even at the least-desirable properties.</font>

I'm just back from a free weekend at W Chicago City Center (report will be posted in the W Chicago thread in a bit).

No problem redeeming, got the hotel I wanted for the dates I wanted at first try. (Did call the Platinum Concierges to arrange it, but it was done in a minute).

Very happy with the free weekends promotion (if we could only earn more of those for every 10 nigts http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif ) and intend to spend the next free weekend in some European hotel (London, Venice? http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif )

Venice is pretty busy right now -- had a hard time getting a competitively priced flight and availability of hotel rooms is not great.

Was pleased to get a free weekend at the Hotel Gritti Palace -- considering the website was quoting a price of around $600/night+ I am looking forward to a luxurious stay.

Anyone been? Opinions?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by Eastbay1K:
Question? Are you booking/looking through the website? That is an exercise in futility. Good luck. I've yet to have a big problem booking these nights in the past, at prime properties.</font>

That may be my problem; I've indeed been trying to book through the website. I'll call SPG directly; thanks for the tip!

I just used one of mine for a 400.00 room at one of the top Luxury Collection props in Europe. Worked like a charm!

I've never had a problem getting a free weekend reservation at great places like the St. Regis LA and W New York. I do believe they are capacity controlled (unlike standard awards with starpoints), but I don't know how strict it is.

I agree with most of the others - DON'T USE THE WEBSITE. Call the SPG preferred guest center. Twice I checked the web site for free weekend days in various cities and didn't even see my choice hotel listed. When I called, the rep was able to book me with no problems.

The Free Weekends Worldwide are the same as a Preferred (free) Night Award. There are no capacity controls or black-out dates. I have passed on everyone's comments regarding the difficulty reserving them online to our programmers. We hope to have this fixed, or at least tweaked a bit, to allow for easier redemption as soon as possible. Thanks to everyone for your continued patience with any web site difficulties you may have experienced.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Specialist, E-Communications Department
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

Thanks William - but the web site needs a lot more than just fixing this particular problem. For over 6 months, it's performance has been clunky - often giving me timeouts and javascript errors. From reading other posts, fellow SPGs have experienced the same. I know it's "being worked on", but when do you expect it to be ready for prime time?

A follow-up is warranted: I called the SPG reservations no. directly, and had no problems finding available rooms to redeem my free nights. Thanks, Starwood, for a nice award promotion!

I have had no problem redeeming mine!
Just back from a fabulous Royal Hawaiian free weekend.
Used my $50 off for a great breakfast by the sea.
Im off the Mirage port douglas for the next.

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Hyatt Diamond/Hilton Diamond/Starwood Platinum/UA1K-Ansett-WHITE/Qantas-WHITE

PHL, how is that St. Regis LA? How much for parking? What type of room did you receive? I may use mine there in Sept.

Also anyone, How long after qualification for 2 free weekends can you use them?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by TrojanHorse:
Also anyone, How long after qualification for 2 free weekends can you use them?</font>

It's my understanding they can be used right away...once the account reflects the Free Friday/Weekend qualification, you can redeem it...

It must be just.... YOU. I just booked at the Phoenician in AZ in September no problem. The value on my rooms was over $1000!!

You can reserve the room under the promotion as soon as it shows up on your account (usually within 2-3 days of your stay).

I had no problem reserving the Bal Harbor Sheraton just North of Miami (a $250/night property).

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by artiem:
...I can't get *anything* in the Chicago area except Smoking rooms</font>

Considering that much of my business travel lands me at Four Points properties, I thought it would be a pleasant change to use my two free weekends at the St. Regis Monarch Beach in Dana Point, CA, opening August 1. I tried to book weekend dates on the web site and was offered only smoking rooms. So I called "my" SPG Platinum concierge in Salt Lake City and he promptly made my reservations for two free weekends in September in non-smoking rooms (with an ocean view on request). I've never had a situation "my" SPG Platinum concierge couldn't remedy. Those folks are angels.

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Biggest Little 1K (in The Biggest Little City) In The World

TrojanHorse:

The St Regis LA is great. Good views, wonderful rooms with glorious marble baths. Parking is, as I recall, $21 for self parking and a few more for valet. There is noplace else around to park either.

I have never been able to book a Free Friday and/or Saturday on the linked web site since these promos started. I go through the procedure and always get only smoking rooms available, with a very strange set of codes. When I go to confirm the date(s) I want, I get a tech problem screen. However, when I call the PreferredGuest Gold line, I never had problems getting the dates I want, in non-smoking rooms.

I have reported that there are problems, when people try to book their Free Weekends reservations online, to our programmers. Perhaps a follow up is necessary, but I want to stress an important point here. If you call us to reserve your Free Weekends reservation, no representative of Starwood Preferred Guest can confirm a room type for you. This is outlined explicitly in the Terms and Conditons. This means we cannot confirm a room on a certain floor, or a certain area, or even as smoking or non-smoking. The best we can do is make your preferences known to the hotel, but it is their job to assign rooms, not ours.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Specialist, E-Communications Department
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com