Starwood Preferred Guest - Anytime... Anywhere only good when there are rooms available. :)

Just venting...

I had my heart set on a two-night award stay (20K Starpoints) in the Westin Alfonso XIII in Seville during New Year's... was waiting for a few stays and Starpoints to post -and some AmEx MR points to transfer over-, before making the reservation. And therein is my mistake. ... I just found out the hotel now is sold out for the night of the 31st (it wasn't last week), though is available for the 1st.

Any chance if I keep trying something will open up for that one evening... Thoughts? Had others been able to put a reservation "on hold" before having the right amount of Starpoints (something I should've done in this case then)?

I already have a reservation for the Westin Palace in Madrid before heading down to Seville... maybe I'll use Starpoints for that stay instead. Though I much prefer to spend them at the Alfonso... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif

Or consider more stays to get Platinum (or see if Starwood is willing to comp you directly somehow), then you can use guaranteed availability to book a room with cash. Since it's a hotel, not a resort, you should be able to use Platinum Guaranteed reservation and you may not have pay rack rate (some corporate rates are pretty good bargains). If the cost of that night is less than $500 USD, then, not using 10,000 points is not a bad idea.

I just checked it for you also, the price seemed to be quite high around that period of the year so it's a good idea to use points if you can but also consider this:

The standard rooms may be out for Dec. 31st, but some Tower rooms may still be available. This means you'll need to pay an additional 750~1250 points to be able to book it as award. If you check online, you can't tell. The best thing is to call SPG and inquire about this possibility if you are willing or give the hotel a call...sometimes, the hotel just set aside certain rooms which they may release if you call them.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Guava:
If the cost of that night is less than $500 USD, then, not using 10,000 points is not a bad idea.</font>

10,000 points isn't worth more than $250 in my estimation.