Starwood Preferred Guest - What are the best benefits of the Starwood Platinum Card.

We just got a new Platinum Starwood AMEX card.

What are the best benefits of this card?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Punki:
What are the best benefits of this card?</font>

IMHO, the greatest benefit is the ability to earn Starpoints... No annual fee the first year ($30 thereafter), plus bonuses for the first 11 stays within 12 months at Starwood properties paid with this card (1,000 points for the first stay, and 500 points per stay for the next 10 stays).

Punki, if you're an elite SPG member then the benefits Eugene lists are about the only ones that are beneficial to you....the card also has some upgrade and check-out benefits that have been described to me as somewhere between entry-level SPG and Gold status.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by jja34-1:
somewhere between entry-level SPG and Gold status.</font>

It's called Preferred +.

We are Startwood Platinum.

What about the rental car insurance?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Punki:
We are Startwood Platinum.

What about the rental car insurance?</font>

http://www25.americanexpress.com/cards/Fmacfservlet?6/20/b/3/0/345081817271/20/n&from=0

Car rental insurance seems to be no different from the rest of AmEx Optima-type cards (like SkyMiles, HHonors, etc). Two nice features of this card that neither HHonors Platinum from AmEx nor SkyMiles Gold (perhaps SkyMiles Platinum card is different though) from AmEx cards have are Return Protection and Best Value Guarantee.

There is also no cap on the number of points you can earn a year. This is by far my favorite card.

I do not believe I have seen any bonus points offered for getting this card...Has there been any before? Will there be any? Any info appreciated.

George

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by gpapadop:
I do not believe I have seen any bonus points offered for getting this card...Has there been any before? Will there be any? Any info appreciated.

George</font>

Previously the card came with a 1000 point bonus for the first purchase. This has now been replaced with the 1000 point for first stay and subsequent 500 pts for 10 stays in 12 months.

&gt; Previously the card came with a 1000 point bonus for the first purchase. This has now been replaced with the 1000 point for first stay and subsequent 500 pts for 10 stays in 12 months.

Thanks PG,

I think I 'll hold off on getting it then until they do the point bonus offer again, if not, oh well, I am sure my wallet will not be missing another credit card http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

George

I have to agree. I love to use my SPG platinum AMEX, I try to use it everywhere I can.

25% more points than other cards, good on any airling. How can you beat that?

By-and-large, the best benefits of the Starwood AMEX card is the value of each Starpoint one receives.

I personally value each Starpoint at 0.05 effectively meaning that I get a return of 5% per dollar spent. The next best deals are the 2% AMEX cash back. A far cry from the Starwood card.

As for the insurance, Diners Club is by far the best company to deal with, in terms of rental car insurance claims http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum70/HTML/000336.html

Flash your Starwood card with pride http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

------------------
Got points ? Got smiles !

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Punki:
We just got a new Platinum Starwood AMEX card.

What are the best benefits of this card?</font>

For me, the best benefit of the SPG AMEX is the ability to earn Starpoints at a rate which is much, much, much faster than I would be able to based on my nights stays alone.

Since I generally stay at lower priced hotels, without the Starwood AMEX, it would take me forever to earn enough points for a free night stay. With the Starwood AMEX, SPG points-a-plenty. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I would be interested to hear from anyone who has transferred Starpoints to an airline program. How long did it take from the time you made the request to the time it showed up in your FF account?

Thanks...

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by anthonyanthony:
I would be interested to hear from anyone who has transferred Starpoints to an airline program. How long did it take from the time you made the request to the time it showed up in your FF account?

Thanks...</font>

I haven't taken advantage of this yet but people have posted that it takes about a week.

See this current thread at the American Airlines forum:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum71/HTML/006995.html

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by anthonyanthony:
I would be interested to hear from anyone who has transferred Starpoints to an airline program. How long did it take from the time you made the request to the time it showed up in your FF account?

Thanks...</font>

Not sure about the rest of the airlines, but transfer from Starwood to AA (for the 20/20 promo) took about a week.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by anthonyanthony:
I would be interested to hear from anyone who has transferred Starpoints to an airline program. How long did it take from the time you made the request to the time it showed up in your FF account?

Thanks...</font>

I transfered 50k miles to Qualiflyer last year, before the Swissair fiasco.

took 47 days, and I could not use the miles. The miles hit the day after I tried to use them.

I have been unable to transfer them back. I started trying to get them back, but everyone said "no, no, here they are, and you cannot have them back"

I think the original transfer problem was with Qualiflyer, not with Starwood.



[This message has been edited by slawecki (edited 12-16-2001).]

I've transferred to UA and it's taken a week or less. Depending on your travel patterns with UA, if they know you have miles coming they will issue awards leaving a negative balance in your account. My husband was just short 20,000 miles on a 120,000 award and, while most of the missing miles were from UA, some came from Starwood. Though a supervisor had to approve it, they ticketed before the miles posted.

Thanks for the replies.

As I thought, transfers to popular airline programs such as AA or UA seem to go smoothly and quickly, but as evidenced by slawecki's experience with Qantas, problems might arise with less popular airlines.

I will soon be doing a 20000 + 5000 bonus transfer to Mexicana so if anybody has ever transfered to them, would like to hear about it.

I think I will request a transfer of just 10 points to Mexicana today to see just how smoothly it goes...hope it doesn't get tied up for 47 days http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by anthonyanthony:
Thanks for the replies.

As I thought, transfers to popular airline programs such as AA or UA seem to go smoothly and quickly, but as evidenced by slawecki's experience with Qantas, problems might arise with less popular airlines.

I will soon be doing a 20000 + 5000 bonus transfer to Mexicana so if anybody has ever transfered to them, would like to hear about it.

I think I will request a transfer of just 10 points to Mexicana today to see just how smoothly it goes...hope it doesn't get tied up for 47 days http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

</font>

anthonyanthony, a transfer to a non-domestic carrier's frequent flyer program will take 30 days minimum.

Best regards,

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

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

[This message has been edited by Starwood Lurker (edited 12-17-2001).]