Starwood Preferred Guest - 500 point online booking bonus

Is this still valid? I was told by the plat concierge that it was a few months back, but I was reading otherwise in one of the threads. Anyone know the official word?

I sometimes use quikbook.com because they always post the same rate as the lowest on starwood.com, but starwood's rate is usually an advance prepay and quikbook's is not.

The standard SPG 500 point online booking bonus was discontinued several months ago.

You'll often see folks still refer to it, but they are part of a special limited time promotion that they qualified or were targeted for.

The general web booking bonuses ended for stays consumed by December 31, 2003 at the beginning of the year, although there were two westin.com booking bonuses that went beyond this date into January and February respectively.

Now, web booking bonuses are being offered by specific properties on our web site as an incentive to book their hotels there or from being pre-selected to participate in one of the major promotions Y27, Y28, or Y29. Some got this invitation, some didn't.

Your account was registered for Y28, the web booking bonus at spg.com (only), and the Chicago/Seattle add-on, so if you book at spg.com for stays during the promotion period, then you should be getting a 500 Starpoints web booking bonus.

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

[This message has been edited by Starwood Lurker (edited 04-15-2003).]

What's the Y60 booking bonus? I got this for one of my stays and have no idea what it is... (not that I'm complaining... these promos confuse me)

Y60 seems to be a sort of add-on that was offered to some of the Y27-29 folks, as far as I can tell.

Howdy, Just joined. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Their card key envelope still says "Earn 500 points by booking at SPG.COM" or something like this.
It was somewhat confusing for couple of months...

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Starwood Lurker:
The general web booking bonuses ended for stays consumed by December 31, 2003 at the beginning of the year, although there were two westin.com booking bonuses that went beyond this date into January and February respectively.

Now, web booking bonuses are being offered by specific properties on our web site as an incentive to book their hotels there or from being pre-selected to participate in one of the major promotions Y27, Y28, or Y29. Some got this invitation, some didn't.

Your account was registered for Y28, the web booking bonus at spg.com (only), and the Chicago/Seattle add-on, so if you book at spg.com for stays during the promotion period, then you should be getting a 500 Starpoints web booking bonus.

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

[This message has been edited by Starwood Lurker (edited 04-15-2003).]</font>

Then is there a reason the Westin Harborcastle, Toronto key holders (you know the one you get upon check-in) still mention a 500 online booking bonus? Or are they just using left-overs?

Left-overs.

Some of the Starwood Preferred Guest in-room materials also still give examples of past policies and promotions.

Not to mention old "Earn Free Weekends" promo door tags that are still out there in use.

Can anyone tell me when the promotion period ends for Y28? My account is flagged with that code and I don't know when the promotion ends. Also, just for the record, I think the promotion started March 1 but could someone confirm that for me?

I want to be able to track my stays during the promotion so that I get the appropriate credit.

Thanks in advance if anyone can help.

Erik

Erik - 31 May is the end date.

FWIW, the 5000 bonus points post pretty quickly....the 500 booking bonus is very sloooooow indeed!

Swanhunter...Starwood Lurker posted in another thread on this subject:

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">1) the Y60 promotion began for stays beginning March 1st.

2) the first sweep was done on March 17th

3) the next scheduled sweep is going to happen around April 17th</font>

In fact the second sweep for Y60 happened on April 15th, so it is being done once a month around the middle of the month. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

Yep! Just checked and:

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2"> 04/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

04/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

04/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

04/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500</font>

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Thanks all, sure enough after I read this forum I looked at my account and:

04/16/2003 SPG.COM BONUS (Y61-68) +500

04/16/2003 SPG.COM BONUS (Y61-68) +500

04/16/2003 SPG.COM BONUS (Y61-68) +500

04/16/2003 SPG.COM BONUS (Y61-68) +500

04/16/2003 SPG.COM BONUS (Y61-68) +500

04/16/2003 SPG.COM BONUS (Y61-68) +500

Though I had 8 stays since March 1, I was credited for 6 so maybe the next 2 will be in the next sweep.

But thanks for the reponses and answers!

Erik

Hmmm...it looks like this might be happening in batches over several days. PremEx's were done on 4/15 and lasertagmiles' were done today.

I'd give it a day or two before contacting us for follow-up - at least until Friday.

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Starwood Lurker:
Hmmm...it looks like this might be happening in batches over several days. PremEx's were done on 4/15 and lasertagmiles' were done today.
</font>

Or the Y60s were done on 4/15 and Y61s were done 4/16. I got Y60 credit for only 2 out of 8 stays since 3/1 on 4/15.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">
I'd give it a day or two before contacting us for follow-up - at least until Friday.
</font>

Too late. Already sent e-mail earlier today. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I have already sent out an email too. Only received credit for 1 our of my 3 stays. Too bad I was in Austin for most of the last month and could not hotel-hop to get more stays.

I only got one booking bonus, despite having 2 stays.

I think it's because there's something freaking out the SPG system with regards to one of stays. Despite the reservation being in March and the SPG stay/points already credited, it's still showing up in the system as a current reservation.

Has this ever happened to other people?

I've had a total of ten stays which qualify for the bonus, and the last sweep posted 3 more, for a total of six stays where I have gotten the bonus. It's still very hit and miss to match it up with the actual reservation, but I guess Starwood just likes giving William more work when I try to figure out which reservations didn't get the bonus http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Hope they give you the big bucks William, to deal with the IT mess!

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Starwood Lurker:

I'd give it a day or two before contacting us for follow-up - at least until Friday.
</font>

As I mentioned above I had sent e-mail on 4/14 about missing booking bonus credits. Three out of the missing 6 posted yesterday as WEB BOOKING BONUS GOODWILL (!).

I have not received e-mail from them saying my request has been taken care off (only the initial response they have sent it for investigation) as yet so it is still possible that I will get more GOODWILL additions.

Clearly, the targetted promotion accounting is broken. People are well advised to keep track of their stays and contact SPG for missing credit.

The same in my Account. Web-Bonus posted as "Goodwill Gesture" after 4 Emails!

I wonder if anyone (maybe our friendly Lurker?) could enlighten the rest of us on how they choose people to receive these promotions and whether any more online booking bonuses might be forthcoming in future?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Kremmen:
I wonder if anyone (maybe our friendly Lurker?) could enlighten the rest of us on how they choose people to receive these promotions and whether any more online booking bonuses might be forthcoming in future?</font>

Been there; done that; and have the t-shirt to prove it, but once more for emphasis:

"A promotion of this type is one where, by its very nature, the benefits of the promotion are offered only to a pre-selected group of accounts. The criteria for being offered a promotion such as this one varies by the promotion being offered. For example, in some cases, account activity may be only one of many areas considered. Sometimes there is a random pull of accounts to simply “test the waters.” Many other factors can play a part in the selection process. If you find that you were missed in any past pre-selected promotions, you may find that you will become part of an upcoming offer."

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Starwood Lurker:
Been there; done that; and have the t-shirt to prove it, but once more for emphasis:
</font>

The funniest quote I've seen all day- like "My Mom and Dad got a targeted Starwood promo and all I got was this stupid t-shirt." http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Starwood Lurker:
In fact the second sweep for Y60 happened on April 15th, so it is being done once a month around the middle of the month. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif
</font>
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif
05/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

I am having a really tough time collecting on this bonus.

I had 8 eligible stays for this bonus by the 4/15 bonus deposit date and only 2 posted on 4/15. I contacted customer service and after a week 3 of them posted as goodwill. I contacted them again and they just said some of the stays had not reached the 30 day deadline. So I waited until 30 days after the last of those stays (of course nothing happened during that time) and sent a reply back enquiring about the missing credits for 3 stays.

Then they ask me which of the the three out of the eight am I referring to!!!!!

How the heck should I know since they don't tell me which ones they have credited earlier for. So I said it is the latest three assuming the first 5 had been credited. Since then I had one more eligibile stay. I got a reply saying they were investigating.

Today just 1 (#$%&!) posted. 3 are still missing.

The 5k bonus for 5 nights posted just fine and reasonably soon after the 5 stays

The handling of this booking bonus credit has been uncharacteristically bad on behalf of SPG.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by venk:
I am having a really tough time collecting on this bonus.</font>

Well, well, well! I got two more credited as GOODWILL after I posted this.

Hey William, if you had anything to do with this, thanks very much.

I will wait for the next round of credits on 6/15 to see if the remaining one presumably for the 5/1 stay and for tomorrow's stay get credited. Phew!

Not me. This was on my "to do" list, but I hadn't gotten to it yet.

Glad to know the group is living up to their Best Customer Service award - even though the process can sometimes take longer than anyone likes. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by PremEx:
Y60 seems to be a sort of add-on that was offered to some of the Y27-29 folks, as far as I can tell.</font>

I just received tonight a big slug of Y60 bonuses (9 total so far?) but I didn't even know that I was selected for one of the Y27-29 promotions? Of course, I am not going to argue with an additional 4,500 bonus points. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

And I also got some kind of US Sheraton Booking Bonus? Can anyone shed light on what this is?

5/15/2003 US SHERATON BOOKING BONUS +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60)+500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500

5/15/2003 SPG.COM BOOKING BONUS (Y60) +500




[This message has been edited by onedog (edited 05-15-2003).]

onedog, everything marked spg.com is the Y60 web booking bonus. The one marked Sheraton is either from the Let's Spend the Night web booking bonus or from a property-specific web booking bonus.

Noteworthy is the fact that you received two of these for the same stay - one Sheraton and one SPG for a total of 1,000 points in web booking bonuses, which is how I was told it would happen. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Sincerely,

William R. Sanders
Customer Service Coordinator
Starwood Preferred Services

guest.forum@starwoodhotels.com

4 Weeks after Check out, No Miles!!
the same my last Stay, 4 Emails....for the 500 Web-Bonus Points