Best Western Rewards - BW Salzburg Elefant

Going in November for 1 night. I can get a reservation through BW site for 139 Euro and also through Costco/BW for $218.00. Looking at exchange rate for future. Best to have reservation in USD which may work to my advantage? Would they even honor the dollar rate or just charge me in euro no matter what.

Your comments will be appreciated. :)

Going in November for 1 night. I can get a reservation through BW site for 139 Euro and also through Costco/BW for $218.00. Looking at exchange rate for future. Best to have reservation in USD which may work to my advantage? Would they even honor the dollar rate or just charge me in euro no matter what.
Unless your reservation at another site (consolidator, not a BW-affiliated site) is 100% prepaid (ie, they charge you now-- btw, most such prepaid rates have no ability to change/refund) and says it will charege your credit card an exact USD amount, it's going to be charged in the local currency no matter what the reservation says.

You can get the regular BW site to show it to you in USD as well, but again, it's just an estimate based on a different exchange rate that will be in effect at the time your stay is billed.

There are a few places (dunno offhand of any hotel chains, but Avis car rental is one of them) that will offer to charge you overseas in your home currency, but even then it's based on the exchange rate at the time you actually pay (in that case, when you return your car), not at the time you make your reservation. I've only had this happen at one hotel,, but it was a non-chain hotel in Interlaken, Switzerland (and, again, it only happened at checkout time).

The only way to lock in USD for a reservation in November, other than using perpaid rates at third-party sites, is to burn points in Europe, after earning them (at cheap hotels, from credit card spend, whatever) in the US. But the way BW promos are structured (and based on how infrequent they are) for most people that isn't nearly as easy with BW as it is with Choice or Priority Club. (But then you have to deal with limited booking windows, 60 days at Choice unless you're Diamond there, and I think at most 6 months at BW.)

Does anyone know whether this hotel recognizes Gold Status with BW?

And thank you sdsearch for your previous response!

Does anyone know whether this hotel recognizes Gold Status with BW?
Don't expect it. While I doubt anyone here has experience with this specific hotel, general experience is that status (whatever level) with BW is not (yet?) widely recognized by hotels in Europe or elsewhere.

I did get bottles of water at a Huntington Beach BW recently that might have been due to status (or might not!), but that's it. I stayed at two BW hotels in Switzerland (one in Luzern, one in Zurich) last year after making an effort to get Platinum (via a bunch of cheap one-night stays in the US) earlier in the year, and the Platinum got me nothing that I could discern.

Of course, even with chains that do honor status consistently, if status only gives you benefits like room upgrades that may or may not be available, unless they specifically mention "we tried to get you an upgrade but we're booked up" how can you tell whether the hotel gave you nothing because they ignored your status, or just gave you nothing because they had nothing to give?

(BW doesn't give "always available" elite perks like free breakfast -- a la HHonors -- making it harder to tell if the hotel recognized your status. It does give bonus points, but that's at the BW end, not the hotel end, and is after your stay, not during your stay.)

Btw, what benefits were you expecting with Gold? As far as I can see:

https://goldcrownclub.bestwestern.com/members/levels.asp

there are none that the hotel is involved in, only bonus points. It's only at the Platinum level or above that you start to supposedly have hotel benefits like upgrades or early check-in or late check-out.

I was hoping that since I requested not guaranteed/non confirmable - Non Smoking and upper room that by having gold I would have a better chance at receiving those requests.

Thank you for your response!

I was hoping that since I requested not guaranteed/non confirmable - Non Smoking and upper room that by having gold I would have a better chance at receiving those requests.

Thank you for your response!
I don't know if status makes a difference for that or not.

At many hotels, checking in earlier as opposed to later makes more of a difference with that. Ie, if they don't read your comments until you check in (all too common!), and you check in late, your preferred rooms are less likely to be available.

Also, not sure about Austria, but in some European countries there are no such things as non-smoking rooms officially. That is slowly changing (with some hotel chains in some countries -- for example Choice in Norway -- even going 100% non-smoking), but I ran into it as recently as last year, in Switzerland I think.

Thanks for the advice. I will make sure that we take the earlier train from Vienna so that we can arrive at a good time.