So I was at a Marriott this week (that will be unnamed because I don't think they did anything wrong)...

My reservation, again, said nothing about guaranteed king room. I get the double room.

After unpacking I remember this advice from my fellow FTers, and next time I am at the front desk, invoke the Platinum room type guarantee. I get the $100, even though I feel a little bad, because they say it's not in my profile. I log in and show it to them, but they can't see it in my reservation.

However, today, I tried making a reservation at the same hotel on the same rate for a couple of weeks from now.

Now I see this magic "Room & Accessibility Preferences" drop down box, and can get the "Guaranteed: King bed" when I make the reservation. I have never seen that before...res was always either for a specific bed (King standard) or a combo (Guest room, 1 Queen or 2 Twin/Single Bed(s) ), now for the combo I get to pick.

Not sure what they did, but thanks to you guys, I am $100 richer, and apparently my issue is fixed and I will be able to select the room type from now on. Maybe it was there before and I just never saw it (in which case I feel really bad about the $100) but at least it seems to work now.

[added more]

I can get it to do both ways on the same room:

Preferences Summary edit

This hotel has a smoke-free policy

Not Guaranteed:
•High Floor Room
•Refrigerator

Or, if I open the "+" next to room preferences (whether I then pick something or not)

Guaranteed:
•1 King Bed

Not Guaranteed:
•High Floor Room
•Refrigerator

Perhaps this is all due to me misunderstanding what "adding your preferences" means. I thought, previously, it meant making sure your profile says you always want King bed, high floor, etc. Perhaps it means that you should be sure to click on this hidden drop down box when making the res. If it is the latter, then I really feel bad and will probably send the $100 back...but I swear I have never noticed that "+" sign next to room preferences, nor the drop down to select the bed type, in several hundred stays.