I just had a 4-night stay at Westin New Orleans at Canal Place. Had pretty frustrating experience getting suite upgrade as a platinum, mostly due to hotel staff lying. I want to share my experience here and hear your opinion . I will try my best to just layout the facts and not put in my own judgement until the end. Sorry for the long post in advance.

Here's what happened in chronological order:
Before arrival: I booked 2 rooms for 4 nights. I called the hotel in advance to request suite upgrade. The rep on the phone confirmed that the request was received. The day before arrival, I called again to check how likely i will get suite upgrade. The rep said i would not get upgraded the first night because the hotel is fully booked due to weddings. But two suites would open up starting the second night. And I should get them as long as no one else booked them. Fair enough.

Check in At check in, I asked about the upgrade. Same story: no upgrade the first night, but two suite will open up next day. I should be able to grab them the next day, if they are not sold.

2nd day morning I went down to the front desk to inquire about suite upgrades around noon. It was a different associate here. My bad experience started here. The conversation went like this:
Me: My name is XXX and I am in room YYY and ZZZ. I asked about suite upgrade last night when i checked in. I was told nothing was available at the time but there should be two suites available for me to move in today. Are those two suites available.
Associate: Yes, those two suites are available today. The guests have checked out. But I can not upgrade you.
Me: Why? Did anyone else book the suites?
Associate: No. But our king bed rooms are oversold by 17 rooms. We need to keep the suites to balance it out.
Me: If you upgrade me to those suites, you would have two empty king bed rooms. Also, according to SPG terms, platinum member should get suite upgrade when available.
Associate: let me talk to my manager. Then she picked up the phone. While she is talking, I open up the mobile app and checked what rooms the hotel is selling. They are still selling king bed rooms despite being "17 rooms overbooked". And they are selling suites for the rest of my stay. The manager came out after a few minutes. She shaked my hand and introduced herself. The conversation continues..
Manager: Mr.XXX. I understand you want suite upgrades. But you didn't request suite upgrade in advance. You would not get suite upgrade if you don't request it, because we wouldn't be able to block the suites for you.
Me: I did request upgrade ahead of time. I've talked to three different people and they all confirmed my requests.
Manager: [tying on computer] hmmm, i don't see any notes here. Did you remember who you talked to?
Me: I don't remember their names. But the fact is you still have suites available now.
Manager: Well, our king rooms are oversold and there will be more guest coming in later today. Some of them paid the rate for the deluxe room and you paid the rate for the traditional rate.
Me: Are you saying you will give suites to non-members who paid the rate that's $20 higher instead of SPG platinum?
Manager: Some of the guests checking in today are platinum
Me: But I checked in earlier. SPG terms says I should get them. If it comes down to rate difference, I will pay the rate difference.
The manager did more typing, then said: Well, okay, I can only upgrade your both rooms to suites for today. We have no suites available during your 3rd and 4th night. So you will have to move back to regular room after tonight.
Me: Are you sure? Spg.com is showing there are suites available for the rest of my stay.
Manager: SPG.com doesn't reflect what's available in our system. You wouldn't be able to book it.
Me: Is this about the rate I paid? If so, I'd be willing pay cash to get upgrade.
Manager: No, it's because we don't have any suites even if you want to pay suite price. We don't have any suites, from Bienville suite to presidential suite.
Me: Let me think about whether to take the suites for just a day.

I stayed in the lobby thinking about the situation. I decided to the book the suites on my mobile phone to see what happens. The rates are non-refundable. But the suite rate are not much higher that stardard rooms. So the worst case sceanrio is I end up paying cash for the suites, which is not too bad. I went ahead and submit my reservation for 2 suites during 3rd and 4th nights. It went through without a problem. In 2 minutes, I got email confirmation. I went back to the front deck. The manager already left.

Me: You just said there is no suites available during my 3rd and 4th nights. But I was able to book them. There are still more suites available after my booking.
Associate: Let me talk to my manager. Then she picked up the phone. After 2-3 minutes, she turn to me: Now you paid the suite prices, you will be able to get 2 suites for the rest of your stay.
Me: then what about the statement of no suites available 10 minutes ago?
Associate: the availability in our system can change if someone cancels.
At this point I already spend almost 30 minutes. I decide not to spend more vacation time and let SPG deals with this later. So I decided to settle: Fine. At least can you comfirm my upgrades TODAY? You manager said i could get 2 suites today.
Associate picked up the phone, after a minute, she said: Yes, you will get two suite upgrades today. One of them is a larger suite with river view. The other one is a smaller one bienville suite. They are not on the same floor, one on 25th and one on 28th. Do you want to proceed?
I said yes. I also asked them to modify my existing reservation so that I don't end up paying for 4 rooms. Then I left.

2nd day afternoon After lunch, I called SPG Platinum deck and complaint about this situation. After hearing my story and talked to the hotel, the SPG rep told me a different story: the hotel only upgrades SPG platinum to Bienville suites, which is their junior suites. What I booked were suites with river views, which were not supposed to be given out to SPG platinum memebers. That's why they told me no suite available. (Several lies were told here: 1. The manager told there is no suite of any type available, not just junior suite. 2. the hotel just confirmed that I would get a bienville suite for the rest of my stay, now they told SPG rep that they don't have one. 3. the manager told SPG rep that suites with riverviews are not given to SPG plats. But the flyertalk Westin New Orleans thread says otherwise) The SPG rep also told me that what the hotel will do is to upgrade one of my room to riverview suite, which is better than the junior suite, then let me paid for the other suite. I thought this was a fair solution, which is much better than me paying for both suites. I thanked her and hung up. It was quite a hassle to get there. But the final outcome was fine.

Unfortunately the story did not end here. I packed up my stuff and was ready to move that afternoon. And I was calling the front desk every hour to check whether my suites are ready or not. Everytime I was told i need to wait a bit longer every time. A different rep answered the phone when I called at 7pm inquiring about the suites. This time, she said: "suites? what suites? I don't see you have suites until tomorrow night?" I hang up and went down to the lobby. The associate said i would have suites tomorrow but not tonight, there was no notes on my reservation. And the two open suites were already sold. I asked to talk to the manager. A different manager showed up and said she had no clue about what was going on ealier that today, and she had no suite available at that point. I knew there is no point discussing further and gave up.

I got my two suites the next day uneventfully.

My thoughts
Overall, I was quite frustuated about my experience. I did end up being upgrade to a larger suite for two nights. So I guess it was fine from the results perspective. But I hate the fact that I had to fight for that. I probably spent a hour at front desk or on the phone. I'd rather have hassle-free upgrade to junior suite for 3 nights instead.

I also thought the manager and the staff were very unprofessional and lied multiple time. They delivered bad customer experience and totally failed to manage my expection by selling suites to others after confirming upgrade for my 2nd night.

What do you think about my experience? Should I adjust my expectation that I have to flight to get a suite (and be happy that I did)? Is it okay for hotels to lie so that they don't give you upgrades? Am I expecting too much from being a platinum?

Thank you for reading.