Originally Posted by
mahasamatman
Since my experiences match the vast majority of people (in this forum at least), your experiences appear to be the anomolies.
I'll second this. More than half of my stays are BRG stays. I've never once gotten "run around" -- yes there are times where I submit a claim and it gets denied because a lower rate miraculously appears on SPG's website during the time between my submission and SPG's response, but hey that's part of the deal... and all of those instances are fully consistent with what may likely be happening in real life, which is that hotels may load rates to some websites before they change their rates on SPG.com.
One of the most valuable uses of the BRG for me has been when the hotel shows as sold out on starwood websites but as available on another website. This, to me, is far more valuable than the Platinum Guaranteed Reservation or whatever (where you pay rack rate and have to give 3 days notice)... I've gotten rooms at 10% less than a fairly reasonable rate on 2 days notice where the property has shown sold out on SPG.com but available elsewhere.