Originally Posted by
adampenrith
Booked a 4 night stay at the Hilton KL back in March.
King Exec with Club Access for 35 000 points per night.
Our travel plans have changed and now we are spending the first night at the Doubletree in Johru Baru before training it to KL.
when I went to modify the booking the King Exec rooms were not available, only base rooms at 24 000 points per night.
Hang on a minute I already have 4 nights booked why can I not just modify the reservation down to 3 nights.
Hotel told me to ctc Hilton Honors - Hilton Honors said no can do.
So at the moment the booking has a notation saying we are arriving on the 2nd night, and I have been told that I just have to lose the 35 000 points for the first night or rebook at 24 000 points for a base room, we really wanted access to club.
So my question is - to the Brains Trust - is there a way to fix this mess, or do I just suck it up, use up the rest of my points and move my buseinss away from Hilton.
I only signed up in 2014 prior to a European trip where we had a couple of stays in Hiltons - so its no biggie to jump ship, but I would have thought Hilton would have been more understanding and done something to keep a member.
Thanks in advance for the advice
Whilst i disagree with hotel practise of repricing as cancel+rebook, what most uneducated/unknowlegable guests think is a simple modify of a booking, you can often prevent hotels gouging you by booking separate nights, remembering (though unlikely) hotel could be unhelpful and move your room each night
I often book my multi-night stays as 3 bookings with separate bookings for first/last nights in case i will ned to arrive/depart 1night earlier/later. This allows me to drop either first/last night without triggering repricing to the nearly always higher rate in the 7day window before my stay ... and also no issues about rebooking if room/bed type no longer available to reprice.
1. Whether points/ADR/Flex hotel bookings, changing the reservation, whether i)shortening stay b)moving date back/forward is in substance never simply modifying your booking but instead performing an immediate cancel+rebook using new (mostly now higher) nightly rates at that new moment in time
2. Hotels premium award nights are no longer available and canceling yours to rebook will not make them re-available. So yes you often cannot rebook award nights exactly as you are experiencing
3. Two different scenarios for a stay are
i)leaving 1day earlier
ii)arriving 1 day later
and unfortunately only (i) is managable and without risk to booking ie
i)Recommeded approach .. never use HH helpdesks or contact hotel before arrival, but instead during checkin simply state you intend to leave 1day early so can they check you in for 1day less and refund points for last day.
(can sometimes also work for paid flex, but revenue managers can get annoyed as on paid flex, checkin clerks should reprice the whole stay )
ii)Arriving 1 day late .... if you arrive after checkout time next morning , eg 1100 or 1200, hotel may have cancelled you bookings as a noshow, refunding the points for nights 2-4. .....
nb
Really annoying on ADR non-cancel rate, as arriving after midday on day two means no-refund and room cancelled. No different from airlines, hotels rely on overselling and non-arriving guests to boost income.