Hotel Saranac Curio Collection in August 2024: I asked during check-in (award stay) about using GCs for meals & incidentals at checkout, but was told they’re not allowed because “they don’t work”. I had already been in touch by email with a hotel manager about our reservation, so I asked them and was informed we could. They charged my cc on file well before checkout for the one meal we had onsite, and by that time I was done dealing with their incompetent staff (this and other issues). I did not bother asking to use GCs to pay for the meal when finally checking out.

Chrysalis Inn & Spa Curio Collection in July 2025: had two consecutive single night reservations (prepaid almost entirely with C1VX travel credits), but charged multiple meals and spa treatments to the room with the intention of using my accumulating stack of Hilton GCs. First morning went down to settle the bill, “checkout” and re-key our room cards: FD clerk immediately recognized my GCs and mentioned they were AmEx-issued and meant to be run as credit cards. She manually entered each GC number and charged the full $50 to each, until there was only a few dollars remaining on our bill which then charged to my AmEx Hilton Biz already on file. Tedious but no problems. Second morning and actual checkout, went down to pay for day two meals and spa with more GCs. Same clerk was at the FD, we reviewed all the charges and agreed to repeat the process of entering each GC for $50. She absentmindedly entered the first Hilton GC as a “gift card” rather than “credit card” and this did not only not reduce the balance on my bill but also seemed to lock up my folio (that’s the way she described it) from any further changes. After conferring with a supervisor, they agreed to consider that GC as “used”, keep it to sort out with their accounting dept later, and create a revised folio for my total bill -$50. She entered the rest of my Hilton GCs manually as “credit cards” for $50 each, as the day before, and the remaining balance again went on the AmEx Hilton Biz card. In all I used up 18x $50 Hilton gift cards, and they thanked me for being so patient. Q3 Hilton credits posted on the Biz card two days later.

I closed 3 Hilton Surpass cards in the last year because of the increasing reports of difficulty using GCs, then the lack of GC availabiity, and I don’t stay at Hiltons often enough to use the quarterly credits organically. I got lucky that I finally had a use case to potentially use them all, AND found someone at the hotel who knew what they were doing. Paltry retention offer on the Biz card this year, second paid AF, probably not going to keep it open after the next AF.