MikeMpls

I've been wondering the same thing after repeatedly getting the same "no award stays available" message for a night in the middle of Nebraska (Lincoln, Grand Island, Kearney) & for the Green Bay area.

Why am I paying ~50% premium for Hampton Inns over cheap hotels when I can't use the points?

On top of that the web site seems to have gone a bit south.

Hate to break it to you but Josh, the DP manager responsible for Dultah.com, took a similar job w/ hilton about a year & half ago.


Later: Got one of them (York, NE) booked as a 25K point "diamond standard room award" after repeated tries. Part of the solution might just be keeping out of their beta version that it kept sending me back to.

Later later: Finally got Green Bay book after another 15 or so attempts. It's actually a good deal (50K points for two nights in fairly close to the air show @ Oshkosh) but was it ever frustrating. "we are experiencing technical difficults" probably gets more hits than any other Hilton page, and having to enter your pin on multiple successive pages gets extremely frustrating.

This really is the next best thing to Dultah.com -- if you're used to be offered something & then told that it's not available, you'll feel right at home here.

Football Fan

Bye Bye Hilton - 8 year Diamond here.

dshafiee

This year with Hilton, 36 stays YTD ...
*Wood 39 Stays YTD with their promo net me so far 7 Cat 7 rooms.


Hilton gave me Diamond for 5 years w/o qualify since i was 10 years maintaining Diamond.


I will wait it out, but at this point, adios Hilton. Most of my colleagues have already switched.

mnredfox

How you know this stuff is nothing short of impressive. I love all of your history knowledge you share, so thanks! ^

But all along, I knew there was some sort of connection.

Keyser

my checkout on the 14th of june re-qualified me for diamond this year....its the same day this thread started....had it started a couple of days earlier i wouldn't even have bothered with my last 14th june stay with hilton....i would have been happy dropping down to gold next year because now diamond means pretty much nothing over gold....

since this thread started i have had about 10 spg stays, 5 pc stays & zero hilton stays....the only other time i see myself staying at a hilton property this year would be to burn as many points as i can....this would be my 5th year as diamond & will definitely be my last....i'm sticking to spg & pc from now....

MikeMpls

We will probably qualify for Diamond again (8 more stays). Most of our travel this year has been driving between Minneapolis & St. Louis, and there are a couple Hampton Inns in Cedar Rapids & esp. Marshalltown that work out really well for us. I just hope I can keep using the points.

The website is just an incredible source of frustration, worse than ever & getting even worse.

A2010

I'm looking for a January award break.... I see some hotels (on the beta site) without any award rooms available, not even 250,000 pt rooms. Has anyone tried a Diamond award force in such a situation? I'm currently Gold but will be a Diamond very soon and I'd like to know if any perks will come with the new level...

vrbaba

You will just have to wait and call when you become Diamond. Its hit or miss so far from reports, as you can see.

dwcatty

Try switching to the non-beta site and check again. I was making a res a month or so ago and beta showed no availability but when I switched to the old screens, there were rooms available.

Filthy Monkey

It's the inconsistency of this that's annoying me. I managed to book a room at the Cavalieri using a Diamond Force and 3 Q3FN vouchers the other day (Showing as a King, Rome view). I made a booking yesterday at the ADT Hilton, but it's not showing up in my profile and apparently hasn't gone through. So, with no standard availability left today, a room at the same price as the one I thought I had booked yesterday is now showing at 137,000 points and the woman I spoke to at the Honors desk won't allow a Diamond Force on a standard room. Grrrr She actually had the cheek to tell me that Diamond members weren't losing out as it was now a benefit that we can book a premium rooms on points! Where's the benefit? Previously I could always get a room there for 50,000 points. Now I have to pay 137,000!

Sweet Willie

keep drinking the HHonors kool-aid, all will be ok............

soy

I sent my complaint to the customer marketing management (earlier posts suggest that its a waste of time complaining to the Diamond Desk itself)
I go the email address from post 99 on this thread. I doubt it will do much but nothing to lose. I am almost set for diamond again this year but it will be my last year if this pans out as expected.

ElmhurstNick

Very much a YMMV situation. I do two kinds of leisure stays where points are really an option, and spend about half my points on each:
- 4 night stays in high-end urban properties such as the Conrad HKG
- 1 night stays when on a driving trip, in areas where there are no available 3.5* Priceline options

So for me, a 30-35% reduction is quite realistic. The high end properties are going to be problematic to get four nights in a row, especially weeknights. For the low end properties, about 1/3 of the time there's an acceptable ICG property at 30% less points than a Hampton/HGI/Homewood.

Case in point, Windsor ON.
Hilton properties: 25k (Hampton), 30k/NA (Hilton)
ICG properties: 15k (HIX), 15k/NA (HI)

In most smaller cities, the HIX/HIXS is always 15-20k instead of 25-30k. In this example, it's across the street from the Hampton.

So if I'm better off earning PC to book the low end, and the high-end isn't going to be available any more, then yeah, a 30% reduction for me is realistic.

mnredfox

Next week I finish my last 4 stays to requal for Diamond for the last year, then it's to IHG the rest of the year.

I already have 4 IHG stays reserved, no more Hilton.

HHR, I hope you're reading this and realizing the business you'll lose from me the rest of the year because of this (likely 60-70 paid nights).

bharv

Diamond for a number of years

have 110 nights so far this year with another 100+ till the end of the year

will probably jump ship

any advice as to marriott ( i am plat there ) or maybe give IHG a try

Thanks