craz

Sorry but you are wrong. I run into that when booking hotels on any site where if its for multi nights the rate I see ends up being the avg cost and not the per night cost per night eg I will see $75 say per night when staying 2 nights when in fact its $100 1 night and $50 the other

B&S would be it shows say 20k and in reality not 1 of the nights is available for 20k and its 30k per night when you click to book. But if it shows 20k or 20k is the avg over all the nights one put in for the res , then I dont see it as B&S

nk15

No, bait and switch is a hotel program sells you points and gives you rewards at X value, and then it cuts the points value down. B&S, a time honored tradition in the travel industry...

Anyway, in this case I think this is just an IT problem that is often misleading, I think I have seen it before in hotel reservations, it displays the first night only, not the average.

Happy

Unless I need the 4th night free, I NEVER book multiple nights. Always one night at a time to give me max flexibility should our plan changes. Never had any hotel at any chain unable to keep us in the same room on all those 1 nighter ressies.

craz

In that case you can say almost every rewards program including Staples are all B&S, since almost everyone makes changes to its program every year = some folks who signed up under 1 set of T&Cs will have them changed on them

Changes to earning or cashing out power isnt B&S unless said company pushes a program knowing 100% that they are going to change it and sap everyone. Since most folks know car,hotel and airline programs changes all the time its not B&S. It may not be nice but its not B&S.

If a person plays their cards right and get lucky the new system with HH can easily save them alot of pts, but its not every hotel everyday. eg Ive seen 1 of my reg places go for 21-19k when before 3/1 it was 30k, now it still may pay to use $$ but thats a very nice savings if a person wants to use pts

For the record Im not siding with HH and I would prefer the pre 3/1 system, but its not B&S

hurnik

Hmm, is there something special about Hawaii?

I know the Grand Vacations Clubs aren't eligible for the 5th night free.

But the Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki Resort says (5th night free)

Regardless of whether I'm logged in or not, the Kalia Tower 1 King Bedroom Ocean View for 2/14/18-2/19/18 for 2 people shows 90,000/night. Total of 450,000. I'm pretty sure I did math and that's 5 nights, and 5x90k = 450,000, right?

Are Premium awards not eligible for 5th night free?

nk15

In essence, it is B&S. Technically and legally it is not, but in essence, it is.

This is akin to lobbying and political campaign contributions. Technically and legally, it is not bribing, but in essence, we all know it is bribing.

Cymro

They weren't before - assuming that is a premium reward then it looks like nothing has changed in that respect.

serpens

They are not offered in the T&C.

craz

Guess we will have to agree to disagree. I would agree with you had HH posted say 20k for each night separately and when you make 1 res they up it to say 30k per night.

Since most likely each night by itself will have a different rate then how could you expect HH to hold by 1 amount of pts for every night, that is unless every night would workout to need more pts then its capped at, so then it should be the same amount of pts every night as long as its a standard room each night

The same can be said for paying ca$h, 1 night may be more or less$$ then the others, Marriott always made it known that as of x date the rate is higher or lower but the rate of your 1st night was the rate that showed as your main rate even thou it may not be every night of ones stay.

nk15

I am talking about the rewards program as a whole, not the different rates per night, as I said I think this is an IT issue.

iahphx

Some interesting discussion in this blog about the "points cap." But nobody (including Hilton) seems to know how long it will last.

http://loyaltylobby.com/2017/04/05/h...-are-in-place/

gengar

Always a little scary when loyalty programs feel the need to caveat with "at this time".

Definitely rethinking my HH loyalty...

jeffandnicole

Nothing wrong with stating 'at this time'. If you think Marriott and SPG's reward offerings are set in stone forever, you're going to be very disappointed at a later time.

pinniped

Actually, Marriott and Starwood have been structurally much more stable than HHonors. The fundamental building blocks in those two programs have remained the same for many, many years. Marriott has had 1 revamp in the past decade that entailed an across-the-board increase in award costs - BUT - it also included increased earnings for elites that mostly offset the cost increase, and it dumped the formerly-annoying two-tier availability scheme. The program got better - for real. Starwood's only change of note has been a downgrade of the quality of their promotions, but that's a bit of a different topic.

HHonors, on the other hand, has had at least 2 (or is it 3?) major structural overhauls in the past decade. Entire awards that I used to book regularly are completely gone. That's why "at this time" is especially anxiety-inducing with Hilton. It feels like they move the goalposts in this program a LOT....more than just the gradual annual Category Creep that all programs are known to drop on their members.

It doesn't necessarily kill off my desire to stay at Hilton, but it does make me reevaluate how much I find the stays worth, relative to nearby Marriott competitors where I hold a similar status.

(Obviously 2017 is a unique case for MR and SPG. I'll enter 2018 with a modest balance of SPG, expecting a hybrid program that is slightly less rewarding than either of them are today. I definitely wouldn't advise anyone to stockpile there thinking 2018 will suddenly get *more* rewarding.)

iahphx

Earn and burn, baby.

And that's now quite easy with the new Honors points structure.