pilot1976

Hi All,

what is the point having a HHG? or being one? i have never been upgraded in a hotel and every time you call reception they tell we are full then check yourself on line they still have executive rooms.. i have been HHG/HHD for ages and believe me there are much better reward at different hotel out there.. try intercontinental..

Hilton doesn't seem to care about there customers...

Tizzette

The free breakfast and lounge access and free internet for Hilton Gold are good enough benefits to factor in my decision where to stay. In the US, the Gold room upgrades I have received have been pretty minor, maybe a higher floor with a view, some free bottled water, a bathrobe...that sort of thing. Outside the US, there are fewer Golds and so the hotels seem to take it more seriously. The same seems to be true with IHG and Radisson outside the US, but you need more than Gold to get much benefit from SPG status anywhere.

sdsearch

Lounge access is no longer guaranteed for Gold unless you are upgraded to a floor that automatically comes with lounge access. Some hotels outside the US give it anyway, but in the US not often any longer. (This is a change made a year or two ago.)

You're right about free breakfast and free internet though.

There's no free breakfast benefit for any of the status levels at IHG, while you only need mid-level of Gold at Hilton to get it. (There's a handful of hotels here and there that give free breakfast to IHG Plat's, but it's up to the individual hotel, and it's not many of them any more, since IHG started requiring a 500 point check-in bonus for Plats last year, a lot of hotels that used to give free breakfast to IHG Plats stopped doing so.)

Are you one of those people who doesn't eat breakfast? Otherwise, I don't know how you could have missed that key difference between Hilton Gold and IHG Platinum.

SteamyUncle

As both IC RA and HHD, I couldn't disagree more.
Please be more specific as it is difficult to know which type of IHG/Hilton properties you target in your comments.

satman40

When it is free with a CC everyone has it, and the line just gets longer.

BearX220

I've never had to stand in line at a Hilton for free Internet access. And the line for free breakfast is not separate from the line for those who pay.

I used to make Gold with 16+ stays and was happy enough. When the bar was raised to 20 stays I got the HH Reserve Visa which pays for itself many times over -- breakfast and Internet on just one three-night stay for two in London can run close to $300.

I can't ever tell when my room has been upgraded, and unlike many I have no lounge fetish and could care less about a super-elite room with crackers in it, but the basic guaranteed benefits are good enough.

Yellowjj

- Free Breakfast
- Free Internet
- Bonus on points
- Better Customer Service (as compared to a non elite member)
- Separate elite check-in line (some hotels)

Lounge is just an additional benefit if upgraded to executive floor. Upgrades are based on availability with most of the hotels programs. It's not that serious. If you really want a room type, book it.

jamesteroh

If you are staying 20 stays for the gold status at full service Hilton or other brands that charge for WIFI and even if the stays are 1 night you are getting at least $240 in benefits seeing most hotels charge at least $10 a night. You are also getting the breakfast benefit, so you are looking at $500 a night minimum in benefits.

And remember Hilton gives away gold ion the US with just a credit card or through a lot of other avenue likes Fast Tracks, some airline programs. If someone has gold status through a credit card they should expect white glove treatment and to be upgraded over a diamond.

A hotel could still have rooms available for sale but waiting to give them to diamonds and people on higher rates. If they have three exec rooms for sale when you check in, they are probably being held for diamonds that check in later and if they can sell them before then they will, if they aren't sold when a diamond checks in, they will go to the diamond, which is how a loyalty program should work.

Hyatt explicitly states their Platinum's aren't eligible for club level rooms and I believe SPG gold isn't either so not sure why Gold's complain if they don't get on the exec level. There are times as a diamond where I don't get either a suite upgrade or the exec room.

If you have a Marriott, SPG Hyatt, or IHG credit card you don't get a free breakfast.

sdsearch

But the irony of that is that the IHG credit card gets you IHG's top elite tier (Platinum), and the problem is that Platinum is nearly worthless (it doesn't get you free breakfast except at a handful of hotels that decide on their own to give it to you, and you don't need any status at all any more to get free internet at IHG, you just need to be an IHG Club member of any level).

So I'm mystified who, of all possible other programs, the OP thinks that IHG is better for elites than HHonors Gold???

If the OP has said that Marriott or SPG are better for second-tier elites, then I might have understood. But IHG?

pilot1976

Hi All
I appreciate all the comments above, i am a HHD myself when i have checked in number of times at London Hilton hotels they’ve refuse to give you an upgrade, when i called and complaint i get the manager telling me "sorry we just had cancelling and now we have 10 rooms available and I would like to give you an upgrade" that’s has happen to me more than once, i think its ridicules when a hotel/airline program promise something to their customers they should give it….. A free breakfast, lounge most of hotels give these anyway.
To achieve a diamond status with Hilton you must have spent 30 stays (not number of nights) they should honour that otherwise customers will go away... i don’t care about the room upgrade to be honest but they SHOULD NOT promise something they don’t give. (that was my main point)

BearX220

Room upgrades are not "promised."

To its credit Delta is trying to fine-tune the elite population to sync with scarce resources, e.g. F upgrades and award seats. All these airline mergers and capacity cuts have resulted in too many elites chasing too scant rewards. (Delta is at least being honest about fiddling with the thresholds to make elite tiers meaningful -- contrast that with United which has opted to make its elite tiers less meaningful, and the lower ones practically meaningless.)

There have been no analogous mergers in the hotel industry so the same "overeliting through merger" phenomenon does not exist here. And most bedrock HHonors G/D benefits (wifi, breakfast, lounge, D-force) are not "scarce" like airline F seats. (A d-force booking can arguably get a random guest walked but shouldn't hurt another elite.)

Room upgrades are black-boxy and at manager discretion anyway. Not often an issue for Golds, and the Diamond cohort is smaller than perhaps you think. So the complaint that credit card elites are ruining HHonors for "real" elites doesn't hold water.

flightexpert

Or you can earn airline miles + hotel points instead of the bonus points, and I believe HH is still the only hotel rewards program to allow that.

jamesteroh

At some properties it does. Palmer House Chicago was a good example. The lounge was so overcrowded it was impossible to find a seat at breakfast time. Fortunately the property listened to the diamonds that complained and now only allow diamonds and those on the exec floor access but it did ruin it for the gold's who stay a lot of nights since they no longer have access.

Hilton should just give silvers internet access and give silver status with the credit card, and that would be in line with what other hotel chains are doing. Even if they did that gold is still easy to get, you just have to put $20K on the free Hilton Am Ex.

Next year, I'll probably be a credit card diamond myself since Hilton points aren't worth much at a lot of properties. I've benefited a lot through credit card spend on Delta, I'd only be gold or Plat if it wasn't for all the AmEx MQM's I get.

Tizzette

As far a room upgrades to executive floor and lounge access, I think hotels look at whether Gold is based on credit cards or stays. If we can tell that at the top of our Hilton page, the hotel can, too.

jamesteroh

Not sure about Gold's but some hotels (not many) do for diamonds and upgrades. When I stayed at Checkers in LA recently and at the Amsterdam DT Ceentral station made comments about how many nights I had and gave me great upgrades.