Reward night stay but credit card was charged
 

Hi everyone,
I had my first experience in redeeming HHonors points for a reward stay and currently facing some issues.

I reserved a stay at Hampton Inn in Manhattan (32 Pearl Street) for one night stay for a total of 29,000 points and no cash. I thought it was a good deal because normally hotels in downtown NYC costs 40,000+ points.

But after the check-out, I realized that my credit card was charged for the full price ($140) and received an email invoice for that amount.

I contacted both the hotel and the guest services, but both of them insisted that I reserved the room under "points and discounted rate" and the extra $140 was the discounted rate (which is already odd because I believe the cash price of the same night was only about $120).

Attached is a part of the reservation confirmation that I printed at the time of booking. Could someone with more experience take a look and let me know if there is anything that I'm not following?

"Standard Room Reward" would certainly suggest a points-only booking. And redeeming 29,000 points for a room with a $120 room rate is okay, but hardly a steal, since it values a point at $0.004 each.

Out of curiosity, does you email invoice include taxes that would be appropriate for a $140 room rate?

If there's no cash portion shown under "Total for Stay" then all they are supposed to charge are the points.

If they won't refund your money, I would dispute the charge.

The invoice (which states the same confirmation number as my reservation page) has no mention of reward certificate and no mention of 29,000 points, although they were taken out from my account.

The charges were broken down to:
GUEST ROOM: $105
NYC OCCUPANCY TAX: $3.50
STATE OCCUPANCY SALES TAX: $9.32
NYC HOTEL SALES TAX: $6.17

(So the total was $123.99, not $139.99. My mistake).

Yes... I have spoken with over 6 different people (2 from the hotel and 4 from Hilton Guest Services) but I don't understand why they don't get it.

So weird. If the cash-only room rate was about $120 (or really, anything remotely close to that), that would mean 29,000 points was worth something in the neighborhood of $15.

And while the value of a single Hilton point might be less than that of SPG or Marriott, a $0.0005 per point value would be a joke.

As Kacee said, if you're not making headway with Hilton and/or the property, I would advance to disputing the charge with your credit card company.

Are you sure you didn't adjust the points/money rate using the new slider? I'm not seeing any points rates that low for that hotel.

A little OT: I have never been offered the option to use variable points + money. Is there a setting / certain browser I need to do or use..? It has always been full points for me or cash. No sight of slider anywhere.

You don't see the slider until you get to the very last screen when making a booking...right before you click the "book now" button or whatever it says.

See:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/hilto...ture-work.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/hilto...g-problem.html

Thanks. Will be giving that a try.

I wondered about that too. If there were a cash component, that would show on the e-mail confirm right above the points amount.

There isn't a room at any Hampton in New York during the week for less than 350 dollars, and that's why you were booked in cash and points. My rule is never use points or miles if the price is cheap. On Hilton points, the Waldorf Astoria in Key West, Fl. ,
is $520 a night or 80,000 points. The points and cash option only comes up if that rate is available.

UPDATE

So the 7th person from Hilton finally confirmed the information and said they will issue the refund within 5-7 days.

Finally! :-)

Wut?