chicaloca453

Worst news I've read on FT this month. I love Hyatt BRG because it's instant. I'm guessing they realize that some comparisons may die on their own before being verified which will bring additional revenue to the company. I know Marriott will sometimes drag out the approval process if they know there's a limited time sale on a prominent site just so they don't have to approve every BRG.

I also think sites like onotels.com will get tougher because it may not be clear to agents how to go in and find the upgraded room types. This one will end up being a loss for the customer.

hailstorm

If Hyatt now aspires to be like IHG, then they need to start offering an IHG-like reward to make up for the increased degree of difficulty and increased level of work and inconvenience they've now foisted upon their customers.

antonius66

Yeah, as I have said already, this is a terrible anti customer change. Its made even worse by the lack of any announcement or such regarding it. Real **** move on their part in my opinion.

chicaloca453

I don't think it's just IHG. It is industry standard to go through the web link to process with a 24-48 hour processing time. They're just lowering to everyone else's level. Makes me wonder what happened to the Hyatt we once loved that strived to be head and shoulders above the rest.

I never experienced any of those 30 minute on hold times others mentioned, but I wonder if that affected their decision as well. This does devalue the program though, but I don't think an IHG type reward should be offered. Of all of the "elite" brands, Hyatt is second only to Marriott in the discount given (unless you get really lucky with Hilton). I think the award is fair, but I wish they'd continue doing phone processing because it's convenient for the customer. I like knowing immediately if my claim is approved. However being that I've had 100% success rate this year (on about 10 tries), one has to wonder if corporate doesn't like those statistics and wants to cut back so there aren't so many discount rates on a property. I'm sure they'd rather my success rate be around 50% and the easiest way to make that hhappen is to do online submissions with lag time (to give the rates a chance to go away). Also not having the customer to explain the steps is likely to reduce claim approvals.

This is good for Hyatt's bottom line but bad for customer service.

hailstorm

I claimed that they are aspiring to be like IHG. They aren't that good yet. The form is much longer, and the reward is much smaller than IHG. They went from having the best Best Rate Guarantee system of all the chains to being far behind IHG.

Even when you're logged in, the form does not fill in information that they should already have, like name and Gold Passport number. They do this for the booking process, where they want to make things as easy as possible for their customers to spend money, so I can only conclude that this omission is deliberately done to make it as difficult as possible for them to save money.

danger

Terrible change.

antonius66

I am still surprised they have not had a GP rep or account come on here yet and at least try and spin it with some positive nonsense.

banzani

Good change for me. Based outside US it's much easier now.

hobo13

They crawled in bed with Chase.

antonius66

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; Android 4.4.2; SM-G900V Build/KOT49H) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/34.0.1847.114 Mobile Safari/537.36)

Yeah that really marked the beginning. Obviously there were other factors, but that represents a good time marker.

777 global mile hound

After a number of emails from my fellow Hyatt travelers
who were angry at Hyatt and disappointed by me for not chiming in I thought I would voice my two cents.
My take on this is more folks were actually using the BRG and this is a way to discourage/put an end to the usage of the previously outstanding/appreciated claim process
Being able to deny any percentage of claims by the time they are actually processed (though clearly a more frustrating process) is going to save some
percentage on paying/making good on such claims

Less customer service support is also going
to be a benefit to Hyatt in additional cut costs.The idea behind these BR guarantees as many probably know is to drive trust/business consistently to their own booking channel
Booking through Hyatt.com where claims of always the lowest rate is suppose to have folks going only to Hyatt.com to find the best deal
While this may be frequently true there are some occasions when this is clearly not the case.
I'd speculate that because more recently lower prices are in fact coming up on other third party web sites/elsewhere and the increase of claims overall this new policy came about.
And Hyatt's competitors were already benefiting from rejecting a higher number of claims by email
For me this is as others stated this a big disappointment from Hyatt who in my eyes is certainly one of the most above boards trustworthy company to do business with.

stiwi

What a letdown and I just became Diamond. The claim form is also ridiculous as you have to enter all details manually, instead of grabbing your current reservations (like the new SPG BRG forms). It also ask you to provide competing rate excluding taxes, while some websites provide all inclusive rates...

danger

Will this new process create confusion over what cancellation policy is applied, should a BRG rate be approved? As it stands it seems mixed as to whether an approved rate comes with the cancellation policy on hyatt.com or that of the competing rate.

chicaloca453

IMO submitting an online claim should always have been an option just for people like you who need/prefer to do it this way. But to say this is a "good change" is overlooking how customer unfriendly the new policy is. Not only is there extra work for the customer with the long form and the jpg verification required, but the lag will also most certainly eliminate the approval of a percentage of claims just because the rates on the 3rd party sites are often short lived "flash sale" type things. I'm wondering if you'll think this is a "good change" the first time you get denied on a BRG that would save you tremendously all because the rate on the 3rd party site was a temporary flash sale. As someone who booked a $300/night room that was reduced to $160 thanks to the BRG and a flash sale on a competing site, I was grateful to have the immediate approval over the phone. Had the new system been in place then, I likely would not have gotten it because the rate on the 3rd party site was gone that afternoon. So while this change may seem like a positive one for you since you're out of the country, it is likely to turn into a negative really fast and you'll miss the 30 minute skype calls to the US pretty quickly.

stiwi

I guess we have to wait and see. I submitted BRG claim form more than 10 hours ago and no response yet. In my experience they left the cancellation policy unchanged if they are unable to determine the same on 3rd party websites (e.g. Galahotels).

@banzani, not sure what is easier now? You can't afford $0.02/min Skype rate to US or is it because of time zone difference? Obviously there should be claim form in addition to instant approval, but saying it is a good change is a stretch.

The problem also with changing from instant BRG to claim form is that I sometimes book properties less than 48 hours from date of arrival. I have noticed that Hyatt flexible rates are worse than the ones from SPG or Hilton which basically allow you to cancel until 4pm of arrival date. The ones from Hyatt have cancellation policy of 2pm one day before arrival. With this whole claim form thing it is a bit of gamble now whether it will be approved on time or not. What if it is going to be denied after the cancellation policy has passed? I will be stuck with higher rate where I would normally not give my business to Hyatt at this particular standard rates unless they were BRG approved.