CrazyPete

I had a pretty decent experience with the BRG for the Holiday Inn Express in Fredricton NB Canada.

Booked it at $175 + tax on app (Member Rate Advance Saver, free cancellation up to a week before arrival).

Checked Expedia, saw the same room and terms for $169 + tax.

Sent in a request form. They got back to me in a little under 24hr saying they accepted the claim and matched the rate. Checked the app and saw my rate was adjusted.

When I arrived for check in the paperwork she gave me to sign still showed the $175. I mentioned that and she made a note on the sheet that the rate should be $169. I am not sure if it was because it was an old printout or if they actually had to modify anything but regardless when I checked out the next day the bill showed the proper rate.

A couple days after the stay the base points and my Platinum bonus appeared in the account. About a week after the stay the extra points from the BRG guarantee appeared (5x base rate, but since I already got the base rate right after the stay the second point arrival amounted to 4x base rate).

The 5x doesn’t include the elite bonus.

delpiero223

Had the same issue in New Orleans these days. The claim was approved more than a month before the stay, but the hotel still had the old, almost double price in their system. They manually adjusted it after showing the price-match e-mail.

dadgummit

I tried to submit a BRG over the past day - is it a generally bad process with all hotels? This is my first time submitting one for any hotel. I thought it was worth it because I saw what seemed to be the same room for the same dates for about half price at a HICV property on a sketchy website called Traveluro. It seems straightforward to me, so that's why I went through with submitting. IHG claims they are seeing a different price for the room and can't accept screenshots (while the price I saw is still there) and also say it's a different room. I told them that even if they think it's a different room, I'd like to book whatever room they have at the Traveluro rate. Waiting on a response - it seems like you can't call to follow-up on this kind of issue and have to correspond with the BRG team via email.

Another thing I don't like is that you have to book the room to submit the BRG. I booked the cheapest rate for the room (with a prepaid deposit of a day) to ensure that the IHG terms would be more restrictive than the rate I saw on Traveluro. I know, I know, you shouldn't do any prepay on hotel reservations, but I was booking specifically for the BRG. So now I am really committed to this hotel stay, I guess, even though I wanted to book it at the BRG rate. I'm sure I can get that deposit back by calling the hotel directly, but the moral of the story is that this BRG isn't a very useful guarantee if it's just lots of hoops and ladders.

dadgummit

Well, I'm surprised, but after diligently following up, this worked.

charliechan51

You get your prepaid back from the hotel?

dadgummit

even better - IHG is going to honor the BRG in my case. It’s a difference of ~$80/night (on a five night stay!!). I do actually want to stay at this property on those dates at that price point.

does anyone know if the 5x is 5 times the base points earning for the room, or 5 times the room rate?

nacho

Interesting. I used the same site for Marriott and as soon as I filed a BRG, Marriott was able to tell Traveluro to stop offering lower rate. I found out after I got the rejections from Marriott and checked the rates again and they all disappeared.

ArnoldB

This is a complete joke with you having to book the cheapest available rate, which is almost always non-refundable. And then they are always too incompetent to find the matching OTA rate anyways and claim it is even more expensive. I thought Hilton BRG was ridiculous, but this is even worse to parody levels.

MNLIST

I just made a best rate guarantee claim and got denied because "The name listed on the reservation does not match with the one on the claim form." I included my middle name in the claim form, but not on my reservation. Every other info matched though such as the email linked to my IHG number, booking reference, last name, date... I know it's in the T&C but this feels absurd? What is even the point of getting a perfect match on name, it's not like a random stranger would go and submit a best rate guarantee rate on my behalf without knowing my name.

Luckily the rate I booked is refundable up to 14 days before stay even though it's the cheapest. At this point I'll just cancel and go somewhere else cause I don't want to go back and forth on this stupid technicality.

Pseudo Nim

Welcome to the IHG Best Rate Guarantee, where we guarantee we will find the best way to reject your claim - we have a team of highly dedicated and skilled representatives that will trawl the Internet in search of any reason to deny you your hard earned 100 bucks!

nacho

I know! I don't want to book something with 7 days cancellation notice if I don't know whether my flight is going to cancel or delay or something.

Davidob

Just unsuccessfully tried the BRG after booking a non refundable stay at the IC Bali. I found a much better rate on agoda, like hundreds of dollars cheaper. The BRG team say they are seeing a much higher rate on Agoda, even though I’ve just rechecked and the better rate is still there and, of course, they don’t accept a screenshot.

Very frustrating, lesson learned the hard way!

adoptasaurusid

Hotel Name: InterContinental Jakarta Pondok Indah, an IHG Hotel
Date of stay: April 2023
Nights: 3
Room Type:1 KING BED CLASSIC
IHG Website Rate: 155.20USD++
Competing Rate: 128.24USD++
Actual Approved Rate: 128.24USD++
My first attempt at IHG BPG .. approved within 2 hours. Competing rate was vio.com via google search of the hotel name.