Bollox

johngo7470

Yes, the original booking was made online and the 25k per night was deducted at the time but the extra 10k was done automatically over the past couple of days.

It was when I complained that they manually credited back the 100k points

michaelr

Last summer the Sunspree in the Bahamas was available for 15k all inclusive and I was tempted until I read all the (very) bad comments on TripAdvisor. Decided ultimately that while this is a great rate, it's still not worth it if the hotel is so subpar. Can anyone who has been there, elaborate on their experience?

ToledoRocket

While I would prefer it did not happen, Holiday Inn Express at 10,000 were underpriced. When old Holiday Inns command 25,000, a newer Holiday Inn express is worth 20,000. I think Intercontienetal at 35,000 are a steal.

With all the promotions that Priority Club offers, I am not going to complain too loudly about the adjustments up.

Sydfly

Boy, you kind of had me shocked there for a while. Just went and checked whether IC have really gone up to 35k per night...but everything looks like before at they are still at 30k/night...

johngo7470

I disagree. There's a Holiday Inn Express near Disneyland(R) that sells
rooms for $66/night (I just checked for a 15 day stay, 27 Apr - 12 May).

That yeilds an out of pocket cost of 66*15 or $990.

If I want to use reward nights, it will cost me 300,000 points, and based
on their selling price of $0.01/pt, that's $3,000 in points I would have to
pay for a $990 room. Even under the old scheme, I'd be spending $1500
in points for a $990 room. Can you imagine the airlines changing their
award program and charging 1.45 million miles for international first class
award tickets? I agree 100,000 miles is actually a steal compared to the
real ticket cost, but that doesn't mean I would fork over 1.45M miles
(that I don't have) either.

I agree that some rooms are more than $100/night, but I don't think
that justifies charging $200 of points per night.

I'm not angry about the new rates so much as I am about the devaluing
of my current points - I easily lost $1500 worth of hotel nights I had
already earned, without any warning. I wasn't given the opportunity to
spend my points and go to another plan if I didn't like the changes they
had made, and that's what I'm mad about.

J

Tempus Fugit

Me too. I immediately went and checked to be see if they had jumped in price and was really relieved to see that the IC was still 30K.
Now I am worried that ToledoRocket was "seeing the future".

I too disagree that at 10K HIEs were underpriced. Not so. At 20K I think they are way overpriced. There are still areas where HIE's are not in "special destinations" and are 10K but a large number are now 20K. And a doubling of price is one heck of a price hike.

I understand the frustration of johngo7470. I too am upset about the price hike. And I too was shocked that the prices were uped with no warning. Wouldn't we all be angry if the airlines without any advance notice doubled the price of a standard award from 25K to 50K. Those times when the airlines have uped the price and have given lots of warning most FF were not happy campers with the price increase. But at least those with enough miles could "buy" the awards they wanted at the current price before the price increase.

I too am reevaluating how I am going to respond to the new award rates. For example I am now wondering if I should concentrate on other chains or if I should just requalify for Plat at PC as fast as possible (spending as little as possible) and then after requalifying always try to get the lowest rate possible- eg entertainment. That way I will have Plat upgrades but save money on the cost of the rooms. I am going to be running some numbers.

Anyone else starting to reevaluate their loyalty to PC or their willingness to pay a premium for points earning rates?

Shareholder

While I do sypathize with those who have been sideswiped by this change, I think one needs to bring a sense of perspective and reality into this whole thing. PC has always had this differential for HIs and HIXs in major world cities like London and Paris. These are cities where there is high demand on a limited supply of rooms. Operators of these properties are reluctant to put award rooms into inventory if they are only going to receive a less than market return. If PC pays them 50% of what they could otherwise receive selling the room to a regular customer for an award, these properties are going to severly limit the number of award rooms available.

Look at other programs and you will find there are several levels of value based on where the property is, not just on the brand it carries. PC has been evolving from an amalgum of several different companies, and vastly expanding the number of available properties in the low and mid range [HIXs and HIs]. It has been converting the FORUM brand to CP or HI brands, and this has not as yet been fully reflected in the redemption levels.

There is no way an HI in Brampton Ontario can be equated to an HI in Los Angeles or Glasgow or Hong Kong. So this is a very overdue revaluation.

Yes, it should not have been "snuck in" overnight. But I think it is a rational and fair reallocation of value based on actual market value of rooms/cities.

ICs have always been 30K and remain so. [In fact, in these premium cities now represent a great value over HIs and even HIXs.] CPs remain 25K, and like ICs, now represent great value in those same premium cities. It was just not practical to consider every HI was worth 15K or every HIX 10K.

Check out the price of a Sheraton or Westin or Four Pts from city to city, and you'll find categories 1 through 4, sometimes higher. Same goes for where Hilton places various of its brands from major cities versus other communities.

As I've expressed previously, PC has been overly generous with promotions and elite status [and many here have boasted about the largess they've managed to accumulate accordingly by not only double-dipping quite legitimately, but also registering for the same promo at every threshold offered], so why shouldn't they rebalance their redemption levels on the other side of the program?

Radioman

Hi
Your lucky, I have been checking since Dec 2004 for summer nights at IC Rome and a few others and no reward nights offered at all. Not a happy person at all with IC regarding this.

Also HI in Florence could not give me a room for 2 adults and 1 child but after contacting them, they have spare rooms but nothing about this on the PC website when booking.

I think that some of the hotels are actaully playing a game with folk and will try their best to get away from not giving reward nights away.

Anyway, enough of my moans.

Standby4321

What I'm looking for is something in the area a half cent per point in value or better. If I can get a room for less money than that value in points, I'm inclined to pay. With typical room taxes, that means something in the $90 range for 20K points is about a wash and a little less than $115/night for 25K points. An I-C for 30K is often going to be a good deal. As an example, I was happy to get the Boston HI Select for 15K last year -- but it was clearly underpriced, in terms of points. I don't like the increases any more than anybody else does, but many are understandable. For those properties where the avoided cost doesn't justify using points the answer is simple: don't use points for stays at those properties.

johngo7470

How did you come to the conclusion points are only worth $0.005 per
point? They sell them on their website for $0.01 per point...

I did a quick check of this hotel and found rooms are going for $127 - at
the going rate of $0.01 per point, 15K points is $150, which is fair, not
underpriced, IMHO.

J

Standby4321

I disagree. While there have been instances in which a person can get the equivalent of $0.01 per point, that is not what I've found to be typical. In my shopping around, most $200 rooms did not go for 20K, even before this latest round of changes. As for that specific property, there may be $127 rooms at times, but not on the prime fall weekend that I had selected -- even on a pre-pay. The lowest rate I ever found for the period was $157 plus taxes that put it well over $180/night all in.

johngo7470

Ok, add $127 to $180 (which isn't quite fair because the hotel doesn't
keep the tax), and that yeilds $307 for two nights, or an average of
$153.50. Again, right in line with $0.01 per point, which is what they
sell points for. Although I have argued that it would be more appropriate
to charge points consistent with the prevailing current rate on the date
of arrival, they prefer to charge based on typical (year-round?) average,
which gets back to the price they sell points for, $0.01/point.

I'm still curious how you determined points are worth only $0.005 each...

J

johngo7470

Consider too, that the cost of airline tickets does not necessarily reflect the
cost of miles. An international first class ticket can be bought with miles
that cost $3200, but the real ticket can cost $12,000. By this logic, we
should be able to buy $27 worth of points (2700 points) to get a free room
night at a $100 hotel. Instead, the cost just went up to $200 worth of
points. This is why in an earlier post, I equated PC's move to be equivalent
to United jacking up the award miles needed for a first class ticket, to
1.45 million miles.

I think 10,000 points is fair for most HIExpress. Others seem to disagree.
Fairer yet, I think $100 rooms should be 10K points, $120 rooms should
be 12K points, etc... It's the fairest solution overall IMHO.

J

Standby4321

My $0.005 per point is my own rule of thumb and it is based on avoided cost. Room tax plays into the equation because it is part of the cost that I am avoiding by redeeming points. Like anyone, I'm happy to get more and I certainly try to do that, but the real point is that I won't take less. If a $100+ room goes for 20K, that MAY work for me -- or I may hang on to my points in hopes of getting a better value. If it's a choice between $90 or 20K points, I'm not redeeming points. What you say about average room rates vs. fixed point redemption requirements is very true. The very same room might be a good point redemption for certain dates and not a good way to use points at another time.

The cost of buying points off the website doesn't fit into the equation for me anywhere. I wouldn't be interested in buying points at the price that is charged because the cost is too high in relation to the value I'm likely to receive, in my view. The only reason to do it would be to pick up a small increment that would make a specific transaction work; in other words, to capture the value from a much larger number of points than what I would actually be buying.

There is no particular reason for anyone to agree with my assessment. Getting $0.01 per point in value or even more is very possible and I've done it -- but I just don't see it as the typical offer out there.

The comparison with miles is apt. I value Northwest WorldPerks miles at 1.5 cents each and I'm not interested in buying them off the website at the cost that is charged for them, which is more than double that. I've done better than 1.5 cents per mile with redemptions sometimes, but again, it's not typical.

Stefan Daystrom

I don't know part of "LA" you were looking in, but at least in central OC (Anaheim through Costa Mesa) bookings this past week and next week have been unusually heavy, with most of the PC hotels selling out days ahead of time, whereas in previous years I never saw such a big block of them sell out (if Anaheim/Garden Grove sold out, Santa Ana/Costa Mesa would have plenty of availability or vice versa). Whether because of this or not, I've also noticed AAA rates at many of these hotels have gone up at least $10 (the second $10 increase at some in just half a year) this week, and some PC hotels are MANY dozens of dollars higher than they were about a year ago.

So apparently it's not just points values, but dollar values at SoCal properties that have been reevaluated, and there is real demand, not just projections, at play.