1353513636

Went to try and redeem my free night from Chase for a hotel in New York next winter. First tried NYE, no dice, seems reasonable, but then I found that every single hotel in NYC is listed as sold out for the free night certificate for the last 2 weeks of December 2019 and the entire month of November 2019 (?) while the hotels themselves are all taking points reservations for that time period. Is the certificate now restricted to off peak periods?

Super Mario

When was this certificate issued to you?

1353513636

October 2018. However, it seems based on a few more searches and a call with IHG that all free night inventory after July 16th (exactly 6 months from today) is blocked. Anyone else having this issue?

Explorer789

You can try checking again tomorrow and see if it is a rolling 6 months, that would mean the free night cert can only be used for up a stay within next 6 months. That doesn't seem too bad since it's just decent inventory management on their part not to let IHG card holders grab all the award nights.

scubaccr

CC free nights come out of the awards night pool which is a minimum 5% of hotels inventory, and unless a big hotel wity > 200 rooms not increased. However the CC freenight (or similar IHG free night cert) is only available for a subset of that award night pool.

As such the fact award nights are open for a specific date does not mean cc-night is also bookable on same night.

sdsearch

Free night certificates from Chase always have an expiration date. (Otherwise why issue a free night certificate rather that just giving you the points?) Doesn't your certificate mention an expiration date? My Chase certificates all give the expiration dates online. Usually it's about 12 months from the date of issue. Anyway, it almost certainly expires before November of this year, if it was issued in October of last year.

Meanwhile, is all free night inventory after July 16th "blocked" for you everywhere in the world, or only in one particular location?

Hotels have to load free night inventory, and some hotels are negligent in doing that in a timely manner. So that can explain what look like "blocks" at certain hotels, but wouldn't explain a "block" worldwide. Which is why I ask how wide an area you see subject to this 6-month "block".

1353513636

IHG certs have historically been book by expiration date but not necessarily needing to stay by that date. The expiration date is October 7th. I tried several dates in November and December in New York and every single hotel was sold out, then I tried September in San Francisco and August in Singapore and again, every hotel was sold out on every date. Then I called in and was told that the hotel I wanted was sold out for every date after July 16th, which, being 6 months after today's, allowed me to conclude that CC free nights were being blocked beyond 6 months and I figured asking the agent to check more hotels and dates was a waste of our time.

sdsearch

Well, I suggest you try in some "unpopular" places to see if that's really true (ie, Phoenix in summertime ). And of course, try again now that it's a few days later to see if it indeed "rolled" a few days later.

I just did a search with my "Book Free Night" button at PHX (Phoenix airport) and I have no problems finding free night certificate usability for 1 night on Aug 18. Of course, why would I, when the paid rate is about $76 then. (Like I said, Phoenix is not very popular in the summertime!)

Then I search with same "Book Free Night" button in Buffalo NY and I have no problems finding free night certificate usability for 1 night on Dec 1. (My certificate online says: :"Book 1 between 12/05/2018 - 12/05/2019".): I then change it to 1 night on Dec 8, and it still works. So yes, slightly after the 12 months for the actual stay date may work. But in this case, all stay dates from Jan 4 arrival onward are greyed out, so it's not allowing to book more than about 30 days past the certificate end date shown online.

I suggest you repeat those searches with your cert's "Book Free Night" button and see if you get the same or different results.

But, OTOH, I also see plenty of free night availability in New York City for the 1 night of Sunday Dec 8. (Yes, I chose Sunday night intentionally, since it's often the least-booked-up day of the week in many cases. You did not explain what specific dates you were checking, so I can't duplicate your search.)