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Marriott's No Blackout Policy, Post-Merger General Discussion Thread

Marriott's No Blackout Policy, Post-Merger General Discussion Thread

Old Sep 7, 2018, 11:26 am
  #31  
 
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Originally Posted by Kacee
Property wasn't available for award redemption on those dates last night. I would have booked if it was.
Actually, that particular property is excluded from the "No Blackout Dates" policy. As stated in the terms:

The following properties either do not participate in or do not fully participate in the No Blackout Dates benefit at this time:
  • Boscolo Exedra Nice, Autograph Collection
  • The Dedica Anthology, Autograph Collection
  • JW Marriott Scottsdale Camelback Inn Resort & Spa, Scottsdale, AZ
  • Marriott Vacation Club and Marriott Grand Residence Club all properties
  • Participating Vistana properties
  • Rome Marriott Grand Hotel Flora, Rome, Italy
  • Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort & Spa, Hawaii
  • Wailea Beach Resort Marriott - Maui, Hawaii
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Old Sep 7, 2018, 11:32 am
  #32  
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Originally Posted by aacar
Actually, that particular property is excluded from the "No Blackout Dates" policy. As stated in the terms:

The following properties either do not participate in or do not fully participate in the No Blackout Dates benefit at this time:
  • Boscolo Exedra Nice, Autograph Collection
  • The Dedica Anthology, Autograph Collection
  • JW Marriott Scottsdale Camelback Inn Resort & Spa, Scottsdale, AZ
  • Marriott Vacation Club and Marriott Grand Residence Club all properties
  • Participating Vistana properties
  • Rome Marriott Grand Hotel Flora, Rome, Italy
  • Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort & Spa, Hawaii
  • Wailea Beach Resort Marriott - Maui, Hawaii
We are going to need a sticky for all the brands/properties that have exclusions within Marriott Inc.:
  • Those excluded from No Blackout dates
  • Those excluded from offering breakfast if the lounge is closed (i.e., the US city-based nice Marriotts)
  • Those excluded from accepting SNAs
  • Those excluded from offering breakfast & other elite benefits
  • etc. etc. etc.
For a program that I heard was all about consistency...seems to be far more inconsistencies than what was seen w/Starwood.
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Old Sep 7, 2018, 12:16 pm
  #33  
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Originally Posted by UA-NYC
We are going to need a sticky for all the brands/properties that have exclusions within Marriott Inc.:
  • Those excluded from No Blackout dates
  • Those excluded from offering breakfast if the lounge is closed (i.e., the US city-based nice Marriotts)
  • Those excluded from accepting SNAs
  • Those excluded from offering breakfast & other elite benefits
  • etc. etc. etc.
For a program that I heard was all about consistency...seems to be far more inconsistencies than what was seen w/Starwood.
Indeed... So many exceptions and exclusions on so many areas.

The breakfast benefit itself is already extremely confusing, even within same brands, there are still exceptions and exclusions.

Why can't the program makes it a consistent treatment across the same brand? because the property owners balk?
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Old Sep 8, 2018, 2:14 am
  #34  
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Let's give them some time to sort this out. I agree there needs to be a list of hotels not willing to honor all of the policies ... this must be disclosed. In the old program I have not run into such issues, but maybe I was just lucky.
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Old Sep 8, 2018, 2:41 am
  #35  
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Originally Posted by aacar
Actually, that particular property is excluded from the "No Blackout Dates" policy. As stated in the terms:

The following properties either do not participate in or do not fully participate in the No Blackout Dates benefit at this time:
  • Boscolo Exedra Nice, Autograph Collection
  • The Dedica Anthology, Autograph Collection
  • JW Marriott Scottsdale Camelback Inn Resort & Spa, Scottsdale, AZ
  • Marriott Vacation Club and Marriott Grand Residence Club all properties
  • Participating Vistana properties
  • Rome Marriott Grand Hotel Flora, Rome, Italy
  • Waikoloa Beach Marriott Resort & Spa, Hawaii
  • Wailea Beach Resort Marriott - Maui, Hawaii
I knew Camelback Inn had a special deal, but was unaware the list had grown so long.
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Old Sep 8, 2018, 11:55 am
  #36  
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Originally Posted by cfischer
I agree there needs to be a list of hotels not willing to honor all of the policies ... this must be disclosed.
In this recent case, the property is explicitly disclosed in the program definition.

I don't think I could claim that 6 of 6800+ is that long of a list (timeshares excluded). In the SPG program, there was a handful or properties that had a reputation for trying to work around the award availability rules, but I think it was a single-digit number. I expect those properties will continue to do so.
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Old Oct 10, 2018, 4:03 am
  #37  
 
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I am not sure if it is a technical glitch, but I have found standard rooms for sale but not for points iN shanghai, London and Johannesburg. Clearly the no blackout rule is not being adhered too either intentionally, by lack of knowkedge or technical aspects.

for a stay this month in Shanghai I found 30% of properties showing standard rooms to buy available but no point nights...
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Old Oct 10, 2018, 7:38 am
  #38  
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Originally Posted by SHLTP
I am not sure if it is a technical glitch, but I have found standard rooms for sale but not for points iN shanghai, London and Johannesburg. Clearly the no blackout rule is not being adhered too either intentionally, by lack of knowkedge or technical aspects.

for a stay this month in Shanghai I found 30% of properties showing standard rooms to buy available but no point nights...
Probably more a slight of hand situation. Yes, we offered one point room that day and it's booked so no blackout dates. MR has been pretty good with their wiggle words to appear to do something. Remember their version of cash & points, such a joke but typical.
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Old Oct 10, 2018, 8:07 am
  #39  
 
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Originally Posted by RogerD408
Probably more a slight of hand situation. Yes, we offered one point room that day and it's booked so no blackout dates. MR has been pretty good with their wiggle words to appear to do something. Remember their version of cash & points, such a joke but typical.
That's how it used to be but isn't it now written in the T&C's that "if there's a room available, it's yours" or something to that effect now?
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Old Dec 30, 2018, 11:44 am
  #40  
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went thru the exact same drama earlier this week with the westin rusutsu (hokkaido, japan) for a 2 night stay in late january.

i am a platinum with this sorry ... program.

you click thru and at the results page it shows points availability, but there isn't any when you click further. but the standard ("traditional") room no view are available for cash.

so i call, agent is just going off what their terminal tells them, i ask to speak to a supervisor, agent very rudely (ie "you're WELCOME!" when i didn't thank her for doing her job) put me on hold for 30, supervisor says, paraphrased: "marriott allows properties to black out high demand periods to a limited extent. this hotel in particular has high demand between 30 december 2018 and 22 march 2019. they can also limit the number of standard rooms available for points on a limited basis. i see here they sell points rooms until they have 5 rooms left. now they have only 3 standard rooms left"

being that marriott doesn't even have a platinum line (you get kicked into the same surly pool, at least in maryland) i don't even know if it's worth writing in to guest relations now as those standard rooms are now sold out. this is contradictory of the t+cs, and the stanza in section 1 about "we can revoke, not enforce, ignore, etc this contract at our whim", while written down and consented to, is likely not legally enforceable; you can't just write away somebody's rights, even if they agree. but i doubt marriott cares about this.

i'm going to drain my points and just go with airbnb or hilton, which at least seems to respect its diamonds consistently.
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Old Jan 5, 2019, 12:37 am
  #41  
 
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Hello. Does anyone have any advice for this... I'm a gold member and disappointing to see that I can't use points for the nights indicated, even though a "no-view" room is available. I know the price is insane for a standard room, but why can't I use my "no blackout" points?

Thanks.

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Old Jan 5, 2019, 12:50 am
  #42  
 
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Originally Posted by fishy21
Hello. Does anyone have any advice for this... I'm a gold member and disappointing to see that I can't use points for the nights indicated, even though a "no-view" room is available. I know the price is insane for a standard room, but why can't I use my "no blackout" points?

Thanks.
Because that hotel is not a pre-merger SPG property so they're allowed to offer only a subset of standard rooms for awards. No blackouts for Marriott does not mean what it meant for SPG. It appears that whatever they allocated for those days has been taken.
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Old Jan 5, 2019, 10:01 am
  #43  
 
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In the legacy spg system agents could easily override the system when the rare occurence happened where you needed to do so. The new system has no such provision. The agents see literally the exact same thing you see. Literally the exact same craptastic web interface. It just has a few more options opened up but they have no means by which to do an override like they could in the old legacy system. Perhaps legacy Marriott agents can(not sure dont know any legacy Marriott peeps personally) but not so on the spg side and as the legacy Marriott systems are phased out they will be forced to use the same junk Salesforce created garbage for everything like legacy spg agents have to.

It's sad, Marriott had the opportunity to do something great here instead they've .... the bed, refuse to change the sheets, and want more people to get in that mess with them. But hey, Arne thinks everything is going just superriffic!
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Old Jan 5, 2019, 10:02 am
  #44  
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You might try calling MR and ask about the "no view" rooms and awards. I checked a few other nights that have award availability and the "no view" rooms don't show up. Only the Deluxe and Mountain View Rooms show up for awards (which incidentally cost more $ per night than the no view rooms do.) You might be able to get them to open one of those no view rooms up for awards. It could be they didn't add the no view rooms to the "base" standard room category and need to do so. But they may not know to do that unless someone lets them know it doesn't show up for awards.
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Old Jan 5, 2019, 10:48 am
  #45  
 
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Originally Posted by hhoope01
You might try calling MR and ask about the "no view" rooms and awards. I checked a few other nights that have award availability and the "no view" rooms don't show up. Only the Deluxe and Mountain View Rooms show up for awards (which incidentally cost more $ per night than the no view rooms do.) You might be able to get them to open one of those no view rooms up for awards. It could be they didn't add the no view rooms to the "base" standard room category and need to do so. But they may not know to do that unless someone lets them know it doesn't show up for awards.
MR agents have zero ability to do anything about what rooms are available or show up. That is done at the property level. And right now they have legacy SPG plat reps taking reservation calls for the various Marriott properties(not legacy SPG but courtyards, and residence inn, etc...brands they have zero training on or familiarity with) so when you're waiting forever and a day to try to get rewards/loyalty help now you know why.

Those agents are being tasked with dealing with stuff that's not even part of their department because Marriott can't be having agents with specialized training for handling escalated calls and elite guests just sitting there possibly doing nothing for 3 seconds before the next call comes in. Oh no, that agent can be used to answer whether or not a room in some podunk town in far flung north Dakota has a kitchenette. Not that that information could be found easily online or anything. Nope, we gotta have that call answered right now.

Who cares if someone that generates 50 to 100+ nights a year of revenue has to wait while that elite agent answers whether that 75 dollar room has a microwave in it, does it have free everything(how do people not get that NOTHING is free it's just added to the room rate?) and is there a shuttle from the airport that's 15 miles away...certainly not the people that make these decisions and definitely not the gold or plat member who has been waiting 20 minutes on hold listening to marriott's suicide inducing hold music. Oh and don't forget to complain to the agent about having been on hold forever. I mean they're the ones that make these decisions after all.

Last edited by thebackcourse; Jan 5, 2019 at 10:53 am
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