Dropping a night without affecting the remainder of a points reservation?
 

I'm wondering if there's anything that can be done in this situation:

The situation is that I have a reservation with 3 free night certificate awards, back when the hotel was 40K points a night (3x 35K certificates + 5K top-off).

My schedule has changed and I can no longer make the first night. I'm attempting to drop said night - which surely should just be possible without affecting my remaining two nights, but apparently that triggers a reprice of the entire remaining reservation. The hotel is now charging 50K points per night, so the system will forcefully drop my remaining 35K certificates and charge me 100K points for the remaining two nights.

The titanium line was no help (They attempted to call the hotel who said they can't touch points reservations), so does anyone know what my options are or have any advice?

PS - Yes, I know I could have avoided this by booking three separate one-night reservations but the Marriott website is so god-awfully slow I decided not to :\

My understanding is changing a check-in date automatically causes a change to your original reservation. I've been able to get a hotel to change my check-out date without repricing a whole reservation before. But I've never been able to change the check-in date without repricing the whole reservation.

Yeah not able to do this, unfortunately you need to reprice. I make separate reservations when there is still uncertainty surrounding my arrival date, then I ask them to combine them upon arrival.

Just to confirm : is this a single 3-night reservation, in which all 3 free night awards were redeemed ?

(rather than 3 independent 1-night reservations, from which the first night could easily be dropped)

Edit to add : the PS has addressed this point. Lesson learned …

First... Yes, if you change a Marriott Bonvoy Points reservation, it will reprice to the number of points required at the time you change it. This applies to any substantive change (dates, number of guests, room type, points changed to certs, etc,)

If I'm reading this right:
— You want to change a 3-night stay to a 2-night stay.
— Your current reservation for three 40K nights uses three 35K certs and a total 15K points.
— The rooms are now 50K per night.

Is the new rate a redemption rate of 50K? Or is it a redemption rate with a points upgrade? That makes a big difference. Certs can only be applied to base redemption rates. They can't be applied to upgraded rooms (such as a "superior" room instead of a "classic" room).

If 50K per night is the redemption rate, it should be possible to make a new reservation with two 35K certs and a total of 30K points. "Free Night Award Top Off" can be up to 15K per cert.

If 50K per night includes an upgrade, that won't work.

Call the hotel and tell them that you need the hotel starting on the morning of the day you want to check in, so you won’t be checking in until that morning, and not to cancel the reservation when you don’t check in the (first) night before. I do this all the time when I fly to Europe and want to access my room when I land in the morning.

If you actually won’t be there in the morning, call the hotel that morning and tell them you’ll be there later that day.

That's assuming the OP wants to burn 3 certificates on a 2-night stay. But yes... feasible.

And I'm guessing that the OP has learned to book awards - especially certificate awards - night by night

That happened to me last month. I made a 2 night paid reservation and ended up only needed 1 night. I tried to change it online, I called the 800 number, no go.

So, nothing can be done than repricing, I paid the new rate.

I'm also confused, but OP could get early check in and credit for 3 nights if done properly. Perhaps the certs are expiring. Or they don't have enough points for the 30K pt top up. The options are:

1) 3X35K certs + 15K pt top up
2) 2X35K certs + 30K pt top up

OP needs to decide if they would rather have an extra 35K cert or 15K pts.

Yep, not enough points for the additional top-ups. I also want to get a 35K cert back since I'll only stay two nights, but alas, none of those situations will help me. In the end I've decided to just cancel the entire reservation and rebook somewhere else.

It's just frustrating that Marriott's reservation system doesn't let you just drop a award night without changing the remaining nights, and so you're forced to make individual one-night reservations. The IT could definitely use an upgrade.

I believe the technical issue is that Marriott doesn't allow any changes to awards. So if you want to change the award, the mechanics of it is that you are actually cancelling and re-booking a new award...hence the price difference. I've also run into this situation where i can't change an award booking because the hotel is sold out. The normal way a phone rep changes an award booking is to book the new one then cancel the old one...but if no inventory they can't book the new one and cancelling the old one runs the risk of your room not going back into award inventory (or someone else scooping it up when it does become available).

Bottom line is the IT system does need to be upgraded to enable true "changes" in award bookings.

It's also not possible to drop a night from a cash reservation without repricing the whole reservation.

And it's not possible to apply a free night certificate to an existing points reservation without repricing it. For example, let's assume you have an existing reservation for which you spent 35,000 points. You receive an annual 35K free night e-certificate. You don't want to change the date or anything else about the reservation. You just want to use the e-certificate and have your points reinstated. Even in this case, the reservation is re-priced and could require far more than 35,000 points.

I don't think any of this is an IT limitation. I think it's an intentional business decision. IT is functioning as designed by the business.

any solution to this? i want to drop the first night, but the other night is no longer available

Unfortunately, not this time. :(

But for the future, you have learned an important lesson to always book each night as a separate reservation if there is even the slightest, most remote possibility you will need to make a change. And even if you think that is impossible, do so "just in case". :idea:

It's not even for awards - ifyou book a 3 night stay vs 3x 1 night stay and you want to cancel the first night - your whole stay will be repriced according to the current price.

That's why I always book 1 night reservations in the increment I want to avoid this $h!t unless the savings are substantial or I use the 5th night free perk.