had my meeting a month ago
 

got an email telling me my meeting elite nights posted this morning

Unfortunately, that's not always the case. It was in 2014, but I haven't seen any buy back offer for 2015 yet. : /

I've done the fake meeting thing several times, and never paid more than $100. I just say I need a small room (without all of the extras that hike up the price) to conduct an interview. If they ask me, I'm somewhat honest and say that I'm doing it for the nights. They don't care. When the "interviewee" doesn't show up, I collect my nights and go. Simple!

Elite BuyBack will be open at the end of January and available thru April.

I had a meeting last Wednesday and points and nights came through today. Another meeting this week. Both real meetings but as stated above you can easily have an "interview" where the interviewee doesn't show up if you want. Best deal going are the 10 elite nights!

I sent in a request via the website and was contacted by someone in Group Sales in Nebraska. Should I make the reservation through them? Or through someone in my city/location?

Hmm. Have anyone tried this at any international CYs? I'm HK based and about 15 days short of Plat and would like to hit it before the end of the year. On the other hand, it sounds like even if you no-show, you might still get credit, so I suppose booking a meeting at a hotel in the States might work anyway.

Sent in my online request. Got an reply from Nebraska, then a contact from the local sales folks.

No dice--must book 10 room-nights along with the conference room to get the night credit. I eventually confessed my true motivation, and said if I was willing to book 10 room-nights, I wouldn't need the conference room. Still too bad, so sad. Conference room was $100/hour. They let me "cancel".

Too little time left in the year to deal with trying another local property under different management. So I'll be gold next year with a bunch of carryover nights. Not the end of the world.

Cite the various links in the second to last point in this post. Plenty of documentation saying that the meeting, not booked rooms, qualifies for the EQNs. I just snagged 30 EQNs last weekend... 3 x $50 meetings at a FF.

As stated many times, people make up rules to fit their lack of knowledge. The property is wrong. There are two programs, one for booking guest rooms and another for booking meeting rooms. You might try contacting MR to see if they are willing/able to "educate" the locals.

Also, your profile shows you are Plat. If that's the case, remember you will need more than 75 "earned" nights this year before getting any rollover nights next year.

When you guys say that the charges need to be coded as a meeting -> I have a "(banquet) event order" indicating some of the details, and under the Function column, it shows as "meeting". Is that sufficient, or do I need to ask them to do something specific when they print the receipt? Also, will the receipt appear along with my other hotel receipts online?

I "hosted" 1 meeting last year to top off my wife's status. I read the entire thread until that point last year & here are the key points:
- You will receive 10 elite nights credit if you host a meeting, and no rooms are required:
* http://www.marriott.com/meeting-even...events-faqs.mi
* expand "Will I earn Elite status by booking meetings and events with Marriott?"
- Many FTs advised getting a signed meeting contract, so if there are any issues you have documentation. I did this, but it wasn't necessary.
- Meetings can be entered into the system in different ways. My meeting wasn't properly entered, but after a phone call to the hotel it was updated & the 10 elite nights credited.

Good luck. I'm reserving mine for Jan now.

I tried booking the whole meeting deal at a local Dallas CY. The on-site "event specialist" agreed to a $50 rental for an hour meeting in a small room. She was going to email me the contract, and I was going to sign it and return it to her later. I ended up leaving around 30 minutes in. She got caught up doing other stuff and didn't get the contract done. Said she'd do it and email it. I got an email saying the card wouldn't close out so she just comped it. I called her and explained that I was hoping for the 10 nights credit. She didn't seem to understand what I was trying to do and was citing the need to book the guest rooms in order to get the elite night credit. She ended up running the card and it closed, but just gave me 2,000 points as a "rewarding bonus". MR didn't offer to help, said that I"d have to deal with the property. Totally sucked. I knew I should have gotten the contract before hand, but decided to wing it because the girl seemed cool at first.

Was the MR contact just one of the CSRs or did you actually contact someone with the program? Many times I find CSRs are too quick to justify the failure than trying to determine if there was a failure. If the property does not code the event properly it won't go through (as you found out).

Another avenue, since MR has pretty much abandoned FT, go to Marriott Insiders or try other social media. Maybe a bad review on Trip Advisor will get the property's attention. It's a shame you have to hunt to find someone.

Show her the links cited upthread that detail otherwise and be sure she codes it correctly when entering into the system to post.

Exactly my issue. I've done a bunch of these "events" in the past and never had a problem with the 10 nights, until today. After a some of back and forth (including me sending all of the links mentioned above), the hotel called Marriott Rewards directly and confirmed that it was in fact a coding issue, and that my account would be credited by the end of the week. :)