I'm beginning a consulting career and I'm looking into joining the various loyalty programs. I was wondering if people have some perspective on Marriott's policy of room upgrades. In the past I've seen that while some programs promise upgrades- they are not delivered consistently. Most plans promise upgrades to elite members but we all know how that works. Does anyone have any opinions on Marriott's proclivity to upgrade vs. Hilton or Hyatt?

As a silver, you do diserve ... nothing, and this is it;

You must be at least a colonel. And, for that level (gold) , I do not know anything. I will let others answer....

Fifty nights a year with any of the big chains, you will get consistently upgraded.

upgraded with EVERYONE but Marriott.....

Hyatt is a safer bet

As a gold and now platnium, I have and expect to be upgraded at a minimum to the Concierge level, and occassionally into a suite, some bigger than others.

Of course, this is presuming that there is a Hyatt where you need to be. The two most common places I stay in hotels are the city of Nashville and the Hartsfield Airport area. The nearest Hyatt to ATL is in downtown Atlanta, and the nearest to Nashville is in Knoxville!

Any large hotel chain is going to vary from property to property.

In our experience, as Platinums with Marriott, we get upgraded at least to the concierge floor 99% of the time. Suite upgrades are less frequent than they used to be, but they do happen. A good friend, who is mid-tier (Gold), is often at the same conventions we are. I'd guess his concierge upgrade success is 50% - but he always is given lounge access without any trouble.

We used to keep Hyatt Platinum (=Marriott Gold) as well as our Marriott status. I can think of exactly 4 times in 6 years that we were upgraded to the Regency Club. NOT exactly a great track record. Hilton, where we had no status for years because they seemed unable to credit most of my stays, upgraded us as plain Blue card members more often than that. But we finally just got totally disgusted with the Hyatt attitude, which is basically "Oh aren't you lucky to be staying in our wonderful hotel, you peasant." Or so it seemed to us.

Hyatt tries to pretend that it's more upscale than Marriott, and indeed there are a lot of cookie-cutter 3star Marriotts out there, many fewer such Hyatts. But we're not talking Motel 6 here. And the high end Marriott hotels are certainly as nice as similar Hyatts (I don't want to get into too much detail, comparing Park Hyatts, Grand Hyatts, JW Marriotts, Renaissance, Ritz-Carlton and so on). And frankly, especially when I'm travelling on business, give me a humbler hotel with great staff over a fancier building with attitudinal staff, thank you.

You need to look at where you're going to be travelling. As silverpie points out, there are far fewer Hyatts than Marriotts or Hiltons.

btw, we are now very happy with Hilton (the customer service is 1000% improved) as our "other" chain. It's pretty easy to get status with Hilton, too, although upgrading and lounge access seem to be a little spottier there than at Marriott. But we're just mid-tier with Hilton, although it's possible we'll make Diamond this year.

The thing about Marriott, as you can check for yourself if you do a Search on something like "comp status", is that generally you have to earn your status by staying the nights. This is especially true of Platinum - but it's why that status is still pretty valuable.

So there's no ATL airport Hyatt now? That's too bad! I actually have fond memories of the Hyatt near ATL - we were upgraded to the RC twice there.

I tried Hilton as my back up for Marriott recently. Bugs in room (and we are talking a destination resort), over charged room rates (despite my confirmation), bad food and poor service. The kicker was, I never received a response to my letter of complaint. I think Hilton (which now is part of a chain which owns many concepts) grew too big, too fast.

As for upgrades, at Marriott I usually get upgraded to Concierge level, if not I at least get lounge access. And, I only stay about 24 nights a year. They've been good and consistent since 1996 for me.

harryheck, welcome to Flyertalk.

Let me repeat myself: Any large hotel chain is going to vary from property to property.
Condemning the whole chain based on one hotel isn't exactly fair, but it does sound like a bad experience. You might want to send a copy of your complaint letter to Adam Burke, the Hilton customer service guy who posts on the Hilton forum here. If you do a "search" on the Hilton board on "Adam Burke", you'll find many references, and his e-mail address.

You could also tell us what property it was, so we can be warned.

Yep, hotels change flags all the time. The Wyndham Garden in Buckhead is now a Doubletree, the Westin went independent and the Crowne Plaza became a Sheraton in downtown Nashville, Delta lost its Winnipeg property to Radisson and then took over the Crowne Plaza, up in southern Cobb County "that Holiday Inn-lookin' buildin' [is] really a Motel 6"--and apparently, someone else is now running the old Hartsfield Hyatt. (The four Hyatts in Georgia are a Grand in Buckhead and three Regencies--downtown Atlanta, Marietta, and Savannah. K-town has the only Hyatt in all of Tennessee.)