I've been trying to access the hotel category function for the past half hour without success. I keep getting this message:
Due to extremely high traffic, the web page you have requested is not available

Extremely high traffic at 3am EST??!!

Is there any other way to check which hotels are listed under each category?

How to list the hotels in each category:

Category 7 Hotel List: http://www.marriottrewards.com/award...els.asp?Tier=7

Part of the URL contains "Tier=7". To view other categories, just change the "7" to the category you want to view in the address bar of your browser and press enter. In Internet Explorer, if the address bar isn't visible, just click on "view/toolbars/address bar" from the menu buttons.

Here's an overly simplified summary of the categories.

Cat 1 - consists of Fairfield and Townplace Suites properties.
Cat 2 - mostly Courtyards plus some others
Cat 3 - mixed bag of Marriotts, Courtyards, Renn., Fairfield Inns etc.
Cat 4 - Mostly Marriott (including SFO), a couple of JWs, a bunch of international properties.
Cat 5 - higher end Marriotts including Renn Parc 55, a bunch of international properties and JWs some Courtyards here too.
Cat 6 - Hawaii and high end Marriotts and several international Marriotts and Ren. hotels.
Cat 7 - Marriott Camelback Inn, SF Fishermans Wharf (!), Boston Long Wharf, JW New York, NY Marquis, Ren. NY, Paris CE, London CH, London GS and London MA.


Marriott Rewards: If you're listening, PLEASE post the hotel category tables on one page, sorted by location, like Hyatt does. That method is much easier to select a hotel by category and location.

bagold: They claim on the website that they aren't changing the number of award rooms available. (It's in the hotel t&c I believe. Sorry for not posting the link to it.) Of course that's difficult to verify one way or the other.

No mention anywhere if the hotel certs can be turned back in for miles .. at least not that I could determine.

I think the no capacity awards are a good thing. I'm not too happy about the rest of it.

At some point we need to compare the cost and point value of the SPG awards with the new no capacity awards.

The new 3 property HI and London awards are nice, but expensive.

I haven't done the math, but the all-inclusive awards still seem to be a better value than the separate awards. Of course, this depends on the point value of the hotel portion of the cert if there is any.

Meanwhile, I'm calling to redeem my 713 tommorrow morning.

-David



[This message has been edited by LIH Prem (edited 04-25-2001).]

David --

Unless you are going to use your 713 cert quite soon, shouldn't you wait until some time closer to 7/31 so that you have that much more time to acquire more points and/or have that much more time re the 1 year expiration of the hotel cert?

One might be able to obtain a better award and/or at least give them more time for the hotel award, if they need to cancel their present plans.

With Marriott's "kind" extension through 7/31, do you think that would include the ability to buy 10% of the required points for the 713 award? I'm sitting at 167K, expect about 5K for my trip to Sydney in 2 weeks, probably can get another 5K if I spend one night in SYD on my way back (the 2 weekend stay bonus) and should be able to transfer 5K AMEX miles. Of course, Marriott may disallow this sort of activity (point purchase or AMEX xfers).

OK, let's have at it!

Our first guest is a super-frequent traveler looking for a high-end hotel in the Buckhead area of Atlanta for three nights. Maryann Marriott picks the JW. Category 4. If there are no award rooms available, the cost is 82,500 points, and since she gets 13 per dollar as a Platinum Elite, the spend is $6,346.

Stephen Starwood, meanwhile, stays at the Sheraton, Category 3 (there is a W in Atlanta, but it's way out in Dunwoody). 21,000 points there for three nights, and since he's a Starwood Platinum, he gets three points per dollar, and had to spend $7,000 to get them. Advantage Marriott.

These two also redeemed hotel points for the flight. 25,000 miles or 16 Southwest credits will cost 70,000 Marriott points ($5,384) or 20,000 Starpoints ($6,667).

For our second adventure, our travelers will be vacationers, heading to Fan Fair in Nashville for five nights and looking for moderate quality. Maryann, who is now only a Silver, goes with the Renaissance or the Downtown Courtyard, both category 3. This stay will run 94,500 points, which cost $8,590 at the rate of 11 points per dollar (we presume that she stays in Marriotts and Renaissances half the time). Another option within a little more than a mile is the Courtyard West End, a category 2, for 64,500 points and a cost of $5,864.

Stephen will be staying at the Sheraton Downtown, which is Starwood Category 2. This will cost 18,000 Starpoints, and here, the huge gap between Starwood's basic and gold levels comes into play. If he is gold, the points will cost $6,000, and Starwood has the upper hand in downtown--those extra $136 over West End will save him $14.50 in city bus fares http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif. If he isn't (and their qualification is ten stays, for this traveler harder than the 15 nights of Marriott Silver), the points will cost $9,000, and Marriott is better.

Finally, the low end. Now our travelers will be no-status ones just looking for a place to crash before a Saturday morning flight from Hartsfield. Maryann finds the Category 1 Fairfield ATL, and spends 11,250 points which cost $1,125. Stephen notes that the only Category 1 is all the way on the other end of town, and is forced to the category 2 Four Points, which will cost 3,000 points or $1,500. If there were a Category 1 there, it would cost only 2,000 points or $1,000, but Atlanta is far from alone in having Marriott-1 and Starwood-2 as the lowest hotels in an airport area, and the comparison swings even farther to Marriott if it's a weeknight or the capacity controls haven't kicked in (and an airport hotel on the weekend is a very unlikely place to have any difficulties).

I think this demonstrates that Starwood is, shall we say, overrated when it comes to its awards.

Turning to the second issue, the all inclusives--let's say I'm headed off for a week-long honeymoon in Montréal. The best Marriott is the Renaissance du Parc, a Category 4, and two front-cabin tickets on Air Canada cost 50,000 Aéroplan miles (gotta love those short-haul rewards). The appropriate package is an 80, which costs 165,000 points.

Separately, the seven nights are 105,000 points, and to get 50,000 miles will run another 125,000 for a cumulative 230,000, so yes, the package is a far better deal even before considering the car (worthless to me, since I can't drive, but of value to some, I imagine) and the phone card ($18 plus tax at Kmart).

(At Starwood, the cost would be 26,000 points for the Centre Sheraton and 40,000 for the miles, total 66,000, and even under the most Starwood-favorable assumptions--gold v. Marriott basic--that's more expensive than 165k Marriott.)

Edited to address issues raised in a later post and to correct for my stupidity in forgetting that ATL-yyz-YUL is a vol court-courrier for Air Canada.

[This message has been edited by silverpie (edited 04-25-2001).]

msb -

Your plan should work, assuming you give yourself enough time to get all of the points recorded in your account before the July 31 deadline. That would be the most likely hang-up.

Both the old and new Terms and Conditions have provisions for purchasing points. And nowhere is there any stated limitation along the lines of, "Awards under the old points structure can be requested through July 31, 2001, but only by utilizing points earned or purchased as of April 24, 2001."

Go for it!

As Tino notes:

"1. Whereas Marriott points were always valued in the 0.8 - 1.0 cent range previously, the inclusion of airline awards values them at about 0.4 cents. More options = less value.

2. Marriott gift certificate awards range from 0.3 to 0.5 cents. More options = less value.

3. The Terms and Conditions mentions that the old Award Chart can be used for a few more months, but it is not made available on the web site. Lousy.

4. Car rewards: 3 weekend days in a rental car (value = under $100 anywhere) for 30,000 points? More options = less value.

5-15. The other classes of merchandise awards are just as devalued.

16. For those of you who want to find out what hotels are in each category, the web site requires 50 manual searches, one for each state. Not as bad as Hilton, which requires 250 searches to do the same thing.

17. The "50% additional" points for "Anytime" awards is unfortunately the way the entire industry is going, and gives them an excuse to effectively devalue the awards another 50%. I'm willing to bet that there will be properties (just like airline flights) that have ZERO availability at the lower point levels and that REQUIRE the more expensive award."

I agree, and I'm not very happy with the "improvements" to the MR program - nor am I surprised! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif

At least there was some advance notice! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

However if the stay was for five nights, it would be advantage Starwood with the 5th night free for Starwood. Also in another example Starwood has lower points for weekends for Cat 1,2. So if the stay overlaps with a weekend again it is advantage Starwood.

msb...

To answer your question about "buying" points...The answer is "YES."

Marriott still maintains the ability to purchase points for $10 per 1,000 points up to 10% of your account balance. Therefore, just multiply your current balance by .20 to see the maximum amount of points you may purchase to increase your balance to the amount you need for the award.

I am sure there will be a lot of MR members taking a look at this option in the next couple of months as the end of July comes near.

Well at least we have time to cash out.

My only question is if I wanted to extend a 713 hotel certificate, can I wait till mid July, and get back a NEW 713 certificate that expires July 31, 2002?

Or will I get back some 'Category' certificate? Is a Category certificate good for that category and all categories below it?

I've sent an email asking this already -- waiting for response. I figure they must be swamped right now, and Marriott isn't that quick to begin with (even though their answers are normally curt -- No way, Jose!)

On the other hand, if the capacity controls haven't kicked in at the JW, that one drops by 50%, and Marriott retakes the lead.

As for your second point, that is a fair one. Applying it to my second example, Fan Fair is three weeknights and two weekend nights (I missed that because they changed the dates for 2001--it used to be all weeknights). That cuts the Starpoint cost of our second stay to 18,000, as the fifth night is not free in the low categories. The costs are now $6k for a gold or $9k for a basic, and I reach the same conclusion I did before.

It can also be applied to the third example--Stephen is still looking at $1,500 worth of Starpoints, as Atlanta is fairly typical in having a Fairfield near the airport but nothing in Starwood's bottom category.

Here is my conclusion: There are categories of traveler for whom Starwood is better, and those for whom Marriott is better. The travelers I picture are better off with Marriott. (Of course, I can't exclude the possibility they'd do better yet with Hilton, now that Hampton Inn is in that family...)

Deleted to avoid confusion!

[This message has been edited by cy-gone (edited 04-25-2001).]

sorry dupe

[This message has been edited by cy-gone (edited 04-25-2001).]

I think you misread my post. Although you state that the quoted language comes from Marriott's web site, the only place it exists is on this page. If you read my post (top of this page) carefully, you'll note that I wrote, "And nowhere is there any stated limitation along the lines of....".

Previous post by Tino reflects his fear that once the cert is ordered he will not be able to secure the reservation.

I would suggest that the best way to get around this is to first book your hotel room as an award stay, find out the points and cert # necessary for your property, and then call Marriott and order the cert. Usually only takes 2 weeks to get them. Most award rooms can be booked with no deposit, and can be cancelled within 72 hrs of intended arrival. Even if a deposit is required (usually only $50 from my experience) you will get that back if you cancel within the time frame. Just a bit of insurance so you don't lose the days you want or have trouble synching up with flights, especially if those are award travel, too.