Yes, MRP's are always deducted automatically unless you click "I already have an award certficate for this stay" ;)

Now, how would one purchase a travel package to get the airline miles to post to secure the airline reservations at the outer window and attach the hotel certificate to a hotel reservation online? Answer: Not possible, IME.

What if someone was making a hotel reservation with the expectation of purchasing a travel package to fund the reservation? How would they attach the future travel package hotel cert to the reservation online? Not possible, IME.

Now, I faxed the requisite documents to Salt Lake a week ago to effect the process of extension and attachment and still haven't seen any change in my reservations or confirmation of receipt and processing. Shall I expend some more time on the phone? ;) :)

Since the option to purchase and assign hotel award certs to specific reservations (and receive confirmation thereof) has existed, all that I've done was print out a confirmation showing the reservation number along with the referenced award cert number. The hotels have been great, except for the SHS in Houston, in processing this information correctly. I've never funded a hotel reservation when making it, mainly because our travel plans are always changing and I make blanket reservations and refine later. If Marriott gave the option to refund the award cert online, I might consider it. I haven't seen evidence of that yet, but remain happy to be educated :)

Pat

I have in my history right now a reward stay reservation that I made online (funded at time of reservation) and then a week later canceled. My account shows a debit of the points from when I made the reservation, and now it also shows a credit of the points for the cancelled reservation. The entry text says "Returned Award Credit". All of that was done without contacting the reservation line or the Rewards help line.

So it seemed to work for me just fine with the online system. (Note I did later make a reservation for use with a package award and did call the Rewards line to link the hotel award cert to the new reservation.)

Excellent! That's the way it should work. My methodology stemmed from it not working that way, combined with not having sufficient MRP's to fund every potential reservation contemplated. The latter still holds true, but I'm happy to hear the points now get refunded without a phone call.

Now, if I can just click a button to attach the package cert to the hotel reservation, I'd be in hog heaven. There are certain things which require a human but IMO this is not one of them.

Pat

Where has customer service gone........personally I'd stand your ground and involve Mr. Marriott's consumer affairs if they continue to disagree with your point of view; regardless of what the rules state the rate wasn't setup correctly in the system, you were offered an confirmation number, it wasn't an obvious mistake as a 00.01 rate would have been

Considering the history, this is a profound statement. I've been browbeat elsewhere (not so much on FT) for my critical statements of the changes in service ethics by Marriott, as well as developing inconsistencies, and my heart somewhat sinks when seeing this from someone whose posts helped solidify my committment to Marriott a number of years ago. Boy, how things change :(

That said, I think I've been a poor customer in that I haven't complained loud enough and long enough when things have deteriorated, rather making simple complaints and just taking my business elsewhere. If my behavior is indicative of the average customer, perhaps it will have change before Marriott will change. A new year is around the corner ;)

Pat

Thanks for all replies - much appreciated.

I have sent a faxed letter to Mr Marriott's office. Let's see what happens next.

Cheers,

Glenn.

You know I was wondering if someone would make a comment about my post as you did, Just for the record I believe I've posted something a long these lines once or twice in the past. I believe Marriott (both franchised and managed hotels) have some of the best customer service out there but as you point out (and as this thread shows) nothing is ever perfect and to stop striving for perfection will only guarantee you wont live up to your potential (wow I'm on a soap box today).....with this being said I would strongly encourage everyone to complete the survey's you receive every so often in your email inbox. Marriott grades each hotel by these results; they are a huge deal for both managed and franchised hotels alike

That's been my experience, too, where things have changed. But it wasn't complex - it was just a night or two in a hotel.

The thing that anoys me is that I presume it is due to an error by someone at the property that I was able to book a rate for one night that was part of a 3-for-2 promo. I mean, you see rates all the time that contradict themselves. If it had been an obviously erroneous rate I would understand but it wasn't.

UPDATE:

Somewhere along the way, my fax never made it to Mr Marriott's office (I used email-to-fax software) so I simply emailed Marriott Customer Care without mentioning any of the specific details of my reservation. The reply I received is below:-

I immediately fired an email off to the Director of Revenue, quoting the above and suggesting an upgrade to an Executive Room and a complimentary bottle of wine would be in order, due to all the chasing around I've had to do. Today I received his reply:-

Good result in the end but it really shouldn't have come about in the first place.

Thanks again to all who helped.

I now have a new situation about which I would appreciate some feedback from FT'ers:

Last night I was looking at making a reservation at a Marriott property and plugged in the M11 (Marriott Rewards Member Offers) code. Even though the reservation was for 1 night, I was offered a '3 nights for the price of 2' rate which was equivalent to the price of 2 nights at the Stay For Breakfast rate. The rate is displayed as a total for the stay rather than individual nightly rates.

I searched again, extending the stay to 3 nights and the package price stayed the same. I tried again, this time making it a 5 night stay and the total still remained the same.

I got silly and put checkin and checkout dates which made a stay of over 50 nights and the total package price STILL remained the same. I reserved it and received an email confirmation.

Now, the sensible part of me says that I'll get a call or email saying 'all a big mistake, you can't stay for 50+ nights for only £xx' but seeing as the system has accepted the reservation, have I grounds to say that I wish the reservation to stand as it is?

Thanks, as always, for your valuable input.

My guess is that since you made the reservation for 50 nights that the rate is an obvious error and therefore, Marriott can and probably will change the reservation. If say the reservation was for 4 nights and you had a "stay 3 night" rate, the per night rate may not be an obvious error and you might have a chance to keep that reservation.

So to answer you, I think that Marriott has grounds for contacting you and changing the terms of the reservation since it was an obvious error.

Note that I'm not a lawyer, I don't play one on TV, and I didn't sleep at a Holiday Inn Express last night. This is just my guess based on personal experience and other threads/posts in FT on similar topics.

Thanks hhoope01, I agree with you that it is unlikely that it will stand but I've sent a vague enquiry to Internet Customer Care asking their thoughts.

I've just been messing around with the package again and it will still allow me to book stays of up to 10 nights for the same package price. The only reason it won't allow any more than that is that there is a night in the middle of the stay where the hotel is full.

HERE is an image of the package price and details.