Rome Marriott
 

I am trying to book a pre-cruise seven-night trip at the Rome Marriott in October 2009. Because of the way Marriott releases bookings, I could only book the first three nights at first. The following week, when more nights were released, I attempted to book the full week. The first night was only available as an "Anytime" booking, so I reserved the final four nights to make the full week. (I also booked a six-night stay if this doesn't work, but I would prefer to stay the entire week.)

I called Marriott to combine the two reservations, to get a seven-night stay for 150,000 points. The 3 and 4-night separate reservations take a total of 200,000 points. Marriott said they cannot do this because there are only Anytime points available for some of the nights, and I would have to keep it as two separate reservations.

Does anyone know, if I were to cancel both reservations and immediately try to reserve it as a seven-night, if the standard nights would possibly be available online? I know someone else may book it before I complete the process, but once a booking is released is it available immediately?

Thanks for any help you can give me.

why don't you try to make the new reservation and then cancel the first

you may have already missed the extremely limited window that the Grand Flora has with 7 day standard awards. They are scooped up immediately after being made available on Sunday. In scoring my 7 day std award next July, I had to book 3 days first then call back the next week to make it a seven.

It appears you do not have date flexibility on this (backing up to your cruise). Otherwise you could line up your dates with availability.

...or you could look at it this way...the 200k points you are paying for 7 nights is a lot less than you would be paying if booked after Jan 15.

The other way to look at it....book as much as you can at the standard rate and then pay cash for the nights that are not available or are at anytime rates. Rates are somewhat reasonable in October.


Keep checking back.....and especially on Sunday.

ooops....I assummed the OP was talking about the Grand Flora. I see that he is talking about the rome marriott....however, same suggestions apply.

Yes, it is the Grand Hotel Flora. I did book the first three nights when they were first available, then the next Sunday morning I booked the other four. So I have seven nights for a total of 200,000, but cannot combine them into one reservation for 150,000. I have tried to make a seven night reservation, but it is only available using Anytime points.

I had hoped that Marriott would have a way to convert my two reservations into one, but they say that they can't.

Why not order a European Hopper Award for 150,000 points and then get the certs attached to your existing reservations? Use the 3-night cert for the first part and the 2 x 2-night certs for the remaining 4 nights.

Every Sunday, keep trying to reserve online with Standard Points. As it gets closer to the date of travel, the hotel may allow it. I finally was able to reserve using Standard Points this past Sunday for the first week of January.

We just booked 2 rooms today on standard awards Nov 7- Nov 14 2009. Not exactly peak season, but I could only find stay anytime any weeks I looked for in late summer/fall. My wife called today after finding these dates. ^^

We have (2) cat 7 travel package certs I wanted to use for this trip in 2010 for my 40th birthday. We had to accelerate the trip due to it moving up to a Cat 8.

Is this information published anywhere by Marriott, or something you just learned by experience?

Could you please elaborate? How did you find out they only release rooms on Sundays? Do you mean rooms are only available in a small block 350 days or so in advance and then not again until a couple of weeks in advance (if occupancy rates are projected to be well below 100%)?

Is this true for this property all year round or only during certain peak travel periods?

Presumably this will change next year though.

Griz....this info is not on the Marriott web. It is from two different experiences I had with the Plat Desk. Since rooms (in general) are made available 50 weeks in advance, these may not line up with a seven day reservation you want to make. For instance the, the first two days fall within the 50 week window, but the next 5 are oustide the window. You need to wait until the next load...typcially done on Sunday's.

I can only surmise that this is the same process year round for most MI properties. Per others, additional dates may become available later on. Since Grand Flora is a top property (cat 8) then it is prudent to jump on the availability 50 weeks out.


Maybe Socrates can chime in?

Just there in November, very limited availability, had to book 1 and 2 nights at a time until I had the 5 nights I needed.

It's a small property. Very well located so worth the effort.

I got MR to straighten it out eventually (after the fact) but there was a lot of confusion between MR and the Grand Flora. English is a challenge with this property in something complex like this.

FYI, had the same issue when trying to combine, I was told is would become an Anytime award etc.

After Jan 15, the property goes to Cat 8, so probably need to resolve by then, who knows how they would handle changes after that.

You have 7 consecutive nights booked with standard availability and they won't let you convert it to one 7-night standard award?? I thought one could could even book 7 non-consecutive nights this way as long as you were paying for the room on the in-between non-award nights.

This does not seem right, not something I would expect out of Marriott Rewards. Marriott Concierge, can you comment on the policy here?

Did Marriott combine your separate nights into one five-night reward?

I just learned that the European Sampler Award is only available when there is standard room availablity. So having this attached to an existing reservation ( which I wanted to do), cannot happen :(

Strange - I had a 5 night Standard Award reservation at the Rome Marriott Grand Flora in February of this year and I called to have it changed to make use of the 3-night and one of the 2-night certs included with the European Hopper Award. It was all done over the phone in about 5 minutes :confused: