gil123

It absolutely has to be brokers/bots. I started refreshing the Choice page about 30 seconds before the atomic clock turned 13:00 on my PC and phone simultaneously and kept at it for at least 15 minutes until I miraculously managed to get one of the 55K packages. Everything was already "on hold" as soon as it went on sale. Same w IHG. Things were never like this for those programs in the past. And HH @ 0.5 cpp is just incomprehensible. I would never buy HH at that price and in most cases it's a terrible deal-- but for a handful of luxury properties I imagine a broker with enough points might be able to sell the rooms at a discount off the cash price-- probably without telling the buyer it is a points redemption. I can't think of any other viable explanation. "Revenge travel" just doesn't explain it.

GUWonder

If not that, then the basically useless/reduced quantities could be a function of USTravel.org’s partners cutting back on their own marketing expenditures funding the sale of discounted items.

If going with the broker/bot narrative, then that would suggest the fast grab/purchases is the action of sophisticated buyers with a better sense than the average Joe for what makes for good return on the $ spent on these packages.

IHG awards nights are now eligible for elite status benefits; and there is that fourth night free thing that has some people wanting as many IHG points as possible.

I am thinking Wyndham also will get grabbed faster this time. Best Western? Well, there was the value gotten on the night of the Beyoncé concert in Stockholm that has me almost thinking maybe I should consider buying more BW points. [Not likely.]

progapanda

One of my colleagues, who I'd given the heads up to, told me they used their teenager's help to set up a 'clicker' app on their computer and set it to repeatedly mash/click on the purchase button when the Choice deal went live. While not quite a bot, I think workarounds like this may be putting many packages into shopping carts nearly instantly after they become available. They managed to pick up four sets of Choice points (and not the $84 variety either).

I've only had luck with the $100 (2) Marriott gift cards this year.

GUWonder

I didn’t have us try for Marriott, but we got most of what we wanted for Choice.

Wyndham hasn’t sold out still from today’s sale, and that’s even as it’s not like Super8 and DaysInn are all they have to offer as redemption options.

steveholt

The MGM packages today were all on hold within 15 seconds of the 1:00 window. I was looking first at the Skylofts packages, and they were on hold at 13:00:02. No fun to compete with bots.

GUWonder

The quantity of the packages is so few that they would go fast even without automated grabbing tools in use.

It’s rather telling which packages aren’t selling out at all yet.

oliver2002

AFAIR these packages are donated by the companies to the US Travel Association for free.

Jitin Kakkar

Have you received the Choice points to your account? My first year participating in this, so wondering how long does it generally take to get the points in the account

GUWonder

As of an hour ago, they had yet to show up in my account or any of the other accounts to which I have access. Wouldn’t be surprised if they show up by this coming Thursday/Friday or before next Thursday/Friday.

I don’t know if they are donated and thereby taken as a marketing-related charitable expense tax deduction by the partner companies involved here, but at least historically the US Travel Association has almost certainly been funded by other sources that dwarf any revenue from these package sales.

dollar

Still waiting here too. The terms said it could take up to 14 days.

josephstern

That would explain the tiny quantities.

GUWonder

Seems to me that we are still on a year over year trend of there being fewer packages of worth on sale and thus it becoming harder to grab them because of that too.

In earlier times the package quantities used to be significantly more in number than they have become. But it’s not like the organization sponsor companies’ ability to expense and get related deductions is much lower now than in earlier times.

But marketing expenditures often get toyed with when times are perhaps too good or expected to be bad and earnings management is the driver of the day.

dollar

Got my Choice points into my account today.

GUWonder

Hyatt packages all grabbed within the first 2 seconds at most — and probably more likely within the first second or so.

josephstern

Not really. At 10:15, people are still holding the big one in their carts. Probably scripters having fun with the rest of us.

Sold out at 10:19.