You're right. Nothing is better than searching for an award online.

BTW, Hilton's new beta site allows members to view and book award reservations online.

starry-eyed - There are many people on this site with more miles and points than I have. But they are older, crankier and not as attractive as I am. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

I have the top status that can be earned at United and Hyatt, and have lifetime privileges in both of these programs as a result of reaching this status year after year. Other airlines have similar elite levels to United. The other hotels also have equivalent levels to Hyatt. I am not sure if the other hotels offer the lifetime perk that Hyatt does.

Most of the programs name their tier levels something different. For example Platinum at Hyatt is “mid-tier” while Platinum at Starwood is their top tier. (Maybe this is a bad example. In this comparison I think these two Platinum levels are equivalent http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif)

You can look at any of the hotel or airline websites get the basics on the different status levels, how to earn them and what they give you. Beyond this basic information, there is Flyertalk.



[This message has been edited by divaof travel (edited Mar 10, 2004).]

My fancy schmancy hotel spreadsheet
 

My answer to the "What did you do while FT was down?" question:

Other than trolling TireFlock, I updated my old hotel spreadsheet that I used long ago to help me determine which program was optimal for my stays. I made significant overhauls - my formulae calculate elite levels based on the rules of the programs (stays or nights, award stays for HH but not for others, etc.), calculate points earned based on the corresponding level, etc. So now I can enter custom user data for # nights/yr., # stays/yr., avg. cost/nt., avg. non-hotel credit card spend per month on your primary CC, # of car rentals per year, # of award stays/nights/yr., and a couple of other parameters.

Then I created four profiles for award use:
(1) The Mileage Hoarder: I take every single hotel point I get and convert it to FF miles at the most optimal rate possible within the hotel program.
(2) The Frequent Weekend Getaway: I take all of my hotel points and spend them on weekend stays. 2-night stays in Cat 2 hotels (all programs).
(3) The Major Vacation Redemptions: I take all of my hotel points and redeem them for the "best" awards in high-end properties in each program. (Cat 5 SPG, Cat 6 MR and HH). The formula assumes that you redeem the optimal award but calculates "value" per night - this puts all the programs on a level footing even through SPG, HH, and MR all put their optimal awards at different lengths (5, 6, and 7 nights respectively).
(4) A blend of 2 and 3 - which is me. :)

I assume you carry all three credit cards and you use the right one for each hotel stay. I assume you have three choices for your PRIMARY credit card for non-hotel spending:
(1) HH Amex
(2) SPG Amex
(3) An FF card

I started to run the numbers for using the MR Visa as your primary card, but there was so little value in doing that that I gave up.

I added a field where you could plug in your expected per-stay-online-booking bonus by program.

So anyway, I create all these fancy-schmancy algorithms and dump in all of my numbers, and voila! I get my results...

And boy were they anticlimactic... :eek:

Basically, the result for me was this: Make the SPG Amex my primary card, and pick any of the three programs, and my total rewards would be roughly the same, plus or minus 10%, in all three programs! SPG Amex + HH Stays was slightly better for high-end redemptions; SPG Amex + MR Stays was best for cheap weekend stays. SPG Amex + SPG Stays was, oddly, third in all cases.

So I started tinkering with the numbers. A road warrior doing 100 nights and $125/nt + $5000/month non-hotel spending starts to really see a benefit with SPG Amex + HH Stays. Somebody doing only 10 nights at $80/nt with little credit card spending earns few enough points that my "optimal big reward" formula breaks down: you can't really redeem a fourth of a Marriott 087 or an HH GLONP. The low earners still saw faster redemptions and more nights in the cheap-weekend category at MR as a Silver.

Long story short: this confirmed that I'm probably best off doing my paid stays at Marriotts. Their hotels are everywhere and, for the most part, I like them. I have maximum diversification that way: SPG points from Amex, MR points from stays, and HH points - if I need them - can be had with airline mile conversion. But...as long as you use the SPG Amex, you really can't go wrong with your preferred chain. So pick the hotels you like the best! They all roughly yield the same rewards over the course of time. Hilton's recent "devaluation" simply brought them into line with the pack - in fact, the GLONP2 is still a better value than most other rewards.

Both my wife and I are SPG Plats, spending about 25 nights a year each in SPG hotels. BUT, we have a small business that charges about 15-20K per month onto the SPG Amex card. In our case, the points accumulate almost faster than we can spend them, primarily due to the card.
This large influx of points, not to mention the promotions, "working the system", and excellent on-line availability of award stays makes SPG the best program for us. I was a Hyatt Diamond for two years and while its a nice program, there were never hotels where I needed to be in too many cases.

I gave up years ago collecting points with Starwood, Hilton and Marriott.

I just could not justify spending over $100 min. for any room at any of these hotels when my usual spend is about $42 per night including PL fees and taxes.

I have also found that when I do want a resort, I can usually get this resort on PL also saving more money and points again.

I believe the chains will have to give better rewards or reduce their prices to make it worth the while of travelers who pay for rooms out of their own pocket.

As usual the all expense business traveler is a winner. No that anything is wrong with this, it's just that your company is paying a higher fare than is necessary which in turns ups the cost of your products or services.

Regards,
Robert

Robert,

You failed to mention the one exception - Hyatt. Incidental expenses on PL stays earn Gold Passport points. And PL stays qualify as "stays" in the GP program.

Although it is hard to build up a lot of points on incidentals, the “killer award” is the ongoing Hyatt "Faster Free Nights" program. Two PL stay earns a free Hyatt night at any property worldwide, including resorts.

To top it off, Hyatt gives me all the perks on a PL stay (e.g. upgrades, welcome amenities, club access, breakfast) that I would receive on a rack rate stay. (Starwood certainly doesn't do this.)

I spent 10 nights in a suite at Hyatt Maui in December on faster free nights. The revenue I spent to get these free nights was probably around $600. I had to make these hotel stays anyway, so in my opinion I truly received free accommodations worth at least $5,000 from Hyatt in this case.

Satori, your analysis is not entirely objective.
 

I have just scrolled thourgh this entire thread and have found it very informative.

However, some of the assumptions concerning the analyses that were advanced were either too optimistic or flawed.

Satori's analysis of earning free nights is quite useful in showing how an SPG Platinummember could earn points so that he/she could redeem those points for a free night in a short amount of time. His emphasis was on the online booking bonuses and decision to forego the Platinum amenity in lieu of SPG points, as each would earn 500 points, garnering 1,000 points together.

First, although the above may be true for SPG Platinums, and I am not familiar enough to know whether SPG has continued giving online booking bonuses, his analysis also yields the overall flaw with respect to his assumptions, as it clearly shows that one earns 10 times as many SPG points on a simple $100 stay than one would earn from the hotel stay, itself! Moreover, this is further reduced if you are not an SPG Platinum, as you will not be provided with the opportunity to choose the SPG points in lieu of the amenity.

Second, I beleive his reliance on the former bonuses blinded him into thinking that all the other chains regularly give these bonuses, as well, and his decision to consider that one would earn, on average, 1,000 MR points for online booking of hotel space is way off base, IMHO. It is my belief that all the other chains regularly do not provide these booking bonuses, although each, has on occasion, done so. I would think that these should be left out of the equation, except for SPG, and as noted above, his analysis also included an additinal 500 points as an SPG Platinum.

Third, as noted above from others, and most recently by Vulcan, who also happens to be an SPG member, use of an affinity card, can greatly influence one's point earning capabilities. Although one can indeed rack up a great many points using the Hilton cards on and off the hotel's premises, one is really not able to fully utilize them unless they are a Diamond. Marriott's Visa might not be that great off-site but if you stay a great deal at their hotels, a 3x multiplier is quite useful. Vulcan pointed out correctly, that unlike HHonors and their affinity cards, if you are not a top tier in a hotel program == not that much of a road warrior or frequent traveler, SPG can still be quite valuable to you if you charge a fair amount on the SPG AMEX because even though it may only earn you one point/$, and the SPG awards are "quite expensive" when it comes to redemption points vis a vis the other programs, you can still make out very well with SPG because you can rack up a fair number of SPG points over the year, and unlike HHonors where you can triple that number quite easily, your abililty to redeem those points is hindered by your not attaining top tier in that program. However, that is not a concern for SPG properties as their are no capacity controls or blackouts, period.

Therefore, as a not so frequent traveler, who would you rather be:

1). A HHonors Gold who has enough points and then some for a free 5 consecutive night stay at a nice hotel but you are unable to redeem same because there is no availabilty;

or

2). An SPG Gold or no status, who barely scraped out enough points for a 5 night stay, but can book it, because there are no controls on the reward?

I will also point out some further thinking into this.

It may be true that HHonors has devalued its GLON and ALON awards in that it now costs more points to redeem. But it is far worse than that. If you are not a Diamond, who essentially has no reward restrictions, not only has HHonors upped the aforementioned awards, but it also has hiked the per night points that those awards will cost. This means that as a non-Diamond member, you could pay as much as 240,000 HHonors points for the non-consecutive 6 night stay that a Diamond will only pay 175,000 points for. Therefore, under HHonors, unless you are Diamond, you are shafted twice, by their devaluation. Moreover, it bears repeating that if you were to go to Biddingfortravel.com, you would see that a large number of Hilton family properties are represented on that board, and that the rates for the rooms are a fraction of what they would cost to redeem those rooms. For example, I am planning a trip to Nappa/Sonoma this summer and the E/S Napa is the top tier in the Hilton program and would cost me a per night redemptionn of 40,000 HHonors points a nice tidy sum. However, BFT recently disclosed that someone was able to bid a 2 night weekend in August (Weekend and Summer are very high season there) for the cost of $120.00!! That calculates out to 1 HHonor point = $00.0015!!! Not a very good return on your points if you ask me.

Nevertheless, has it has been noted above, if you are a HHonors Diamomd member, the program probably is worthwhile given your travel and spend patterns.

I am unfamiliar with Priority Club as I deem, rightly or wrongly, that most of its non IC properties leave alot to be desired, but I can discuss Hyatt in some detail as that is the program that I have fastened onto as the best for my travel needs.

I am a Diamond in that program, and with a little more effort, I could equally attain Diamond in Hilton because the 25 vs 28 stays is not that different from one another, and nor for that matter from SPG.

However, as I am more of a leisure traveler, and I more often than not spend my own dime, I have to decide which of the various programs to center my efforts on, because to split my stays would yied little effective status in any of the programs.

Although, some lament that Hyatt is not everywhere for their business needs, that is no shortcoming to me, as I do not travel much, and therefore, I focus on areas that I want to go and which likely will have some Hyatt representation. This may not be helpful for your business needs, but again, for a leisure traveler, Hyatt is in enougt markets where this is not a problem when researching that kind of excursion.

Second, it has been noted that Hilton will allow you to earn status on award stays. What has not been noted, is that Hyatt allows this as well, so long as you make at least a $1 charge to your room while on the award stay.

Third, although Diva has noted that unlike all the rest of the chains, Hyatt still honors all its top level perks for its Diamond customers for its PLN stays. However, anecdotal evidence from the PLN board also discloses that with a few property exceptions (Monterrey Hyatt) the rooms given to non-Diamond guests on a PLN rate are not shabby, to say the leasat.

Fourth, Diva has also noted that she and I receive all the perks coicncident with our Status in Gold Passport, and that the stays do count to your status in the Gold Passport program so long as you make at least a $1 charge to the room.

So far as I am aware, none of the other hotel chains will permit a PLN stay to count towards attaining one' status. Although Hyatt does not explicitly state this, the practice of all who have reported on this, regardless of their status in the GP program, is that if you were to have at least that single $1 charge, the stay will be credited as counting towards your status requirments for attaining elite status for next year. This, too, is then another benefit that none of the other programs share.

Fifth, Satori, with his emphasis on booking bonuses and amenties refused has neglected to highlight another very lucrative aspect of the Hyatt GP program.
Although Hyatt may not have these ways to earn points, more often than any of the other chains, does it have various property bonuses whereby you can earn upwards of 2,000 bonus GP bonus points for a stay at a property running such bonuses. These bonuses can be in the form of bonus GP hotel points or FF miles, and sometimes certain hotels run both bonuses concurrently, but you can choose only one or another.

As I am of the mind that one "Render[s] unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's," I only choose the hotel points to earn, as they are far more lucrative in that scheme of things. In any event, Satori indicated that putting aside the FFN promotion that are run twice yearly, for approximately at the very least 6 months combined duration, it would take a considerable amount of time for one to earn a free night at Hyatt. Not so. Hyatt's awards are spaced into 4 categories ranging in point cost from 5,000; 8,000; 12;000 and 15;000 points per night. Three separate stays at hotels with either a 1,500 or 2,000 point GP bonus (and this is not uncommon) and only 1 night at each property with a rate of $100 will net you at a minimum 5,500 points and enough for you to stay for free at a Category 1 hotel.

What really brings home the point, however, is that the above does NOT factor in status of any kind to the above equation (if your are elite you also get a point/spend multiplier based on that status) and it limits one's stays to only 1 night. Obviously, the point earning capacity increases markedly the more night you place onto each stay.

Finally, although Hyatt does not have an explicit affinity card per se, it does allow you to transfer points into the program from either AMEX or Diners Club. Moreover, like all the hotel programs, these transfers are not taxed like the airline FF mile transfers/earnings. I am not sure what the calculation ratio is for am AMEX point vis a vis a Hyatt points, but I do believe it is not as good as the DC transfer of about 2 DC points (corresponds to a $1 spend) into .6 Hyatt points. Inasmuch as Hyatt only provides you with 5 points per $1 spend at its hotels, while Marriott and Hilton are twice that, the .6 rate is not all that bad.

.

Satori, continued....
 

My take is that if you have attained top tier in any program, take your pick, because you will be treated well. I must say, however, that it is my belief that Hyatt's US resorts are quite a bit more posh than either Hilton's or Marriotts. And, since I am not a golfer, the latter two hotel chains' offerings diminish further with respect to yours truly.

If you are not a frequent traveler in that you make status, as I do, by purposefully hopping around to maximize my stays in a year, but wisht o be treated royally while at any property then Hyatt may be for you. However, if you cannot do this, but you are a heavy credit card user in your daily activities, then as Vulcan has pointed out, SPG may very well be to your liking, because the hard earned points that you have earned during the year will likely be able to be redeemed when and where you wish to vacation -- this is no small thing, as many HHonors people know, or will unfortunately learn when they try to redeem their points.

I view Marriotts program as a little better than Hilton's because for one, you do get a point redemption discount on multi-night stays, which Hilton does not provide. Moreover, unlike Hilton, Marriott will let you insert a non reward day into your string of reward days so as to maximize the number of reward days that would qualify for the multi-night discount, consecutive, or not. This more than makes up for Marriott's less than spectacular credit card earnings away from their hotels as compared to Hilton's. But, as noted above, although points earning is easy at Hilton, point redemption is not -- unless you are a Diamond member.

Finally, I place Marriott just where many place its hotels, middle of the road in the sense of you know what you are getting, but not spectacular, either for point earning/redemption purposes, nor for that matter, the hotel properties themselves, outside of certain golf resorts, Marriott does not have any truly 5 US star properties like SPG or Hyatt does. For that matter, I do not think that Hilton does either, but at least it has some standout properties in Europe, whereas Marriott mostly has business oriented hotels

NJUPINTHEAIR - You reinforce some of the reasons I give most of my business to Hyatt.

The value of the affinity card is overblown in this thread, and in my opinion, it is irrelevant when comparing hotel programs. You either have an affinity card or you don't. Everybody who cares enough to read Flyertalk should have one. Almost everything I charge gets me United miles. But unless I want to pay for my airfare, hotel room, or rental car twice, a Hyatt affinity card would not do me any good.

I think it is interesting to note that among the airline programs, there is very little difference in the award structure between the major carriers. But the hotel programs are all over the place.

The most likely chain to get my business besides Hyatt is Starwood (I am elite in both.) But if I have a choice, I will always go with Hyatt. To go with Starwood would be equvalent to frequently using an airline which charges 35,000 miles for a standard domestic award as compared to 25,000 most airlines require. (And this comparison ignores the "killer award" of Faster Free Nights.)

PS – NJUPINTHEAIR , I have moved to NJ.

"as Vulcan has pointed out, SPG may very well be to your liking, because the hard earned points that you have earned during the year will likely be able to be redeemed when and where you wish to vacation "

Case in point. I recently redeemed points for 3 rooms at the Westin Puerto Vallarta 12/27/04-1/1/05, very high season, indeed. Rooms were readily available to book with no hassle. Also, remember with SPG, if you book 4 reward nites, the 5th is free, further reducing the cost in *points.

NJUPINTHEAIR - I will respond to a couple of your points.

First off, like you I travel completely on my own dime and hop around to maximize stays and attain status. I am diamond with Hilton and Starwood Platinum, so I am most familiar with their programs and the type of promotions they have run over the past five years. My analysis is skewed towards earning points from multiple one night stays and burning points for extended stays on my vacations.

With regard to online booking bonuses or stay bonuses - All five of the hotel brands periodically offer stay or booking bonuses throughout the year. I have studied this enough to know that over the course of the year there is in all likelihood a bonus going to be offered for stays that I adjusted to 1,000 points/stay (500 for Starwood) to account for this substantial earning opportunity within any of the five hotel programs. Currently Hilton is offering me 4,000 points for 4 stays. Starwood gave me 2,000 points for three stays in the final months of 2003. Hilton offered my wife 50,000 points for 4 stays a few months ago. As you point out Hyatt has 2,000 point bonuses for many of their properties. Priority Club is currently offering 3,000 points for 3 stays. Marriott has a 10,000 point bonus for 7 nights.

Over the course of the year there will be numerous online and stay bonus points earned by a member loyal to any of the five hotel brands. While at any one time there won't be an assured bonus, I think it is a fair assumption to calculate a bonus per stay when comparing programs because of its frequent occurence. Since it is a significant number of points earned over the course of the year, it would be a relatively inaccurate comparison to not include any online/stay bonus.

Bonuses are the major equalizer for Starwood when comparing with other programs. I haven't gone back to read my posts, but I think I made the point that Platinum status is the equalizing factor for the Starwood program. The 500 points/stay is a huge bonus for platinum members. I recently received an offer from the W in Newark, CA for a $69 weekend rate until Labor Day. I can earn 207 points for my paid stay points (Starwood Gold and Platinum members get 3 starpoints per $1), but the 500 point platinum amenity bonus per stay is the real earning power. I earn 2.5 times more points in bonuses than for the paid rate. Currently there isn't an online booking bonus or stay promotion for Starwood being offered to me (many of the bonuses are targeted), but I am pretty confident there will be another offer before next September and then I will increase my stay frequency and likely earn an extra 1000 Starpoints per stay (assuming 500 points platinum amenity and a 500 point stay bonus) in addition to the small number of points I will earn for the hotel charges.

I also thought I stated that if you are not platinum, then Starwood is not as good a program compared to others in terms of earning capability, but the redemption opportunities are still the best of any program.

Regarding your statement about Hilton - I find it confusing. A diamond or non-diamond member is going to spend 150,000 or 175,000 points for a GLON2 or GLON2P. There is no discount for diamonds. A diamond member has to pay 40,000 points/night for 6 non consecutive nights at a Premium resort.

While I like Priceline and I have used it on many occasions I find it isn't always my cheapest option. Recently Amsterdam has been well over $100 per night on Priceline and that makes my last GLON award pretty valuable for me since I am saving that amount of money and it only cost me $200 in airline miles I transferred into points to get the GLON last May.

I agree that Hyatt is a great program if their hotels are in the places you travel. I wish they had a property in Amsterdam. The majority of my hotel stays are international and the properties, service, and upgrades for my international stays with Hilton and Starwood far exceeds the quality of my stays in US properties. I view my US stays as points runs like when I fly economy flights for miles.

My overall position is that if you travel frequently and you can reach top status in any hotel program, then go for it. I did the Priceline route for a couple of years and I find the extra money for the amenities of top status greatly enhances my travel holidays.

I just reviewed my Starwood account for stays since last July.

19 stays
4,473 points earned for hotel charges.
17,000 points earned for platinum amenity bonuses and stay bonuses and of those more points were for stay bonuses than platinum amenity.

Average of 895 points in bonuses per stay on top of 3 points/$1 in hotel charges.

Of course I am not including the 50,000 point bonus for 5 stays in Australia last July.

Actually, I earned 67,000 Starpoints in bonuses since July 2003 and 4,473 Starpoints for hotel charges. So, bonus points were 15x points awarded for my hotel charges.

I have been quite happy with Starwood's earning capability.

Being a novice in SPG, I did not know that about reward night bookings!
 

IS that for any member Vulcan? If one books weekend nights at a hotel, usually they cost a lower point value at lesser properties, say for 4 consecutive nights including a Thursday night, is the follwoing Monday free?

If so, that sounds really great!

By the way, sorry for mistakenly thinking that you were not top tier in SPG. However, my comments are all the more accurate if one is heavy on credit card point earning and relatively light on stay/travel night accumulation, for SPG's no blackout rule will work quite nicely for those individuals, although the relative class of the room will of course be better to those who hold elite status in SPG.

Kudos to you Satori but I was not stating that SPG is not a good program, rather.....
 

First off, let me congratulate you on your success with SPG. Let me be the first to state, that once I run off the 600,000 HHonors points that I have foolishly obtained over the years without having really used them in a substantial way, my second choice of a hotel program will be SPG, for the very reason that I have noted above -- being primarily a leisure traveller, earning status in even one program is hard enough, but two is quite difficult, and a program that allows you to burn off your potentially high number of SPG points that you have amassed over the years via your credit card use -- without any real blackout periods -- is one that certainly lends itself to thtat type of traveller.

Second, let me add that with respect to the hotel chains noted in this thread -- except for 6 C -- I can confidently say that if you wish to stay at extremely nice properties in Europe, with a great deal of geographic distribution, then being objective, the best is most certainly SPG, unless you wish to travel exclusively thru the UK where Marriott and Hilton hold sway.

With respect to your online booking bonus calculations with respect to the programs, I am unclear of your methodology and your total allocation of the number of points earned from this source to your comparison. However, in my brief analysis of the programs and from my understanding of them from review of various threads on them in FT and happening onto each of the sites, I do believe that SPG is probably the most frequent hotel chain that awards these points for bookings.

Hilton's allocation of a booking bonus of 1,000 points to a reservation is paltry in the scheme of things when reviewing the totat percentage that such a bonus would bring to either a reward for one night or more than one night. Same is true for Marriott. Of course, anything that increases your points is welcome, but in the grand scheme of things, the fact that such bookings are few and far and in between is deminimus for those properties.

With respect to SPG your analysis is spot on, and it would also be beneficial to Hyatt properties where lower per night point redemption rates are the norm. However, as I had hoped to point out, Hyatt has somewhat built into is award scheme an indirect booking bonus for specifc hotels, so in a sense, Hyatt has some form of Booking Bonus -- albeit not requiring an online booking -- as well.

That said, the hotel guests that most benefit from relatively small "booking bonuses" of whatever the source, are those that stay at either a Hyatt or an SPG property because redemption levels are skewed downwards by the natur of the program, and one's point accumulation in each, respectively.

However, I must disagree with you with your lumping your wife's 50,000 bonus point promotion from Hilton in with this form of booking bonus. Hilton, as most know, regularly offers this sort of promotion, usually at least twice annually, an although in some sense it does award one for staying at Hiltons for a short period of time with an enormous number of points, it is not truly an online booking bonus for one can also satisfy the terms of this promotion by making reservations for your stays over the phone to a Hilton rep.

In addition, as I have noted above, the trick with Hilton is not earning enormous number of hotel points, but being able to use them!

Continued Below....

Kudos Satori continued...
 

In addition, let me correct a misimpression of yours. Although I am mostly a leisure traveler, there are some stays of mine that are paid by a buisness or a client. So, I am not purely a leisure traveler as you are.

That said however, I am most impressed that you can qualify for top tier in TWO (2) programs, not just one, but I would submit that with a minimum of 53 nights of lodging required for being top tier in Hilton and Starwood (respectivelly 28 and 25 stays, per year) I would submit that you are not the standard leisure traveler that I am speaking of, for your minimum number of nights far surpases the number of spent by most on a leisure vacation -- come on, man that is nearly 2 months in a hotel room! I doubt very much that the standard nuclear family can afford the expense, much less the time for allocating this to one's vacation scheduling.

However, even if you were required to essentially devote the majority of your resources to earning top tier in just one hotel program, I bet it would be Starwood, for their lack of relative point inflation as compared to the Hilton program, as well as the breadth and overall quality of their hotels compared to that of Hilton, at least presently.

One final thought. You expressed some puzzlement over my assertion that Hilton has devalued its redemption program doubly for those who are not Diamond, as you correctly noted that the per night point cost basis for a Category 6 hotel is the same as for that of a less exalted tier in the HHonors program. That is true, but misses the point, that I obvsioulsy was not clear in making.

With Hilton's lack of blackouts and capacity controls, a Diamond who wishes to stay 6 nights at a given hotel, just does not need to resort to booking that hotel on a per night basis that could cost upwards of 40,000 points per night, by virute of the fact that they possess Diamond in the program and thus never need to resort to such an inflated point redemption.

However, this is not the case for anyone else in the Hilton program who is unlucky enough not to secure 6 consecutive nights at the desired property --and compared to the number of Diamond elites in HHonors, these other folks are legion. Indeed, if you cannot string along 6 consecutive nights at a given property, even if you intersperse a paid night for the gap, you are toast, and then face the prospect of either redeeming a 6 night award for less than the total number of reward nights that it could have provided you, or you have to opt for the per night inflated rate -- and as I have noted above, at least with Marriott, you are given an ever increasing point discount the number of reward nights you stay at a given property, regardless of whether they are interespersed with paid stays. With Hilton, you are SOL, period. Either pay the inflated cost on a per night basis, redeem a 6 night reward for less than full value, or just don't go to that place and expect spending your points. A Hobson's choice, indeed!

In the end, if I might use a phrase made famous by Garret Moriss of SNL fame -- SPG has been "berry, berry, good to" you!!

This observation is not doubt accurate, but certain bonuses that you mentioned such as the 50,000 SPG point Australia is not characteristic of the norm of earning points in that program, and therefore should, IMHO, be viewed as an aberration, and certainly not something you should count on in the future. So too, is the fact that not everyone can just pick up and take an 18 hour (?) flight to OZ more from the East Coast where I resided, especially with kids in tow, as that is just not realistic. Finally, in your last post you correctly identified and added the points that you had earned as an SPG Platinum while staying at SPG properties. That is correct, but I would just like to note that when you posted your intial analysis, you supposedly had taken the credit card point earnings potential out of the equation, and yet now you seem to be adding it into your analysis.

These are not major deficiencies, for as I have noted above, for a leisure traveler, I think that either Hyatt or SPG can be the best choice out there, given their travel and spend patterns. It is just that you had for the most part written Hyatt out of that equation, and I thought that erroneous, that's all.

Happy travels and point earnings!

NJ

Duplicate Post!!
 

Damn, this slow server or whatever is the cause of the difficulty in logging onto and staying in FT!! I have been booted off this line twice, now, and I have either lost the details of what I had been writing, or it has posted twice in my efforts to save it!!

Randy, the new site is amazing, but the speed must somehow be increased! I am sure you are working on it, and that is why I have not piled on to the posts whining about the slowness of the new site as that must be obvious to anyone and everyone. I am just expressing my frustation with getting my thoughts to post correctly in the first place! :mad: :eek: ^ ^_ :confused: :)

divaof travel -- Thanks for starting this discussion! Very interesting reading, great points being made by pinniped, NJUPINTHEAIR, satori, Rut Dog, MileKing, Bourne, Patron and many others.

You named this thread "Hotel program objective comparisons" (bolding is mine). IMHO, such thing is very elusive (if it exists at all). One can not make a meaningful comparison without taking into account personal travel paterns, both in earning and spending points.

Availability of desirable properties in locations where you need and/or want to travel is critical. One other thing, is how you feel at those properties. As an example, if you are accustomed to Park Hyatts, Four Points or DoubleTree would not match your style. And under no circumstances (OK, almost no circumstances) one should stay at a place he/she feels uncomfortable just because of points (I know, I know, this goes against the grain for some die-hard points/miles collectors). After all, points and miles are not the goal, they are means to achieve that goal of wonderful travel experiences, right?

Earning abilites in many loyalty programs these days (and hotel programs are no exception by any means) are not really determined by a simple "points-per-$-spent" ratio. Numerous promotions (some as spectacular as 50,000 points for 4 stays at HH properties, in various reincarnations repeated just about yearly for the last few years), co-branded credit card earnings, special elite bonus points (e.g., SPG Platinum Amenity 500 points) are truly making the difference in earning power. Many people earn the bulk of their points through such bonuses, thus greatly decreasing the $$ needed to be spent per an award day. One thing is clear that you can not predict whether such promotions will continue in the future and which program will be the most generous in the coming year. One can only make an educated guess and hope his/her assumptions are the right one, and if not, re-evaluate that choice for the next year.

With some programs the real difference becomes apparent only when you reach the highest tier (e.g., HHonors Diamond). As was properly noted earlier in this thread, HH Diamond Award Desk beats otherwise excellent SPG Platinum Concierge when it comes to oversold situations. As an example, being SPG Platinum last year (since then dropped to Gold) did not help getting an award room at the Sheraton Suites KC when their standard room inventory became exhausted (that's the only room type that is guaranteed to be available for awards if it is available for sale. Never mind they had plenty of higher class rooms available for purchase, yet SPG Platinum Concierge was not helpful in getting an inventory override, so I had to reschedule my stay there. In a similar situation, when I needed an award stay at the Hilton Hawaiian Village and there was no inventory for an award at an extremely busy time, HH Diamond Award Desk made a special arangement with the peoperty, paid them their going revenue rate (so for the hotel it was a regular paid
reservation at a pretty high rate) and simply deducted an appropriate amount of points from my HH account. Excellent upgrade followed as well.

Such personal experience made me conclude that for me it makes sense to keep my HH Diamond status as being anything but would not have helped me much in case of a complete sellout. SPG, on the other hand, is a very good program for just about any level member, and while being Platinum helps getting nicer upgrades and Platinum Amenity points, I feel pretty content being Gold, as I'm treated pretty well at that level too.

Another issue is getting upgrades to suites. While it may be important to others, it is not much of an issue for me (the most spectacular upgrades I ever had were at the Westins in Kansas City and Washington, DC, multi-room Presidential-level suites, but I was traveling on business, alone and did not have to impress anyone or even enjoy it myself because of late arrival and early departure).

Please do not take the above as an endorsement of one program over another! I'm just giving another point of reference, describing experiences based on my personal travel patterns and interests. Other people have different travel patterns and therefore, likely different experiences.

Bottom line: if you are about to make a decision on which brand to patronize for the foreseeable future, do not make such a decision without carefully analyzing your personal travel patterns, priorities, tastes, and yes, earning and redemption opportunities. Shifting some of the "auxilliary" earning means (e.g., credit cards) may be in order to maximize the effect.

Whatever choices you make, remember to enjoy your travel and stay safe!

As Usual, Eugene has summed up the situation succinctly!
 

And brilliantly, I may add.

Thank you Eugene for again pointing out a little quirk about SPG that I had no idea about, probably because I rarely patronize the properties. I agree with you that although suite upgrades are quite nice, they are not a preequisite to my staying at a certain hotel, just so long as I am assured of getting at least a nice room from their inventory.

Although you have had very good experiences with the Diamond Desk, I have not, and unfortunatley, and more to the point, neither has some other members of FT.

I need not detail to you the latest snafu concerning the failure of the Paris Arc de Triomphe property to open on time, and the abject failure as reported by both BKNIAZ and DINGO on the remedies suggested for their upcoming stays.

Unfortunately, this type of customer service is becoming all too frequent from the likes of HHonors. Where there was once a great response to our concerns, now it is almost nil. I understand that Adam is quite busy with other responsibilities and pursuits, and I don't begrudge Hilton upping the points requirements for its rewards.

However, what I do resent are the changes to the program and the broken promises to us withoug so much as a heads up to us. This is unforgiveable in my opinion.

Although you and others still report excellent service to meet your needs, I am sad to note that this often is not the case anymore. I just hope that Hilton keeps its end of the bargain with respect to your brand loyalty.

Best regards,

NJUP

Great posts everyone!
 

All excellent reading. Since it would take me forever to quote each individual section, I'll just respond with my thoughts here.

(1) Availability of awards. Forgive me for being relatively new to SPG here, but I'm not totally convinced about this No Capacity Controls thing. I've just tried to search for awards on two weekends - this past weekend in STL and four weeks from now in CVG. In both cases, all SPG awards were/are sold out at all levels of hotel from Four Points to Westin. I could book rooms in those exact hotels everywhere on the Internet - Expedia.com, Travelocity.com, etc. - but not at SPG.com. They had effectively manufactured a "sellout" situation by shifting their availability to the third-party agents. As folks on the SPG board have pointed out, I might have had luck invoking the Best Rate Guarantee to get a points-earning rate at the hotel instead of booking the Expedia Special Rate. But...I wanted a FREE room. No dice.

Marriott.com and beta.hilton.com had plenty of availability for award rooms.

Also, in the past, I've used two ALONs and two weeklong Marriott awards - a total of 4 weeks in Hawaii on all 4 of the main islands. I got those awards without any trouble, and I've never been top-tier. In addition to the Cincy stay, I have a weekend Marriott award stay coming up. I have never had an availability problem with either program.

My point is: if SPG plays games with their availability on my cheap Ohio weekend at Four Points, what do they do with their premium properties? Will I EVER be able to use my SPG points at a top-shelf hotel? I'm start to wonder, even as I am now starting to earn boatloads of Starpoints from the SPG Amex.

(2) The affinity cards: you have to take them into account if you are seriously considering the hoarding of hotel points. Their impact is MASSIVE - it can dwarf the impact of the hotel stays themselves, in some cases. But even if you do enough volume that it doesn't, why would you ever check into a Hilton on a points-earning rate with the (no annual fee) HH Amex?

(3) Others are bringing up Priceline again. Hey, you're singin' to the choir. :) I wish I could use Priceline more and points-earning rates less. But I do have some business stays, and I do have some leisure stays where I am willing to pay more for the Homewood Suites/Residence Inn-type hotel, so I set up my calculations to help me determine where I should do those stays. I expressed my rewards in terms of # of Free Nights my personal favorite rewards: the Cat 2 weekends and the Cat 5/6 weeklong stay. I took dollar value out of it because I tried not to get hung up on whether I was really going to do that Cat 6 week in a good Priceline zone or not. I just don't know...

(4) Booking bonuses. Oddly enough, I generally don't get them that much. Then again, I usually pick a property that I like and then book it, so I'm not going out of my way looking for which of the three big chains happens to have a booking bonus at the time. I can tell there are a couple of serious mileage runners here who have hit home runs with bonuses upon bonuses with the programs. I haven't gone out on a purposeful hotel run since my pursuit of ALONs via cheap Hampton nights in 2002... My figures assume normal hotel stays. No "crazy" bonuses. Although an extra 500 or 1000 here or there would be nice. :)

(5) At the end of this all, I've decided to obsess far less about a hotel chain than I used to. Since I've made SPG Amex my primary card, I will always and forever be awash in Starpoints. Since I don't do heavy business travel anymore, I will never reach a top-tier. And since I usually like TownePlace Suites and Residence Inns, I'll probably sort of stick with Marriott for paid stays - but with an eye out for a good Hilton here or there, at least as long as they keep mailing me or my family free Gold cards. :D That way, when I want a free room, I'll have a couple of programs to pick from.

[QUOTE=NJUPINTHEAIR]

With respect to your online booking bonus calculations with respect to the programs, I am unclear of your methodology and your total allocation of the number of points earned from this source to your comparison. However, in my brief analysis of the programs and from my understanding of them from review of various threads on them in FT and happening onto each of the sites, I do believe that SPG is probably the most frequent hotel chain that awards these points for bookings.

Satori response - Let me be clear in that I am lumping stay bonuses with online bonuses. All the chains run periodic promotions for bonus points for online booking or for a certain number of stays. A search of any hotel program on Flyertalk will show numerous opportunities. Most require registration. I watch for them and sign up for everything I can.

My calculations when I compared hotel programs was to assume 1000 points/stay earned with Hilton, Hyatt, Marriott, and Priority Club. Over the course of the year if a person has 20 stays with any of these programs I contend that they will in all likelihood earn 20,000 bonus points. The key is to be aware of and sign up for these promotions. Flyertalk is the awareness tool. Most of the bonuses I received for my Starwood stays this past year were from promotions I saw on Flyertalk and then registered. I even changed most of my reservations in Australia while on vacation because a new promo came up after I had taken off on my trip.


[QUOTE=NJUPINTHEAIR]
Hilton's allocation of a booking bonus of 1,000 points to a reservation is paltry in the scheme of things when reviewing the totat percentage that such a bonus would bring to either a reward for one night or more than one night. Same is true for Marriott. Of course, anything that increases your points is welcome, but in the grand scheme of things, the fact that such bookings are few and far and in between is deminimus for those properties.

satori - When I compared programs I was looking at what a typical member will earn in total for a year's stays. Booking and bonus promotions will be earned and since that is the majority of earning for Starwood members, then it was necessary for me to factor in some earning for the other programs.

[QUOTE=NJUPINTHEAIR]
With respect to SPG your analysis is spot on, and it would also be beneficial to Hyatt properties where lower per night point redemption rates are the norm. However, as I had hoped to point out, Hyatt has somewhat built into is award scheme an indirect booking bonus for specifc hotels, so in a sense, Hyatt has some form of Booking Bonus -- albeit not requiring an online booking -- as well.

That said, the hotel guests that most benefit from relatively small "booking bonuses" of whatever the source, are those that stay at either a Hyatt or an SPG property because redemption levels are skewed downwards by the natur of the program, and one's point accumulation in each, respectively.

Satori - I agree. Hyatt and SPG have the inherent complexity in that their earning and redemption rates are markedly different from the other three programs where 10 points/$ is the standard.

[QUOTE=NJUPINTHEAIR]
However, I must disagree with you with your lumping your wife's 50,000 bonus point promotion from Hilton in with this form of booking bonus. Hilton, as most know, regularly offers this sort of promotion, usually at least twice annually, an although in some sense it does award one for staying at Hiltons for a short period of time with an enormous number of points, it is not truly an online booking bonus for one can also satisfy the terms of this promotion by making reservations for your stays over the phone to a Hilton rep.

satori - Again I am looking at what a typical member can be expected to earn over the course of a year. I don't make a distinction between online booking and stay bonuses. I just use a factor to account for extra points that will likely be earned for a hotel stay whether that is booking or a stay bonus.

[QUOTE=NJUPINTHEAIR]
In addition, as I have noted above, the trick with Hilton is not earning enormous number of hotel points, but being able to use them!

satori - I learned that when I started transferring my 1,000,000 LatinPass miles into HHonors points in 2000. That is why I became Hilton diamond in 2001 and I have maintained that status. 2,000,000 HHonors points is no big deal if you can't use them. Most of my award stays are coordinated through the Diamond desk, particularly since I wait until a week or two before travel to make reservations.

I am so angry at the technical problems with Flyertalk because I have wasted 90 minutes with detailed responses that would have benefited the community, but my posts aren't posting and I lose it all. I should be typing in Word and paste. Now I don't have the time or inclination to do it a third time.


I see you had similar problems NJ. Makes it difficult to have a good discussion on the points raised.


Quick response to NJ - The 17,000 bonus points did not include any credit cards. On average I earned over 500 points per stay with my paid Starwood stays from promotions for online booking or stays. Many of the platinum amenity points were earned on award stays when there were no sdditional bonuses.


I actually had about 80 hotel nights in 2003. Mostly HHonors awards. Only spent about $2,500. I haven't been able to utilize Hyatt's great 2 stay promo because I use up my time trying to maintain Starwood status on paid stays and burning off HHonors points on the old point structure.

Now I am ready to jump on Hyatt when the next Stay 2 promo comes around.

I recognized a 50,000 point promotions from Starwood was exceptional. That is why I changed my summer holiday from a Scandic hotels tour of Scandinavia to an Australian trip. I learned three years ago from Flyertalk that Diners Club had loads of potential. 24,000 BA miles the first year, 50,000 mile transfers from American Airlines and United Airlines per year into Diners Club and then to British Airways. Two first class tickets from USA-London-Australia were booked in the first week of June 2003 for $480. $480 and about $1,000 in cost for the miles from AA and UA for two 31,000 mile first class roundtrips.

Flyertalk is the resource for learning how to travel in luxury on a middle class budget.

I follow the promotions and generally I am able to travel luxuriously while earning the big bonuses.

That happened to me too, twice yesterday. Now, before clicking on "Submit Reply", I highlight and copy my message to memory, so in case of a BB hickup I would not lose what I wrote.

AMEX MR points to Hyatt?
 

I thought you could only use AMEX MR points for certificates at Hyatt and not transfer points directly into a Hyatt Passport account. Am I missing something here?

If I do a calculation for the certificates, It is pretty expensive considering I have to pay 25,000 AMEX MR points for a 1 night Premier Level stay. This cost works out to be more expensive than transferring 21,000 AMEX MR points to *W netting 7,000 *W points for a category 3 stay. Am I seeing this wrong or just missing something.

christianj - What are the Hyatt hotel choices with the 25,000 point AMEX MR reward?

I'll weigh in as a Priceline defectee for personal trips. If I'm travelling on business, I usually go Hilton, my 1a choice is Holiday Inn. I quickly figured out that you got more extra nights by paying $50-$100 less per night than by multiple stays at a moderately discounted rate. Priority Club is also much easier to redeem rewards, by far. I prefer to do my reservations over the web, and Hilton doesn't allow reward reservations on-line. PC will. I use the "cheater" sies like biddingfortravel to see what hotels are offered and a little instinct and have gotten some great deals. However, if the Priceline stay is within $10 per night of what I can book with my preferred chain, then I take the chain. I was able to get the Crowne Plaza in Sydney for $85 per night, and I quit bidding on Priceline at $80, not knowing where I woule be placed.

YMMV

redbeard: you can now book HH awards online at beta.hilton.com. It's a surprisingly good site :), and I've found availability whenever I've looked for it.

I am also having a hard time figuring this out exactly! Here is the link I found:

https://certificates.hyatt.com/

First click on the Hyatt Certificates stay link. If you then click on the participating locations link they show several hotels with the premier award but I can't figure the list out exactly as some hotels show several different kinds of awards.

Maybe someone can make sense of this!

Seems to be a cash value certificate. The hotel classes are for reference only. So it seems 25,000 Amex MR points gets you a certificate worth $165.

So looking at your previous comparison, is a $165 certificate from Hyatt that costs 25,000 points as valuable as 1 night at a cat 3 *wood costing 21,000? I would say that is comparable.

Any of these MR points are probably better spent on an airline ticket or another award.