Hotel program objective comparisons
 

Does anybody know of a resource which compares hotel programs by the award received for the revenue dollars spent?

I have been Diamond gold passport at Hyatt for years, and was recently comped platinum status at Starwood. A cursory glance at the programs tells me I have to spend $4,000 revenue at starwood to get one night at Sheraton or Westin Maui. In the Hyatt program, I only have to spend $2300 for the much better HR Maui.

Welcome to FlyerTalk!

FWIW, I usually take other's analyses on these things with a grain of salt, because the comparison is often very individualized. That aside, I don't know off hand of a chart anywhere that does a bare bones comparison. I think it'd be awfully tricky.

The big hotel programs talked about here most often seem to be Starwood and Hilton HHonors. I am an HHonors die hard because of the credit cards and the extensive inventory of properties, as well as the ability to transfer miles to points. Others are Starwood diehards because of their excellent credit card (Amex), the availability of award stays, and the ability to transfer points to miles.

Just that information alone is enough to confuse the comparison issue: points to miles, miles to points, credit card spending as a factor in earnings. And if you're using your credit card at the properties, that rakes in even more points which is very important to your comparison.

And on the redemption side, you should be aware of the HHonors VIP awards which discount a 6 night stay. 40K points per night at Hilton Hawaii resorts, but 6 nights is only 175K or <30K per night.

You could probably do your own comparison in a few hours. If you do so, please post your results. I, for one, am always interested in seeing a new angle on things.


[This message has been edited by Rut Dog (edited 07-19-2003).]

I am not sure of your math in the "$4,000 to get 12,000 Starpoints" comment. Many times their is a 500 pt bonus for online sign ups and AMEX offers 500-1000 bonus starpoints for your 1st 6 stay using their card. So there are many was to increase your points therefore reducing that $4,000 spendind threshold. But i agree that it is an individual comparision skewed by each to fit their preference. I hate Hilton because they have capacity controls for beach properties in the summer and Ski prop in the winter. Whats the point to earning points if you cant stay where you want, when you want to do it. Plus there two Hawaii properties are a joke.( you cant even compare to Starwood or Hyatt).

My humble opinion.

These are common complaints. However, the Hilton capacity restrictions can often be overidden by individual hotel management. I have never been unable to get an award room on a given date in a given city, despite blackouts. Sometimes I have to take a second or third choice property, but I've always gotten a room.

That said, I haven't done much "resorting" with Hilton, and so when you are seeking one particular property in high season for that area, it could prove quite difficult. On the other hand, I recently booked a 6 night stay at a Pointe Hilton Phoenix resort with minimal effort.

And I can't compare Hilton Hawaii with any other (never been to any), but I do know there are many, many satisfied customers that post frequently in the Hilton forum. Hawaii, Cabo, Phoenix, Cancun, Hilton Head, Conrad Singapore, Hong Kong, Paris, London... But I digress.

I'm merely trying to show both sides of the issue, and I have no interest in convincing anyone to switch to HH from SPG or any other program. In fact, in light of capacity control, please, do stay in another program.

Happy comparing.

The way you phrase your question assumes that there's a constant ratio of dollars spent per the value of the night awarded. In some hotel programs it may be closer to constant but in most it's far from it.

For example, you mentioned Hyatt. You didn't specify which night of the week. And you didn't specify how often in which months you might stay at Hyatts.

If you only stay at a Hyatt once every 4 months, you don't qualify for any promotions, so you're probably right. But if you stay twice during the current Faster Free Nights promotion, you get a free night for every two paid ones. Except the free night must be a weekend night (and only redeemable for a few months). So if you need a weekend night, it's of much higher value than if you can't possibly use a weekend night, in which case it's of no value. By extension, if you can make great use of FFN, then that makes Hyatt by far the greatest earning ratio (but ONLY WHEN you're using FFN).

Then there's the fact that the availabilty of bonus offers differs by ORDERS OF MAGNITUDE between different programs. And the publicizing of those bonus programs differs a lot too. So, for example, if you are willing to spend enough time reading FlyerTalk to learn about Priority Club's simultaneous 8600..8604 promos where you can earn 55000 bonus point (not counting the platry regular points you earn for one-night stays) for 10 stays, which can be redeemed for 5 nights at many Holiday Inn Expresses, or 2 nights at better Holiday Inns, or I don't know how many nights at their even higher-end properties, AND you have been able to stay 10 nights at Priority Club properties during the current promo period (ending Aug 15), then who cares how much you regularly earn at Priority Club hotels (because reading deeper in Flyer Talk you'll see they keep running promos like this over and over).

But it also gets more complicated depending on whether you're also after miles (and with which airline[s]) or care not a single bit about that. Because at Holiday Inn or Express you earn paltry per-dollar-spent points or paltry per-dollar-spent miles with domestic airlines, but for example earn 500 miles per stay with BA among other international airlines, and in combination with the above points promo you can earn double miles in their "25000" promotion at the same time! So this is a super value if you need miles in such a program on top of getting free hotel nights, but not as great a value if you have no use for any of the mileage programs at which you earn the high per-stay rate.

Similarly, the Hitlon HHonors program gives you both miles and points for each stay (normally, not only during promos), while Starwood and Hyatt give you only one or the other, so again it's hard to compare without knowing your exact situation. (Priority Club is also only miles or only points OTHER THAN for the bonuses which you're likely to only find out about on FlyerTalk.)

Meanwhile, all the math you can do about ratios doesn't mean much if you can't figure out a way to factor award availability into the ratio, since award availability differs between the different programs quite a bit (but, again, not in a way that can be distilled into a single number that works for everyone, since some programs have better award availability in some locations than others, or on some days of the week than others, or in some of their brands than others, or in some regions or countries than others).

I am both a Hilton Diamond and a Starwood Platinum member, a few years ago I was also a Marriott upper tier member, but do not have much experience with Hyatt. If I have discovered one common fiber between the loyalty programs that I am a member of: it is they do not reciprocate the loyalty I show them. You can’t compare one program to another because the awards you are saving for: could and probably will be changed before you get to use them. In the past few months Hilton raised the points required to use some of its most popular awards by fifty percent and more. They eliminated some of the most economical awards with absolutely no notice. Starwood made significant changes in its program (although not as severe as Hilton) just recently as well. I left the Marriott program several years ago when they changed the point level for the award I was saving for; by forty percent. The "point" I am trying to make is unless you plan on using the awards in the very near term no comparison can be made between programs because none of us know what the future will hold and what program will do.

I have found one program that I have begun to implement this year that is working and providing instant rewards. I now book my hotel stays thru discounters like Priceline and am taking the money I save as my reward. I have discovered that rooms in hotels I once paid $120 per night: for now cost $40. To figure out how much I save does not take any math genius. Saving $80 per night for fifty nights a year puts $4,000 in my pocket. With Hilton and Starwood after deducting for the taxes I would get points on about $100 per stay. Being a Diamond and with some promotions I could get about 20 points per dollar after fifty nights I may get 100,000 points. Starwood as a Platinum, five points per dollar might be a stretch but for arguments sake, lets say you get 25,000 points in Starwoods program.

If you wish to utilize the Hawaii comparison charts as listed above, than Hilton and Starwood are about equal at offering approximately two and one half nights each. How many nights do you think you can get with $4,000 dollars however? How many more with Priceline rates?

If your boss is paying the room there is no reason not to take the extra perks, but for personal stays. Shopping around is the best program of all! Last year I told everyone I knew how great the Hilton program was and now they are asking me how to use the orphan points they have accrued. I won’t recommend any program because I have no way to telling what the future holds!

I am mid-tier on HH, Marriott, and Starwood. All three of the programs have their strong points and weaknesses. The questions you have to answer for yourself will determine which one is best for you:

- First and foremost, should you use Priceline and forget about paying 2x or 3x Priceline rates to earn points?

If you make it past that hurdle and decide that you will pay points-earning rates, move on to the following:

- How many revenue stays/nights do you do in a year? Would you be able to qualify for top-tier or mid-tier in one of the programs? That can make a difference: as Rut Dog points out, the key complaint about HH (award availability) mostly goes away when you hit the Diamond level.

- What is your dream reward, and is that the driving force behind your using a hotel program? If you are gunning for a free week at an upscale romantic hotel on Maui, then Hilton is out and Marriott might not be a great choice either if they sell the Renaissance Wailea. (Although Marriott points can be redeemed for Ritz stays, the redemption rates are pretty harsh.) If you don't care as much about 1 particular award but want a lot of flexibility to use points for a variety of stays, then Hilton and Marriott look better because they have so many properties.

- Do you do revenue stays across a variety of hotel classes and locations? If so, Marriott and Hilton are again best bets with their mid-scale and long-stay chains and more rural and suburban coverage.

- Can you take advantage of the good promotions when they arise? If you can do that, then Hyatt may truly be your best bet with that FFN thing they keep doing. Marriott sometimes has stay-three-get-a-free-weekend deals. Hilton had massive promotions in 2001 and 2002 and has been hesitant to do anything big in 2003.

Talk about bang for buck: using those massive Hilton promotions, I earned 2 weeks in Hawaii from about $2000 worth of my normal business stays in 2001 and 2002. Had to occasionally hotel-hop during a week (and I threw in the occasional peronsal Hampton stay to hit the thresholds), but it paid off with free weeks in Oahu and the Big Island. So bang for the buck varies widely when promotions are involved as your earning power can be magnified by 10x or more.

pinniped - You earned two free weels in Hawaii with HHonors with only $2K in revenue? Pelase elaborate.

Ken in Phs - I understand I get 2.5 points per dollar as starwood Platinum. That means $4,000 gets 10,000 points which I believe is the requirement for Sheraton or Westin Maui.

With Hyatt I get 6.5 points per dollar. A night at HR Maui or Kauai is 15,000 points, or $2308. I understand I can get 500 point bonuses at Starwood properties, and that helps. But I also seem to always be getting "Faster Free Nights" at Hyatts.

I'm looking for a reason to changefrom Hyatt, as I now have lifetime Diamond status. But it seems I have to spend many more revenue dollars to get to a prime resort with Starwood.

I'm on an expense account for collecting the points, so I don't get to pocket any savings by booking on Priceline.

With several 50,000 point promotions, online booking bonuses, etc. etc. I believe it was possible to get two six night stays in Hawaii with just two thousand dollars spending two years ago.

Times have changed significantly however and with new award schedules and the limitations of promotions, you would probably only be entitled to one night today. I doubt it is even possible to get two nights much less two weeks now!

[This message has been edited by cygone (edited 07-21-2003).]

In 2001 and 2002, HH had promotions that awarded 50,000 bonus points for 4 stays. There were maybe a half-dozen different promo codes going, and they would sign you up for one right after the other.

I did 16 stays and earned about 250,000 HH points. I hotel-hopped all over Tampa a couple of times while on business, plus did a few of my own Hampton stays to finish off the promos. (It was an excuse to do a couple of weekend roadtrips to some interesting rural locations. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif ) Total revenue was about $2k, total cost out of my pocket was probably $300 or so for the personal Hampton stays.

This is the one time since the inception of Priceline where I've seen a hotel promo actually be more lucrative than Priceline - if you can fit it into your pattern of stays and if you actually want to go to Hawaii.

Now the 50k promos are gone and it costs 75% more HH points to go to Hawaii (up from 100k to 175k for 6 free nights). I would imagine that it would you 6x or 8x more revenue now to earn the 350k points you'd now need to do this trip.

[This message has been edited by pinniped (edited 07-21-2003).]

I put together a quick spreadsheet, and here is what I came up with.

1)I compared free nights at Maui between Starwood, Hyatt and Marriott. All have properties on Kaanapali beach. I compared Hilton Waikaloa Village.
2)I used the cheapest awards I could find.
3)I assumed top-tier elite earning for all programs.
4)I ignored bonus points beyond the elite bonuses, as most of the programs provide something in this regard.

Results:

Starwood - $3,200 revenue per free night (includes the 5th night free.)

Hyatt - $2,308 revenue per free night

Hilton - $1,944 revenue per free night (Diamond level award)

Marriott - $1,264 revenue per free night

Conclusions:

This analysis may not be relevant to others, but it is to me, as these are the type of properties where I would use awards. I was surprised by the results.

The Hyatt program changed about 1 1/2 years ago. It used to take half as many points, and when I ran this analysis in 1991, they were an obvious choice for my business.

Starwood is clearly the worst value by far for this analysis, and Marriott is the clear winner. If not for the faster free nights at Hyatt, I would change to Marriott.

There is a BIG difference here.

I have reduced my travel to the extent that I “only” would spend about $15K/year at any of these chains. This is all on an expense report, so using Priceline would not benefit me at all. This translates to 12 nights at the Maui Marriott, vs. only five at the Westin or Sheraton. Hyatt would give me 7 nights, but, with the continuing faster free nights, I would get an additional 10–20 weekend nights per year.

The airline miles are insignificant compared to what I earn on United anyway, and the affinity cards are ubiquitous.

I look forward to more commentary from all of you.


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United UGS
Hyatt Lifetime Diamond
Starwood Platimun

With those data points, here are a couple more factors in favor of Marriott:

- They are everywhere and have a consistently nice product for the business customers. Urban Marriotts are, for the most part, very nice. They have fewer oddball bad properties than Sheraton and Hilton, IMHO. (I don't have enough Hyatt experience to comment on them.)

- You are doing enough volume to earn some of the best ongoing rewards out there, IMHO: the Marriott travel packages with 120,000 FF miles plus 7 nights' stay.

One possible issue: your Marriott choices on Maui are going to be limited very soon. The Kaanapali location is going all-timeshare and the smaller, romantic Renaissance Wailea is converting to Starwood (a 'W' hotel). That leaves an Outrigger that has recently converted to Marriott (I sense you want something more luxurious than this) or the Ritz Kapalua (fabulous golf destination, but very expensive in terms of MR points required).

I should consider the move. What are some of th best Marriott resort properties out there? There is more than just Maui. I have enough Hyatt points to stay at HR Maui for one week evry year for the next seven years if I want to anyway.

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United UGS
Hyatt Lifetime Diamond
Starwood Platimun

Thanks for the analysis, divaoftravel. I have a spreadsheet that calculates "value" I receive on stays of varying length, at varying dollar amounts, and at the different elite levels at Hilton, Marriott, and Starwood properties (I stay at Hyatts very rarely). The concept is the same as yours, except it is more generic rather than being specific to award redemption in one location.

The analysis of where the "value" really lies is rather complex, as a good deal depends on what value you place on an HHonors points vs. a Marriott point, etc. The room rate itself also impacts the analysis in some cases in unexpected ways.

For a nightly room rate of $100 by a top tier member at a full service property (i.e. no Courtyards or Hampton Inns or Four Points), they stack up the way you described....Marriott, Hilton, Starwood. However, from my view, the differences are nowhere near as large as your analysis would suggest. For example, my spreadsheet suggests that for a 1-night ($100) stay (top tier member), one would receive $15.66 of "value" at a Marriott, $14.85 at a Hilton, and $14.48 at a Starwood.

However, at the lower tier levels (Gold and Silver, or Base in Starwood), Hilton still beats Marriott unless you are paying $200+ per night for a room. Starwood, again, comes in last.

If you start considering stays at the non-full service properties, you have more complexity. Surprisingly, Marriott Platinum does come out on top here too. The picture is less clear at the Gold and Silver levels as the better deal will depend on how often you visit full service vs. non-full service properties. Even so, if you spend any significant time at non-full service Hiltons (i.e. Hampton Inn), Marriott will be a better bet.

It is hard for me to ignore these results, and I may be forced to reconsider going for HHonors Diamond status again next year.

I thoroughly enjoyed my 1-week award stay at the Marriott Kauai. Nice hotel and grounds, great location, excellent treatment for Golds (big upgraded room, welcome gift). Sadly no concierge lounge, but that wasn't a big deal to us since we could buy a twelve-pack and snacks down the street and sit on our big balcony overlooking the ocean.

There are no Big Island Marriotts. (Edited to add the Outrigger Waikaloa might have converted to a Marriott. I don't really know. This appears to be a less expensive mid-scale family hotel. I've been on the grounds to catch a boat tour, but never stayed there.)

I am not an Oahu fan and haven't stayed at a Marriott there. (It sounds like there are a couple of so-so ones and one really nice one. See the MR board for more details.)

[This message has been edited by pinniped (edited 07-21-2003).]

To be fair to Starwood (and I am no great fan) does offer a nights and flights award that would give you 50,000 FF miles and five nights hotel for 70,000 points. Even if you did not want the miles you could convert the miles ironically to 100,000 Hilton points.

The other comparison point that is not taken into account here and is especially true in the Hawaii arena is the availabiltiy of the awards. With Marriot you will pay a premium to override the blackout restrictions. Hilton will not allow it unless you are a diamond, and I do not know Hyatts policy. Starwoods great claim to fame is no blackout dates. This can be an important consideration to those of us with children who travel at premium times of the year.

The comparison is still apples and oranges.

You might want to revise your figures - as you actually get 3 points per eligible dollar at Starwood (I don't know about Hyatt). Another consideration is whether you can get Hyatt points another way - such as whether they have a Hyatt branded credit card (I really don't know anything about the Hyatt program). If Hyatt doesn't have one, I'd say that swings things a lot toward Starwood or Hilton.

Could you e-mail me the spreadsheet? E-mail is in my profile -- click on the mail icon just above this post.

Volleyball Ferd - Thanks for the correction. It is three points per eligible dollar. It was not clear to me how the "50%" bonus was calculated.

This brings Starwood down to $2687 revenue required for a free night on Maui. More competitive, but still the most expensive.

I use an affinity card (either Amex or a UAL Visa) for all the purchases I can, so anothe affinity card doesn't help unless they are way ahead of the curve for the points they give out.

I like the idea of no blackout dates at Starwoods, but it really depends on whether the rooms are available anyway. Planning two months in advance or more, I've never had a problem with Hyatts in terms of getting the space. I would expect the same availability as an elite member of any other program.

Again, I now have the Hyatt Diamond status for the life of that program. I'm looking for a second progam to patronize at Elite status. It really seems that Starwood has a lot of choices and flexibility, but you ultimately get fewer free nights at the type of properties I would be interested in.

I have learned a lot from this thread, but I still need somebody to close me on which program will suit me the best.

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United UGS
Hyatt Lifetime Diamond
Starwood Platimun

cygone - Thanks for pointing out the nights and flights. I suppose if you need the air miles it might make some sense, but if you convert to HHonors points, you would get 3.5 nights in Hawaii at a Hilton. Add this to the 5 Starwood nights included and you are now spending $2745 revenue for each free night.

So this award costs $23,333 in revenue. Spending that much at Marriott, I would get "18.5" free nights instead of the "8.5" at Starwood cat 4 and Hilton. I undestand Starwood has no blackout dates, but this is no guarantee of availability, right? Am I missing something? It still seems a lot more expensive.

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United UGS
Hyatt Lifetime Diamond
Starwood Platimun

The point you are missing is the Marriott reward you are using for comparison basisis the 130,000 point variety. I do not know how often you have tried to find seven successive nights in any premium season to use this award but I have. It was not easy a couple of years ago and I do not believe anything has changed. Marriott rewards are capacity controlled and capacity is quickly filled in Hawaii. To eliminate capacity controls and blackout dates you need to spend 195,000 points. Starwood has no capacity controls and no blackout dates. If you need a room during the summer, Easter break or Christmas vacation and a revenue room is available you can use an award to pay for it. Try that with the standard Marriott award.

By the way I am Hilton Diamond and I have on two occassions been told no award rooms were available even though the web site showed availability for paying customers!

cygonwe - I understand Starwood has no blackout dates, but are you saying that the award space is more readily available than Marriott and Hilton?

I agree that earning more points is meaningless if you can't redeem them. But over the past ten years, I cannot recall any significnt difficulty redeeming at Hyatt. I suppose I am wrongly assuming this is as easy with the others in their respective elite programs.

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United UGS
Hyatt Lifetime Diamond
Starwood Platimun

That is the best part of Starwood - not the lack of blackout days - but the lack of capacity controls. If a standard room is available for money, you can use points for it. And, if you are Platinum you are very likely to get some sort of upgrade.

My best experience was arriving at the airport in Atlanta at 11 pm, with a connecting flight to LA that I didn't want to take that night. From the airport I called Sheraton, and within 20 minutes I was in a free room - and I wasn't even platinum then.

What I am saying is that because of capacity controls at Marriott a few rooms at each resort are allocated for award stays. Blackout dates also create problems during events and holidays especially for longer stays. If the hotel is very popular and is selling most of its rooms it may not allocate many rooms for award stays. Marriott allows you to get around the blackouts and capacity controls on award stays but you must pay a premium of fifty percent of the points. A seven night 130,000 point award may never be available in London or Paris or Hawaii in the Summer. However Starwood has no restrictions.

As a Hilton Diamond I was turned down for an award stay in Paris and Rome, even though rooms were available for purchase. I must admit alternative dates were offered both times. This only happened twice in probably 25 award reservations so it is not common.

I do not know much about Hyatt, I worked on the Island of Saipan (north of Guam) ten years ago and stayed in one for six months. It was on a negotiated rate and I did not get any points. Can not remember staying in one since.

I am on track to do about 300 nights this year and have moved all my business hotel stays to Starwood (SPG) and Hyatt. SPG mainly because of the award availability and their online capabilities. When I started about 2 years ago, Marriott and Hilton had only paper based redemption. You couldn't even check availability online. I believe Starwood was the first chain to get the award inventory online. I don't like talking to reservations people when looking for possible dates and locations.

I will never forgot how Hilton failed when we wanted to stay at the Times Square Hilton for New Years. There was no award availability and there were blackout days. All my colleagues who were with SPG were able to get great rooms at the Times Square W with no notice.

So, not only is Hilton and Marriott capacity controlled, but they have blackouts around desirable days. A very tiny number of SPG hotels have these restrictions.

I don't have the luxury of planning vacations months in advance. I think the greatest lead time I've had was 3 weeks, for various reasons. Mainly, client obligations and timing with the rest of the family, you know how it can be.

Another thing I like about SPG and Hyatt is that they provide full elite benefits on Priceline rates. Since I tend to save up my points for the big trips, we often use priceline for our weekend travel. In combination with www.biddingfortravel.com, I have been 100% successful in targeting Hyatts and Starwoods. With the preference going towards Hyatt because they provide breakfast (or Regency Club access) for Diamonds.

In addition, with the online booking point bonus, Platinum welcome amenity points, and the SPG card, I spend about $940 to get 10,000 points. If I changed hotels everyday, that would be much less. At the beginning of the year, SPG also had a great bonus, for every 5 nights you get 5k bonus points, up to 20k points. They also have a 50k bonus for asian properties.

By far Hyatt's FFN is the best.

I spent my 25th birthday at the Hilton Hawaiian Village over memorial day week using the 100k ALON award. It cost very little to get enough points to go, and almost no money came out of my own pocket.

I love Flyertalk.

[This message has been edited by Tummy (edited 07-21-2003).]

Tummy - Can you book a specific hotel on Priceline? I have tried the site a few times, and I thought the whole concept was that you pay before they tell you which hotel (or airline or car rental company) you will be using.

It seems to me that I can only bid on a 3 star property, which includes the Hyatt and, according to biddingfortravel.com, about 5 other properties. I guess I could save a few bucks, but I know Hyatt will upgrade me and give me breakfast coupons (in ddition to the FFNs)

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United UGS
Hyatt Lifetime Diamond
Starwood Platimun

I could not agree more with cygone's original response if I had written it.

As for priceline, if the specific hotel is unimportant, for example, any 3 star in midtown manhattan, you will save enough to pay for 10 free breakfasts.

As for this thread, I salute the reasoning of the original poster. YOu have to figure out where you would be likely to redeeem to dtermine the value of accruing points to YOU. I would guess that he is a bit unusual - more of us would place a premium on Starwood's properties and lack of capacity controls to offset what may be a less generours rate of earning. What's more, their excellent customer service and the liquidity of the points and availability of an earning credit card make it the obvious choice for the majority of FT'ers.

I have done two Marriott rewards weeks in Hawaii (Maui, Kauai), both in the summer. I had no trouble with availability, booking 2 months in advance.

For Kauai, I had to book 5 nights in one room class and the last two nights in another to get my dates, but the hotel said that was fine with my 7-night certificate and that they would try and work it out so I didn't have to change rooms. About a week before my stay, availability in my preferred room-class opened up for the last 2 nights, so it wasn't an issue.

Point is...Marriott might not be as bad as you think. Granted, it's 2003 and hotels don't seem as full, and I would guess that Christmas-through-Easter is probably booked solid. I've also never had a problem redeeming Marriott points in US hotels. (Don't know about Europe.)

Certainly, if your goal is Christmas in Hawaii for free, you'd better go Starwood...or factor in Marriott's "anytime" award levels when making your decision. (Give Marriott credit: at least they have that option.)

After looking at the bid amounts for the previous few weeks you can get a good idea of what certain hotels are selling for. I'll give you an example, when bidding for *3 in Orlando near Disney, it's a good bet that you will get the Hyatt if you bid $35. If you bid $32 you will likely get the Sheraton Safari.

Another example that worked for me, in Anaheim California, in the past the Hyatt near Disneyland would always come up as *3 and $28 per night. I bid that exact amount and got it on the first try.

I'm not saying that it's a guarantee, but you have very good chance to get exactly what you want if you bid the amounts posted by knowledgeable people from the site. It's worked almost every time for me. The only time it didn't was when I got the Crowne Plaza at LAX airport instead of the Marriott, like I was expecting.

In most cases I have been able to save nearly $100 per night / room. We're staying in orlando in August for $35 /nt at the Hyatt Orlando. I bid for 2 rooms and got them on the first try (8 total room nights). That saved me around $450, in comparison to the lowest rate listed on Hyatt.com for the same property and dates. While to some people, that's not a lot of money, but it can at least buy us a nice dinner. I didn't feel that any of the two Hyatt's in Orlando was worth the use of my FFNs.

I suggest you check out of the FAQ on the BFT web site, if you're still interested.

I went back and looked more closely at my spreadsheet. There is a difference in value earned for a Marriott Platinum and a Starwood Platinum (same room rate and number of days). The Marriott Platinum will earn more, but perhaps not so much more as to offset the advantage Starwood provides with no capacity controls.

However, there is a huge difference between Marriott Gold and Starwood Gold. In fact, by my calculations Marriott Gold earns twice the value of Starwood Gold on any given stay. Thus, even if you always had to pay 50% more points to claim an award at Marriott you would still be ahead.

Starwood Basic (2 pts/$) is, of course, much worse. It seems clear that Starwood can afford to offer no capacity controls because the earning potential is so much smaller than the other programs. When comparing Marriott and Starwood, my conclusion is that lack of capacity controls only really benefits Starwood Platinums.

Another thing to note is that status on Marriott is much more difficult to obtain. At SPG, it takes only 10 stays / 25 nights for gold, about 1/2 to 1/5 the number for Marriott. Platinum can be had in 25 stays / 50 nights, where it is 75 nights with Marriott. Marriott also has qualification only by number of nights, which makes it very difficult for some.

For those of you who heap praise on any program please remember this famous quote “those who do not learn from history are destined to repeat it”. Let me tell you what history has taught me.

Five or maybe six years ago as a loyal Marriott patron I drove sometimes as much as twenty miles out of my way in order to acquire points in the program. I was such a fan of Marriott Rewards, I even bought JW Marriott’s book “The spirit to serve”. My loyalty to them was rewarded. I saved for only one award and it was Marriott award code 713 which cost 200,000 points: this award included two airline tickets anywhere on earth, seven days of premium car rental, and seven nights in any Marriott hotel in the world. You could use the airline tickets to one location the hotel somewhere else and the car in another city if you pleased. In the beginning we were able to go to India and Africa, but by the third award those destinations were no longer available. Still we were able to go to Asia, Australia, and Europe and it was a good deal. Stayed in the County Hall in London and JW in Hong Kong and a great hotel in Rome. My fourth award no longer included the car rental, I think it was replaced by some coupons, and my fifth award I had to scramble to get enough points before the program change drastically to what it resembles today.

I remember these boards were full of accolades from people who used the 713 award and I think Marriott got the message as they devalued the award.

Angry at Marriott for taking away my beloved 713 I changed my loyalty to Hilton and with the expansion the Honors program developed a new loyalty. I discovered bonus after bonus and quickly attained in excess of two million points. Again I found an award I loved with Hilton: the GLO9 included two airline tickets and six nights hotel. Was given a couple of either 20 or 50 thousand point off coupons for VIP awards each year and I was finding it easy to attain these awards as well. Took the wife and kids to Australia and South Africa. But in December of last year with absolutely no warning Hilton discontinued these awards. Many times I spent more money than I should for Hilton stays so I could qualify for the awards only to have the carpet pulled out from under me with absolutely no warning.

The point I am trying to make and tried to make in my first post is none of these programs is any better than the other unless you can use the award immediately. What they are offering today will not be what they are offering tomorrow. If you begin praising one program over another or one sticks out as being the best be prepared for them to change.

I will finish with a cliché. “Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me…… fool me a third time.... well like the Who said “We won’t get fooled again”. or at least I won't!

This is excellent advice for any air or hotel award program!

This link allows you to compare any two hotel, airlline and credit card loyalty program. The reviews (pros and cons) were written by various FT members. It is easier to use than reading through many many posts.

http://www.webflyer.com/programs/head2head/

John

As you correctly note with your examples, all of the programs change at one time or another, mostly for the worse. Yes, we should be prepared for the changes, but I don't agree that "...none of these programs is any better than the other unless you can use the award immediately".

The Starwood Preferred Guest program has won the Freddie for best hotel program for the last 3 or 4 years. I disagree with that assessment, but a lot of someones out there think it has consistently been the best over that time period, point devaluation and all.

You are right that we can't predict what a particular award with a particular program will cost years down the road. But you have to choose your hotel program now and the best (only?) way to do that is to look at what is offered now and choose what provides you the most value. This can be done on an annual basis or on every single stay. It is really no different than deciding if you should redeem an award as opposed to paying cash for a particular stay, and that is a decision people are making everyday.

There ARE differences between the programs now, both in terms of what you earn and what you can redeem for. There are also the more qualitative factors (upgrades, customer service, etc.) that distinguish them. Opinions, informed and otherwise, abound as to which program is best/better.

MileKing - you forget that Priceline may be a superior alternative.

It may also be interesting to consider the affinity credit cards if a lot of points would be earned there. While SPG seems to require the most money spent at the hotel itself to get the award, it probably requires the least money to get the award from credit card spending. Consider the points earned with the credit card as a percentage as what one would earn as a base member:

program hotel pts/$ cc pts/$ %
SPG 2 1 50%
HH 10 2/3 20/30%
Marriott 10 1 10%
PriorClub 10 1 10%

(sorry for bad table format - it does not format easily here)

If you are to earn a lot of points via the credit card, SPG would probably do you better than the other programs. Marriott may be better for points earned at the hotel, but the credit card is pretty weak. Same with Priority Club. Not to mention SPG also carries the ability to convert the points to miles at the best rate of hotel programs. If someone could cross this table with the other one that indicates how much you have to spend on the cc to get a comparable room, that would be a better indication.

The bottom line is that it all depends on how a person plans on earning the points and how he plans on using them.

[This message has been edited by quinella66 (edited 07-23-2003).]

[This message has been edited by quinella66 (edited 07-23-2003).]

No, I didn't forget about Priceline. It is certainly a viable alternative and in many cases offers superior value. I didn't mention it since the thread seemed to be focused on comparison of hotel programs.

With regard to credit cards, the use/non-use of a particular card and the value it offers is dependent on the type of charge. This is true now more than ever. For example, HHonors VISA offers 3 pts/$ at HHonors properties and only 2 pts otherwise. HHonors AMEX is 5/3. Marriott VISA offers 3 pts/$ at Marriott properties and only 1 elsewhere. SPG AMEX is only 1 pt/$, with the exception of the current targeted double points promo. The extra earning by the Marriott and HHonors (AMEX) cards would further skew the hotel results away from Starwood if they were considered in the overall equation. The best deal here depends, again, on how you value the points.