LAXGUY

For what it's worth, I had a different experience last month at Summer Senses Resort in Greece. At check-in we were assigned a room in the category we booked. I then asked about the possibility of a space-available upgrade and was told to check back in a couple of hours. When I did they offered to show us a room to which we could be upgraded. The new room was exactly the same layout as the room we were first assigned. The only difference is that it was on the second floor rather than the first floor, providing a slightly (very slightly) better sea view. However the second room was a much further distance from the lobby and pool, so we declined the upgrade. The woman at the front desk volunteered that SLH has different upgrade protocols than Hyatt, implying that--at least at Summer Senses--the second floor room is considered an upgrade in the SLH system but probably would be considered the same room category, i.e. not an upgrade, if we were at a Hyatt.

From this I concluded that upgrades at an SLH property won't necessarily follow the booking categories you see on the Hyatt website when you make your reservation.

rota

I got an upgrade at Chateau d'Ouchy in Lausanne from Deluxe Room to Junior Suite. So this actually has nothing to do with SLH but how the property treats it's guests.

The rule is, that the property should upgrade to the next category, which means the next higher priced room is what you get (upon availability). You can clearly see this while booking. Just look out for the next more expensive room and decide to book the one just below what you want to get.

LAXGUY

That's exactly what I did in booking the room at Summer Senses in post #16 above. I got tripped up because the "upgraded room" I was shown cost the same as the room I booked. In other words, on the Hyatt website the two rooms were in the same category. But in the SLH scheme of things, the second room was considered an upgrade.

I'm sure different SLH hotels handle this in different ways. Probably some of them handle it the same way Hyatt would--but not all of them do.

rota

Yeah, then it seems if this is the case on the Hyatt app, it is necessary to ask the hotel before booking, which of these identically priced room categories is the higher category.

demue

I can update on our upgrade experience at SLH Altstadt Vienna - though caveat, it was booked through SLH due to a fair bit better rate. I hold SLH Indulged (highest) status, but it could not have mattered less.

While a lovely place (aside from parking which basically is non existent), the very friendly team could not have been more clueless about SLH benefits and when I probed if they knew about Hyatt+SLH benefits they looked genuinely puzzled.

We got the exact same room assigned than we had booked Deluxe (Medium) and when I started to probe a Deluxe (Large) materialized. To be fair, they were fairly full, but the zero recognition for a top member of their primary hotel affiliation program (SLH) was sad to see.

Eventually, later that day we were informed we could move to a lovely Suite (Medium) called Opera the next day (for 3 more nights) which "fixed" the experience for us, but I still wouldn't go out of my way to return unless rates were reasonable and not above 300€ like when we stayed. YMMV.