uxb

Welcome to the 2017 version of the SPG Best Rate Guarantee thread.

Previous discussion is here:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/starw...on-thread.html

uxb

Signed-in FT members with 90 days / 90 posts can edit this Wikipost.

What is the Best Rate Guarantee (BRG ?)
If a lower rate at a Starwood Hotel is made available on a non-Starwood website or non-Starwood mobile application, upon its receipt of a claim that satisfies these Best Rate Guarantee terms and conditions, Starwood will honor that Competing Rate and provide the individual that submitted the valid claim one of the following rewards: (1) an additional 20% discount off the Competing Rate per room per night (up to a maximum of three rooms); or (2) 2,000 Starwood Preferred Guest® Starpoints® per room per stay (up to a maximum of three rooms).

BRG Wiki on Flyertalk

• You cannot BRG against a rate on a Starwood Website/App (hot escapes, promos, Gov. Rate etc.). It has to be a 3rd party website/App.
• Cancellation policy has no bearing on a BRG claim with one exception if the rate difference is within 1%.
"Starwood may deny claims where the difference between the Competing Rate and the rate on the Starwood Website is less than one percent; provided that Starwood will not use the fact that the difference between the Competing Rate and the rate on the Starwood Website is less than one percent to deny such claims if the cancellation policy for the Competing Rate is more favorable to the guest than the cancellation policy for the rate on the Starwood Website."
• A valid Starwood website reservation is required to submit a BRG
• If a room category is available on an external website but not on Starwood, you may still make a claim. You still need to make a booking with Starwood using any other category of room - if your claim is approved the room type in the booking will be modified to match the room type you are claiming for
• Only one claim may be submitted per reservation number (If your first claim is denied, you may submit a new claim for that reservation if you find another lower rate after you receive the denial email)
• Make sure to book a flexible rate on SPG.com. This will allow you to then cancel this booking if you find a lower Starwood rate later (like the hot escapes etc.) or if your travel plans change.
• You can BRG with a flexible rate against a prepaid rate. In other words, if expedia is offering a room for $100 prepaid, and spg.com shows a prepaid room for $150 or a flexible room for $200, you can book the FLEXIBLE spg.com rate and BRG it against the PREPAID $100 expedia rate. And you will receive the flexible cancel terms if the BRG is approved.
• If your comparable rate includes extras like breakfast or parking, make sure there is a room available on spg.com that includes the exact amenities. If there is the same room type with the same amenities on SPG.com, they will compare and if lower on third party, the claim may be approved for the room type and with the amenities. If there is the same room type available but no/different amenities offered, the claim may still be approved, but the rate will be room only.
• Room types must be the same for a BRG.
• If you have an approved and finalized claim and you find an even cheaper rate later, then you may submit a new BRG claim that is not connected to any existing reservation. If this BRG claim is approved, you will need to make a new flexible reservation on SPG.com. Once the process is completed, you will then email the BRG desk to cancel your first reservation, if it is within the cancellation deadline.
• If you find availability for the room type you want on a third party website/app but there is no availability for that room type or no availability for any room type on the Starwood Website, then this may be an approved claim if it meets all other terms and conditions. You will need to make sure that you specify the room type you actually want on the Starwood Website section and enter 0 in the rate and currency. This will ensure that the processing associates know that the room type you want is not available on the Starwood Website. You may also add additional comments near the end of the claim form indicating that there is no availability on the Starwood Website to help clarify.
• Per the FAQ, "Any questions regarding claims should be directed to [email protected] or call 1-866-500-0368." A human is available at this number beginning at 9am EST.

OTAs not eligible because they do not confirm instantly:

• AsiaWeb
• Cancelon
• Ctrip
• Elvoline
• HappyRooms
• Hoteling
• HotelsClick (Some rates on request, some instant)
• Ostrovok
• Roomertravel
• Laterooms (according to BRG team 24 Oct 2016)
  
  

Special Conditions for BRG & Design Hotels

• You may only claim against the absolute lowest rate on SPG.com, for the date(s) in question.
• The rate must be the lowest on sale on SPG.com, and is regardless of the type of room you actually want, the number of occupants, cancellation policy and the amenities provided. In all likelihood this will mean you have to use a rate for a standard room, for 1 person, non-refundable and without any amenities.
• It is not necessary for the rate on the external website to match the SPG.com rate in any way including room type and number of occupants. The only requirement for a successful BRG claim is that the rate be lower than the lowest rate on SPG.com for the date(s) in question.
• As with normal BRG claims, you need to make a booking before submitting a claim. Since this will likely be a non-refundable booking, note that you are responsible for any and all charges including cancellation charges, even if the claim is not approved.
• Amenities that are included in the external website's rate but which are not included in the Starwood rate may or may not be provided.
• You will retain the category of room booked on SPG.com, even if the external website rate submitted for the claim refers to a different category of room. This is especially pertinent in situations where the hotel continues to sell lower categories of rooms on other websites, while not making them available on SPG.com. You will then be able to book a higher category of room on SPG.com, BRG the lower rate, and retain the higher category of room while paying the lower rate.
• The BRG will be processed for a single occupant, even if the rate does not change for more than one occupant. Your initial booking should also be only for one occupant. If you require a room for more than one, indicate this in the comments section. The BRG team will verify if additional charges are required for more than one occupant and the rate will be modified accordingly.

Differing currencies
• "The Best Rate Guarantee department will approve a claim if there is a difference of 2.5% or greater where the currencies are different or a difference of 1% or greater if the currencies are the same."

Link to T&C
https://www.starwoodhotels.com/bestrate/terms.html

Practicalities During/After Stay
• Reconfirm your rate at check-in; normally the hotel will have the correct BRG rate in your reservation, but sometimes you will need to remind them.
• If you choose points, they will be credited after the stay; check in one week to see if they have posted. If not contact the BRG office to arrange to have them posted.

How to add a SNA to a BRG reservation
• Log into your SPG account
• Click on your stays to view our your current reservation
• Look for your BRG reservation and click on "send confirmation" link for the BRG reservation
• reload the page and you should be able to now select "apply SNA to this stay" link

POSTING FORMAT

Hotel Name:
Arrival Date:
Departure Date:
Number of Rooms:
Number of Guests:
Room Type:
Starwood Brand Web Site Room Rate:
Company Room Provider:
Other Company Room Provider:
Competing rate:
Comments:

Q: Are SPG benefits honored for BRG stays?
A: Yes. You should receive the same SPG elite member benefits and stay/night credit as for a normal paid stay.

shonamac

Repeating my questions asked earlier today at the 2016 thread...

I thought I read somewhere that one can file a maximum o 1 BRG claim per week - is that correct, or is it a memory hangover from IHG? So if I have separate reservations for two consecutive nights at a SPG property, am I allowed to file a BRG for the second night after the first night has been approved? What about two consecutive nights at two separate SPG properties in the same city?

Finally, can one claim BRGs for Design Hotels as well?

yurtripper

This is the relevant part from the T&Cs

Given this, and what's stated in the Wiki, doesn't it mean that you can submit a BRG claim when finding a prepaid booking that's cheaper than a flex booking?

If so, isn't this nearly always going to be the case? Or do the type of bookings have to be comparable (e.g. flex to flex or prepaid to prepaid). I can't find anything that explicitly clarifies this in the T&Cs but if this is true then it makes sense to always do a Flex booking, correct?

supatight80

@bfernad - yes can BRG design. But must book lowest rate 1 PAX only on SPG. Please read wiki for more details. You can BRG how many you want, but on second BRG same city, they'll only match the rate. So you only get 1 award (2K or 20%) on all stays. Again, refer to terms of program.

shonamac

In this context, how is the same city defined? For instance, if I search for hotels in Los Angeles, both downtown LA properties as well as a property in Anaheim shows up on the SPG site; similarly, searching for London shows up properties from the Docklands to Heathrow - are they all considered to be the 'same city'?

Jaenks

Starwood will compare the total room cost of a stay, and multiple claims for a stay consisting of two or more nights in the same week at the same hotel or hotels) in the same geographic location (e.g. city) may be treated as one claim for one stay, even if booked through more than one reservation.

What is the criteria of the same geographic location? In T&C says the word "may" then in what circumstances this applies? I have denied 2k because the hotel advertises their location in the city, but officially it is in outer area. Distance from the previous night hotel was around 28km.

supatight80

LA properties and Anaheim properties different cities. Hayes and London different cities. Malpensa and Milan different cities. CDG and Paris different cities. Etc.

Anyways that's what I've been told by BRG. It's distance and the city they call it on SPG.com. Anyways I'll try to find the BRG email when I inquired. It's been over 2-3 years when I asked this question.

yurtripper

Still no one able to answer my question above about whether BRG works for matching across different types of bookings (e.g. flex to prepaid)?

Hate to sound impatient but I'm just about to jump the gun on some SPG bookings so it would be nice to have the reassurance before taking the plunge

supatight80

I think you're just making things complicated. And your answer is on wiki.

In any event for non-design, find OTA rate lower than the lowest SPG rate (cancellation policy is irrelevant). If indeed BRG verifies that OTA rate is lower than the lowest SPG rate, then your claim is approved.

Just that when you submit your claim, book using SPG flex rate to retain (in most cases) cancellation policy.

Example:
EXPEDIA prepaid 100$
EXPEDIA flex 150$
SPG prepaid 120$
SPG flex 170$

Look EXPEDIA prepaid. Is it lower than SPG prepaid? Then submit claim using SPG flex reservation.

If you're going to compare expedia flex with SPG flex, then your claim will be denied.

yurtripper

Thanks for the reply. I think your answer - that the lowest OTA rate is checked against lowest SPG rate - is actually clearer than what's on the wiki and if I'd seen that written in the wiki I wouldn't have had any doubt.

This is what the wiki says:
So after reading that I was unsure if, for example, the lowest OTA and SPG were equal (say $150) and the flex rate at SPG was $200 then you could claim for BRG. Clearly from what you said it wouldn't but that was less obvious to me from the wiki wording.

One more complication (!), does the SPG rate match on the members best rate (i.e. with the slight discount)? I assume that it would.

supatight80

Whether it's SPG prepaid, members rate, flex, Z3H, Z3R, or whatever. Generally speaking, they are all all irrelevant when making BRG claims. Just look at the lowest rate found on SPG (including promo codes) and compare that to OTA rate with same amenities, room type, etc.

Obviously this is just BRG101. But it's a little more complicated than this if we're talking about Design, less than 2.5% parity difference, sold out rooms, sold out category, etc.

mahasamatman

That should read excluding promo codes. The SPG rate you use for comparison is the rate that comes up on a basic search. BRG does not consider any rate that requires a promo code.

supatight80

They include Z3H, Z3R, etc etc. And incorrect, they also look at promotions link on SPG website.

mahasamatman

I challenge you to provide evidence of this. They have never included any promotions for any of my claims.