The new Hyatt pricing has just gone into effect. I’ll be studying it today and then provide an update on how good (or bad) it is, but here I’m going to share the triumphs and frustrations of booking many award reservations ahead of the devaluation.
My Final Bookings Before Hyatt Devaluation
The nature of my work right now gives me some level of freedom on a day-to-day basis, but makes long-term planning very difficult. Nevertheless, with prices rising by as much as 70% today, I did book several “prospective” trips over the next 13 months. It may be that every single one of them ends up falling through, but at least I’ve secured space at the old rates.
Like the rest of the internet, for the last month I’ve been trying to book space at the Ventana Big Sur and the Park Hyatt Kyoto. I totally failed, wasting hours checking and never finding any space…oh well. That’s not surprising considering how many people were searching for so little space.
What I did end up booking:
- Park Hyatt New York
- Park Hyatt Paris
- Park Hyatt Tokyo
- Andaz Tokyo
- Park Hyatt Vienna
I wanted to book the Park Hyatt Sydney too, but did you notice that all points bookings were restricted (non-changeable and non-refundable)? I suppose this was by design to tamp down on speculatory bookings, because cash + points redemptions had the traditional 48-hour cancellation window.
I’d really like to go Japan next year and review the not only the Andaz and Park Hyatt in Tokyo, but the Park Hyatt in Kyoto, so if space does get a little better now that the hotels can charge so much more, that’s one booking I’ll have to make now.
I was also going to redeem a few nights at the SCHLOSS Roxburghe, a Destination by Hyatt Hotel in Scotland pictured above, but the only points space was a king bed and that doesn’t work for my family of four!
I hear folks had a lot of trouble booking at hte last-minute as the website seemed to crash last night (hardly a surprise for Hyatt). While checking once more for the Ventana Big Sur and Park Hyatt Kyoto last night I noticed the same thing too: the website just said “contact the hotel.”
Anyway, let’s let the dust settle and see how bad this devaluation is. Even if I end up cancelling everything I booked, at least I have some bookings to look forward to that may now be out-of-reach or priced at a point that no longer makes sense to use points.
What did you end up booking?
image: Hyatt (SCHLOSS Roxburghe)
I booked all of this a few days before the final rush and am glad to have avoided the IT issues, and even for the hotels that didn’t change category, they did go up in price slightly after the devaluation. Booked the Hotel Figueroa, Hyatt Regency Vancouver and the Thompson Chicago (wanted the Park Hyatt, there was no points availability). There is 1 hotel that I might book post-devaluation where the price went down and it became an okay deal but that is TBD.