£50 back from £200 Amex spend

I booked a Hampton in the UK, pre paid nightly room rate £120. I asked them to charge me an additional £80, so that I trigger this offer, but they’re saying that I can pay in the hotel when I’m there ! Somewhat frustrating.

Bill wrote:

I booked a Hampton in the UK, pre paid nightly room rate £120. I asked them to charge me an additional £80, so that I trigger this offer, but they’re saying that I can pay in the hotel when I’m there ! Somewhat frustrating.

Why are you trying to pay £150 instead of £120?

I knew you meant that! Was there not a DBB option or similar rate which would have taken you over the £200?

I havent booked a non-cancellable room since pre-covid, but I dont think I ever had had a non-cancellable charged until I got to the hotel, has something changed? Everyone seems to be getting charged right away now? 🙂

For me nothing has changed since 10 years ago. Some hotels are still charging 0-1 days after booking, others a week after, others 0-1 days before arrival, some on check-in and some not until check-out on prepaid rates.

Hamptons are basic hotels, you can’t charge to your room and don’t earn points on any spend. They aren’t going to keep track of you having “£80 credit” to spend between now and the stay. Most don’t even like having a tab open at the bar. Though there are a few Hamptons where you can buy something like £20 credit as part of the room rate for £15 or so – but then the computer would say £20 credit at check in, they wouldn’t have an option to enter other numbers.

aso40 wrote:

slidey wrote:

I havent booked a non-cancellable room since pre-covid, but I dont think I ever had had a non-cancellable charged until I got to the hotel, has something changed? Everyone seems to be getting charged right away now? 🙂

Yes, the payment standards changed so Hilton updated the app – it now asks for the two-factor authentication (i.e. the code via text from your card provider) when you book the non-cancellable rate, so charges right away. Some report that not all hotels use this yet (especially in Europe), but the UK hotels seem pretty consistent.

The pre paid rate on my Hampton reservation wasn’t charged immediately. After one week they phoned and asked for my security code off the card. They them took a further two days to charge me.

Corrrect WillPS.

And, it’s actually the Blackppol Hampton that I am referring to in my posts above.

Since a couple of years Hampton stays earn points on incidentals.