I'm so confused about new Hyatt purchase

[skimeup]

So I picked up a 1300 point, 2 BR unit at Pinon Pointe week 4 )late January) for basically $0. (I also own an 1880 point unit in Carmel). The HPP unit came with the 1300 point usage for the previous year. Closed in June. When I tried to use the transferred points, the Hyatt agent said I had to pay the mf on those points. I pointed out that Hyatt would not have transferred the unit without the mf being paid but she insisted. I appealed and she came back in a huff and said they approved putting those points into Interval but I still had to pay mf for a year of Hyatt points (or use of the 2BR unit). I paid and used the points in Interval as well as some points at a Hyatt. So that gave me 2600 points to use.

I thought I could pay next year's mf and use points for this year (lots of travel this past year!). That was wrong - I could pay ahead to make an advanced reservation? Except they would not let me. They just took the money. Charged me an additional mf when the new bills came out. I really don't understand what paying in advance will get me.

I snagged a week in Interval at Four Seasons Aviara a week ago, just before my new points were to be issued end of January. The week is listed as "Pending Confirmation" in Interval exchange history. I called Hyatt when the new points were issued and a different agent said I would need to pay another mf to put points in Interval. That what I paid in mf (the second time I paid) in November was for the January 2023 usage. But the website allowed me to transfer the points to EEE. And a different agent earlier had told me that I would have those points to use in Interval at the end of January for a different unit I was trying to hold.

The confusion seems to be that the unit's use occurs in January.

Now here is a kicker. I plan to attend the music festival in Aspen this summer. I put a set of requests on a studio unit but of course would need to wait until I was six months out (I thought) in order to get the request granted, since the Hyatt units are all portfolio and I don't have portfolio points. However, I a couple of weeks ago I got confirmed for a three day stay and yesterday for an additional eight day stay. Using the new Pinon Pointe points that she told me I could not put into Interval. So I am double bewildered. I can't put those points into Interval but I can use them as portfolio points eight months in advance?

I shudder to think what will happen as they try to integrate weeks with portfolio with Welk with Interval. Yikes! And I assume I will be dealing with this confusion as long as I stick with owning Hyatt? Any thoughts on how to handle this? Perhaps there is a knowledgeable agent someone deals with who can cut through this nonsense?

 

[PerryKing]

All I can add right now is that you do NOT NEED portfolio points to make a portfolio reservation.
You can use regular Hyatt points.

And also maybe you were past the deadline to actually transfer your regular points to the EE program. And the computer knows you were or weren’t. Think about that until someone jumps in here that can figure it out for you. Maybe !

Ppk

 

[PerryKing]

Also call the member services”phone number, not the “owner services” phone number for a higher level of service and knowledge.

 

[travelhacker]

So I picked up a 1300 point, 2 BR unit at Pinon Pointe week 4 )late January) for basically $0. (I also own an 1880 point unit in Carmel). The HPP unit came with the 1300 point usage for the previous year. Closed in June. When I tried to use the transferred points, the Hyatt agent said I had to pay the mf on those points. I pointed out that Hyatt would not have transferred the unit without the mf being paid but she insisted. I appealed and she came back in a huff and said they approved putting those points into Interval but I still had to pay mf for a year of Hyatt points (or use of the 2BR unit). I paid and used the points in Interval as well as some points at a Hyatt. So that gave me 2600 points to use.

I thought I could pay next year's mf and use points for this year (lots of travel this past year!). That was wrong - I could pay ahead to make an advanced reservation? Except they would not let me. They just took the money. Charged me an additional mf when the new bills came out. I really don't understand what paying in advance will get me.

I snagged a week in Interval at Four Seasons Aviara a week ago, just before my new points were to be issued end of January. The week is listed as "Pending Confirmation" in Interval exchange history. I called Hyatt when the new points were issued and a different agent said I would need to pay another mf to put points in Interval. That what I paid in mf (the second time I paid) in November was for the January 2023 usage. But the website allowed me to transfer the points to EEE. And a different agent earlier had told me that I would have those points to use in Interval at the end of January for a different unit I was trying to hold.

The confusion seems to be that the unit's use occurs in January.

Now here is a kicker. I plan to attend the music festival in Aspen this summer. I put a set of requests on a studio unit but of course would need to wait until I was six months out (I thought) in order to get the request granted, since the Hyatt units are all portfolio and I don't have portfolio points. However, I a couple of weeks ago I got confirmed for a three day stay and yesterday for an additional eight day stay. Using the new Pinon Pointe points that she told me I could not put into Interval. So I am double bewildered. I can't put those points into Interval but I can use them as portfolio points eight months in advance?

I shudder to think what will happen as they try to integrate weeks with portfolio with Welk with Interval. Yikes! And I assume I will be dealing with this confusion as long as I stick with owning Hyatt? Any thoughts on how to handle this? Perhaps there is a knowledgeable agent someone deals with who can cut through this nonsense?

This confused me as well when I was a new owner.

You bought a week 4 and closed in June (we'll say week 25) of 2022. The 2022 points (if there were any) would have had to have been deposited to Interval OR in LCUP for you to be able to use them. The 2022 points expired (and would have converted to LCUP) on Week 4 of 2022. The LCUP points would have fully expired on Week 30 of 2022.

Since you made no mention of LCUP points, what you had was your 2023 points. To be able to make reservations, you typically need to prepay maintenance fees. This is why they made you pay before you used them.

Typically, they will charge you the previous years amount + a little extra, and then later in the year when maintenance fees are actually due, they will bill you for the remainder. I suspect that you were just billed for the remainder.

If they charged you a whole new maintenance fee it would have been in error, and you should follow-up on this. I would log into your account and check the history and have a call at some point. While I have had my fair share of issues with the Hyatt agents, ultimately every issue that I have had has been solved in what I feel has been a very fair manner (I've had quite a few weird things happen).

2) Now that we are actually in 2023, you were issued your 2024 usage. Again, you need to prepay to use them. There are a couple of exceptions:

- MOST of the time waitlist requests aren't filled unless maintenance fees are prepaid. I suspect that since you have multiple weeks, some points were used from that week and the remainder were pulled from your Week 4 Pinon Pointe (without needing to pay the maintenance fee).
- Deposit to Interval. I am almost certain that you can deposit points to interval without necessarily pre-paying your maintenance fees.
- When Hyatt confirms a reservation from Interval, they first use EEE points and then any remaining HRPP or CUP points. However, they will not confirm the week if maintenance fees are not paid (or pre-paid) for the points that are to be used.

3) There are a lot of issues with waitlist requests. Always make sure that you double check what you request in a waitlist request (and even then they sometimes will confirm something that is close to what you asked for, but not quite -- that is RARE though).

 

[skimeup]

Also call the member services”phone number, not the “owner services” phone number for a higher level of service and knowledge.

Thank you! Usually tug send me a note telling me when someone responds to a post and this time they did not. Glad I checked anyhow. Do you have a contact number for member services? If not, I suppose I could get a number from owner services.

I believe that the 2022 points (for week 4 in 2023) are what I paid for and the 2022 points were given to me. They put them in Interval in any case, so I ended up paying mf in June 2022 and receiving (grudgingly) 1300 points in Interval and 1300 Hyatt points. Which made me believe that what I paid in December would have been for the January 2024 usage. Hopefully escalating to member services will resolve this. Right now Hyatt says I have 505 points in EEE but I am unable to use them - somehow they are being held.

I do know that I can use week's points to reserve in portfolio, but I thought I had to be six months or less out from the reservation. I was quite amazed when they popped up with an 8 day res in Aspen during the music festival. And that was definitely using the 2024 points.

It is most confusing!

 

[GTLINZ]

i wonder if the seller never paid the MF for the 2022 points that went LCUP in Jan of 2022 and expired in June of 2022 (so you were setup for failure by the seller - free would not have been free). But if that is the case and they let you put 2022-week 4 points in interval in June of 2022 - you got lucky since that deadline was long gone.

What you have to get straight in your head is that if you use your unit, you never prepay MFs - you pay MFs at the end of the year as normal. But if you want to use the week 4 points on something else (spend them before week 4 of 2024), the MFs have to be paid. The time of year that you own can make that seem confusing - but since normal billing is at the end of the year you have to take into account what week you own.

Follow these extreme examples (end of the year vs beginning) ....
If you use your week 4 unit in 2024, you pay in Nov/Dec 2023.
If you want to use your 2024 week 4 unit points for something else, they can be used now but you have to prepay the MFs.
If you owned one month earlier in Dec of 2023, you would have already paid the MFs for your 2023 week at the end of 2022. What a different a few weeks can make.

So the time of year you own can get tricky if not using your home reservation. Hyatt rules are simple, but the application of said rules and the life of points can get confusing. They do have that all tracked BY CONTRACT online.

I would call member services and ask them what each of the MF payments you made were for - and each should always map to week 4 of a different year.

Good luck.

 

[skimeup]

i wonder if the seller never paid the MF for the 2022 points that went LCUP in Jan of 2022 and expired in June of 2022 (so you were setup for failure by the seller - free would not have been free). But if that is the case and they let you put 2022-week 4 points in interval in June of 2022 - you got lucky since that deadline was long gone.

What you have to get straight in your head is that if you use your unit, you never prepay MFs - you pay MFs at the end of the year as normal. But if you want to use the week 4 points on something else (spend them before week 4 of 2024), the MFs have to be paid. The time of year that you own can make that seem confusing - but since normal billing is at the end of the year you have to take into account what week you own.

Follow these extreme examples (end of the year vs beginning) ....
If you use your week 4 unit in 2024, you pay in Nov/Dec 2023.
If you want to use your 2024 week 4 unit points for something else, they can be used now but you have to prepay the MFs.
If you owned one month earlier in Dec of 2023, you would have already paid the MFs for your 2023 week at the end of 2022. What a different a few weeks can make.

So the time of year you own can get tricky if not using your home reservation. Hyatt rules are simple, but the application of said rules and the life of points can get confusing. They do have that all tracked BY CONTRACT online.

I would call member services and ask them what each of the MF payments you made were for - and each should always map to week 4 of a different year.

Good luck.

Thanks! I'll report back on what I find out from member services. Thanks for explaining the end of year issue. I think that is what is confusing them. I did use the new Pinon points for the Hyatt reservation so it would seem that the November mf payment went toward Jan 2024. I can see why the phone agents get confused too.

 

[skimeup]

Success of sorts. The gal who answered the phone said "member services" and I don't ever recall hearing someone say guest services, but then I've never paid attention either! Apparently it just matters who answers the phone. This time the gal was able to make a reservation using EEE points and she said I needed to call to use the EEE points, but I've never had to do that in the past. Usually it just goes to the Hyatt computer system and that takes care of it withdrawing the points from EEE - or from Hyatt points not yet transferred. I did lose a nice res at Four Seasons but I think this is straightened out.

It is great to know that I don't have to pay the mf for a week in January until I am ready to reserve something. Always put off bills till later when possible at this age!

Seriously they don't let a transfer go through unless the mf is paid so clearly I paid twice when I received ownership so it should have been apparent one payment was for January 2023 and one for January 2024. I guess I need to keep calling until I get someone who understands the system!

 

[GTLINZ]

Yes, you really do need for them to explain which years you have actually paid for. If it was Jan 2022 and 2023, i would think you should have 2 years worth of EEE points. If it was Jan 2023 and Jan 2024, you know you can use your 2023 EEE points by calling and use your 2024 points for Hyatt reservations as usual.