So I booked a junor suite at Sofitel Sentosa Singapore for 2 nights. It was almost 60k per night but since I was paying by points, why not splurge, right? Sure. I have stayed at 10+ Accor properties and always redeemed points for the entire stay at checkout so I didn't do anything different this time.
However, at the time of checkout, the front desk told me that the Accor system is facing an error and redemptions are not working. The bill was almost INR 150k. I told them to try again and contact Accor but to no avail. The manager showed me his screen and where he is getting stuck. Accor support was nonexistent.
Discussed my options with the front desk. Showed them my email to them where they confirmed that they will accept the bill through points redemption.
As for a resolution, I told them to keep the charge on my card and redeem the points when the system is live again but the hotel didn't agree to that. Finally agreed to accept the charge on the card, redeem the points later, and then the hotel would refund the charge. In my mind, I had accepted the cost already. But I immediately wrote the agreed resolution on an email to the hotel and the front desk manager acknowledged. Hoping against hope.
The system was fixed 4 days later. The front desk emailed me, fixed a time, then called me, started redemption while on the phone and charged 70k something points. Residual was SGD 7 charge which they deducted from the card charge and refunded the rest. The refund took 7 days but it finally reflected in the card 😀
Learnings:
1. Always pay by points at the time of booking. I was over-confident and didn't do it, but never again.
2. Always write an email to the hotel before arriving to confirm they will let you pay with points. This helped me explore options. Without this I would have to accept the charge.
3. Never rely on Accor support, it's absolutely useless, irrespective of your status.
