Triangle Trip

If you are a Starwood Platinum member you have one of the best free tools out there at your disposal: The Platinum Concierge.

• Need tickets to a Broadway show?
• Need the name of a restaurant in South Beach Miami and have someone book it for you?
• Forgot to cancel a Starwood reservation and got charged a penalty?
• Need to get a room when the hotel is sold out?
• Need to escalate an issue you have with a hotel like bad service or being charged for goods inside the room?

I’ve used the Starwood Platinum Concierge service to find resolutions to all of these. The Platinum Concierge number is: 888-625-4991. Starwood’s excellent and responsive customer service makes them my favorite hotel loyalty program.

It has been awhile since we have written about rental cars. Similar to hotel reservation rules (see previous post), rental car companies do not penalize you if you do not show up for your car reservation. Since some rental car companies are using the Yield Management model to price their cars, we highly recommend you make your rental car reservations weeks in advanced to avoid higher fees. Unlike hotels, you don’t even have to cancel your reservation. Most rental car companies will just void your reservation without penalty if you don’t show up.

There are however exceptions to this rule. On major holidays like Memorial Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc., some rental car companies will make you pre-pay for a day or the entire reservation. Check with your rental car company before confirming your reservation.