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BRG is a way of getting compensation for finding a cheaper rate then the one offered by the hotel website.  Compensation varies greatly by the hotel brand policy. It can be in the one following: first night free, gift cards, matched rate with an additional percent discount as well as bonus points.

Hotel brand/ site compensation policy
Please note: most will match the rate plus give compensation.
Choice hotel : $50 VISA gift card plus rate matched (US residents) OR first night free plus rate matched (non-US residents). It goes by the address you write on the reservation so if you Write down an Israel (or anywhere non U.S) address, you're good
Ihg: rate matched plus 5x points for the reservation
Best Western: rate matched plus 100$ BW travel card
Marriott: 25% off matched rate or 5,000 Marriott points
Hyatt: 20% off matched rate or 5,000 Hyatt points
Hilton: 25% off matched rate
Wyndham: rate matched plus 3,000 Wyndham points



How to find a brg claim
Search for the hotel and dates of your choice and then the fun begins.
Hotel price comparison web sites are great way of finding BRGs. Some of the following work very well:

TripAdvisor.com
Hotelscombined.com
Trivago.com
Wego.com

If you want some tutorial articles about how BRGs work, how to find them, how to match them, and all the details, go to http://brgdeals.blogspot.com/ and read the articles.

The site run by a guy named David, and he also finds BRGs and posts them there. So If you don't want to start making one yourself, just go to his site, search for the city you need and see if there are any current BRGs available. You can also be spontaneous and look at his most recent finds (he posts new ones almost daily), although you may have not planned a trip, but if you can get it free (or discounted) hey why not.

How to claim a brg
You do need to book the hotel first and then file a BRG claim.  Just search the hotels/ third party site for a best rate gaurantee policy and you should be able to find a link to a brg claim form. Be aware that room and conditions need to be a perfect match.
As they often find ways to wiggle out of this policy it's not advised to book a non refundable room unless you would have stayed there regardless.


Redeeming brgs
No  diff as to the form of compensation ( discount or free night) redeeming Is all the same. Your reservation will look like a standard reservation except it will be either discounted or show a 00.00 balance. Most hotel receptionists aren't familiar with brgs and automatically assume that it's a points stay.


Why I love choice brgs
Choice hotels include brands like quality inn, comfort inn, rodeway and of course the ascend collection. They are fairly easy when it comes to approving claims as long as you stick to the following:
- 1 claim per household per 30 days
- price match before taxes (ymmv on this one)
- your claim is submitted / approved 72 hours before your scheduled stay
However even within those policy's there are plenty of loop
Holes.



When Posting a brg please use the following Example format:

BRG claim for: Choice Hotels
Hotel Name: comfort suites
Hotel Add: 320 North Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL, US, 60601
Room Type: Queen Suite
Room Rate:197
Better rate found: Hotelscombined.com
Better Rate: 127
« Last edited by a mirrer on August 05, 2019, 01:23:12 PM »

Author Topic: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee  (Read 432163 times)

Offline gavhaller

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1520 on: December 16, 2014, 03:11:42 PM »
Welcome, David! Pleasure to have you here. Thanks for all you do.

Want to add a search function to your site, so it'll be easier to search by city? That would rock :)

Lol. We got to just be grateful for the things he does.
But, yeah. That would be fantastic. :)

Offline @Yehuda

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1521 on: December 16, 2014, 03:27:08 PM »
Good idea, Yehuda! I will look into that.
Awesome! For now, I just find a post on the right-hand toolbar that has the state I want. Then I click on the state name under the post and view all posts by that state till I (hopefully) find the city I need. :)

Lol. We got to just be grateful for the things he does.
But, yeah. That would be fantastic. :)
Of course :)

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1522 on: December 16, 2014, 04:29:47 PM »
Welcome, David! Pleasure to have you here. Thanks for all you do.

Want to add a search function to your site, so it'll be easier to search by city? That would rock :)

For starters, I put a search function in the sidebar of the old blog (towards the bottom) since there is so much content to search for and the blog will be up for awhile. The new blog will get one next!

Offline @Yehuda

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1523 on: December 16, 2014, 04:31:53 PM »
For starters, I put a search function in the sidebar of the old blog (towards the bottom) since there is so much content to search for and the blog will be up for awhile. The new blog will get one next!
Awesome!! Wow that was a really fast!

Offline Emkay

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1524 on: December 16, 2014, 04:35:31 PM »

For starters, I put a search function in the sidebar of the old blog (towards the bottom) since there is so much content to search for and the blog will be up for awhile. The new blog will get one next!
thanks, your quick!

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1525 on: December 16, 2014, 04:44:13 PM »
I put a search bar in the new blog just now, but it's not recognizing any of my posts there.  :(  Strange. Oh well, maybe it will after awhile.

Offline Buruch

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1526 on: December 16, 2014, 05:06:27 PM »
We really appreciate your work! Can you do more IHG?

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1527 on: December 16, 2014, 05:55:00 PM »
We really appreciate your work! Can you do more IHG?

I don't know, has any IHG deal that I posted in the past even worked? lol ..Most of the time I never even find out!

Maybe if IHG would stop denying people based on insignificant things like one hour differences in cancellation times! .. then yes, definitely! Otherwise, I'm cautious about the IHG deals that I post (details must match exactly). I guess they're trying to convince us in those cases that yeah, you found  a lower rate somewhere else, but you really shouldn't care because when you book with us you have an extra hour where you can cancel! Isn't that just grand! Who needs to pay less for a room when you got a deal like that?! Because of this WE DENY YOUR CLAIM! (Do I sound bitter?)

Believe it or not, IHG once approached me asking if I would "promote" their BRG on my site (by posting BRG deals!)

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1528 on: December 16, 2014, 06:23:40 PM »
A big thank you to those who've subscribed so far! (quite a few) I really appreciate the kind words/emails I've received from you guys over here at this forum!  ;)

Offline srap

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1529 on: December 16, 2014, 07:28:14 PM »
Welcome!  I'm excited to see how this is going to unfold!   :) (ie, how we can take advantage of your finds with you being a part of us now). 

You do know the power of DDF and DDMS, right?  Your website can handle it?

Offline @Yehuda

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1530 on: December 16, 2014, 07:30:55 PM »
You do know the power of DDF and DDMS, right?  Your website can handle it?
Dan won't post BRGs on the main site anymore. For better or for worse.

Offline lubaby

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1531 on: December 16, 2014, 07:34:42 PM »
Dan won't post BRGs on the main site anymore. Better for us.
FTFY

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1532 on: December 16, 2014, 07:42:49 PM »
Dan won't post BRGs on the main site anymore. For better or for worse.

I think I (unintentionally) caused him a lot of grief last year with my IC Barclay BRG. Little did I know how that deal would escalate! He simply heard about it and shared it. But I guess people went crazy with it!

Offline @Yehuda

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1533 on: December 16, 2014, 08:02:04 PM »
I think I (unintentionally) caused him a lot of grief last year with my IC Barclay BRG. Little did I know how that deal would escalate! He simply heard about it and shared it. But I guess people went crazy with it!
That's the power of his community. :)
FTFY
True true

Offline gavhaller

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1534 on: December 18, 2014, 08:53:19 PM »
Anybody find BRG's over new years in London or Amsterdam?
I found one in London on Jan 1- Jan 2nd, but I'm looking for one on either Dec 29th, or Dec 30th.

If you see anything, please let me know- been looking for 2 hours already. Thanks!

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1535 on: December 19, 2014, 07:42:33 AM »
A few of my readers are telling me that their claims (for Choice) have been getting denied based on differences in cancellations dates/times. The competing sites this apparently happened with are Hoteltravel.com and Hotelwiz.com. Is this type of thing happening consistently with any of you guys, or is this just a "once in a while" occurrence? I'm trying to see a pattern here. It's been awhile since I've filed a claim myself. Thanks.

P.S. Which BRG do you guys feel is giving you the best results (and I doubt you're answer will be IHG!)

Offline Emkay

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1536 on: December 19, 2014, 08:12:00 AM »
A few of my readers are telling me that their claims (for Choice) have been getting denied based on differences in cancellations dates/times. The competing sites this apparently happened with are Hoteltravel.com and Hotelwiz.com. Is this type of thing happening consistently with any of you guys, or is this just a "once in a while" occurrence? I'm trying to see a pattern here. It's been awhile since I've filed a claim myself. Thanks.

P.S. Which BRG do you guys feel is giving you the best results (and I doubt you're answer will be IHG!)
I have filed claims recently with choice and got approved even though the cancellation times were different. I have never used the two you mentioned though, Its possible that their prices are consistently cheaper and it reached higher supervisors who saw the timing was off and put out a memo to decline all from those sites.
And choice is by far still my favorite

Offline freeroomguy

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1537 on: December 19, 2014, 08:18:11 AM »
I have filed claims recently with choice and got approved even though the cancellation times were different. I have never used the two you mentioned though, Its possible that their prices are consistently cheaper and it reached higher supervisors who saw the timing was off and put out a memo to decline all from those sites.
And choice is by far still my favorite

This has been my experience also. And I tend to think they give more credibility to the mainstream competitor sites (Hotels.com, Priceline, Orbitz, etc) than they do the smaller players for some reason.

Offline shimino1

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1538 on: December 19, 2014, 09:24:32 AM »
Cancellation time difference is always YMMV. I have gotten approved several times with IHG despite difference in cancellation policies.
My favorite BRG's are IHG. A roadside motel in Iowa can't compare to a five star hotel in a major city.
Ironically, I was never approved for a choice BRG

Offline gavhaller

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Re: Free hotels/Best rate guarantee
« Reply #1539 on: December 19, 2014, 03:26:06 PM »
A few of my readers are telling me that their claims (for Choice) have been getting denied based on differences in cancellations dates/times. The competing sites this apparently happened with are Hoteltravel.com and Hotelwiz.com. Is this type of thing happening consistently with any of you guys, or is this just a "once in a while" occurrence? I'm trying to see a pattern here. It's been awhile since I've filed a claim myself. Thanks.

P.S. Which BRG do you guys feel is giving you the best results (and I doubt you're answer will be IHG!)
just got denied yesterday based on the difference in cancellation by a few days.