ASPIRATION Level 1: 40,000 Tier Credits reward $100 folio credit failure

I recently stayed Caesars Palace for my DIAMOND ASPIRATION Level 1: 40,000 Tier Credits reward. I used it for only 2 of the 4 days I could have stayed. When I checked in they told me that I had a $100 folio credit with my offer and all I had to do was to make charges to the room. When I got to my room it was dirty and there were items missing from the mini-bar snacks so I called the front desk and they said that I was not being charged for the missing items and they were sorry that the room was dirty and that they would tell housekeeping and give me an additional $50.00 folio credit. I purchased items at a gift shop and charged them to the room. I also had breakfast with a friend and charged it to the room. When I went to check out; I was told that the folio credit was for food and drink ONLY at Caesars owned restaurants; the gift store purchases were not covered and the breakfast was at a third party restaurant (Central) and was not covered. So I returned the items to the gift store. While I was there someone else was also returning items for the same reason (not covered in their folio credit). What do you do when you find out at checkout, after eating a big breakfast. You do what I did. You check out and tell them they can keep their credits. A very disappointing trip that left me very unhappy.

And we wonder why CET is going South. Whoever makes these policy decisions is an idiot. They should be trying their hardest to make people happy -- happy enough to tell folks of the great experience, not a frustrating and disappointing one. I fear that if they ever figure this out it will be too late to save the sinking ship.

It is true that Central (the 24 hour restaurant in the lobby at Caesars) is not owned by Caesars, but I have always been able to charge my check to my room and have used "folio credits" to pay the tab. While I did not charge using the Diamond Aspirations promotion, I did have another promotion recently at Caesars which included a $250 folio credit and I bought some small items in a gift shop and also charged a meal at Central to my room without a problem.

I called my host at Caesars and I was told that even though Central is not owned by Caesars it is treated as if it was owned by Caesars for all sorts of folio credits and comps.

John you should definitely call Total Rewards or your host who booked the trip and find out what happened here. If you weren't allowed to charge your tab at Central then there is a serious problem.

Also check on the restrictions of that $100 folio credit. Indeed it might be for "food only" and not gift shops.

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Originally Posted by carolinajacket

And we wonder why CET is going South. Whoever makes these policy decisions is an idiot. They should be trying their hardest to make people happy -- happy enough to tell folks of the great experience, not a frustrating and disappointing one. I fear that if they ever figure this out it will be too late to save the sinking ship.

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They can keep treating people this way because we don't take our business elsewhere. Until they start losing loyal customers, they will continue to mistreat us.

And I am equally at fault as the rest of you, although I have minimal expectations from CET. Whereas I used to be a high roller who went to Vegas at least 6 times a year and was given carte blanche, now I only go to Vegas if I am on business or in a horse racing tournament. I play just enough to be a low level Diamond. But that is enough to get me rooms whenever I want in Vegas or AC and usually covers my food as well. I don't really need or ask for anything else. So for me, I still get what I need from CET, even though I would also get pissed if I allowed myself to from all of their rules and cutbacks etc.

So should I change affiliations--yes. But I still get what little I need for very little play. And that is really what allows them to continue to mistreat us.

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Originally Posted by Alan Mendelson

It is true that Central (the 24 hour restaurant in the lobby at Caesars) is not owned by Caesars, but I have always been able to charge my check to my room and have used "folio credits" to pay the tab. While I did not charge using the Diamond Aspirations promotion, I did have another promotion recently at Caesars which included a $250 folio credit and I bought some small items in a gift shop and also charged a meal at Central to my room without a problem.

I called my host at Caesars and I was told that even though Central is not owned by Caesars it is treated as if it was owned by Caesars for all sorts of folio credits and comps.

John you should definitely call Total Rewards or your host who booked the trip and find out what happened here. If you weren't allowed to charge your tab at Central then there is a serious problem.

Also check on the restrictions of that $100 folio credit. Indeed it might be for "food only" and not gift shops.

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Your host is wrong, unless they changed it recently.

I have had many folio credits in the past (mostly 2012-2013) at Caesar's, and they always tell me up front that the credits are NOT good at Numb Bar, some other little bar, and Central. Sometimes they include Nobu on that list, but I think that's erroneous, as I have always been able to use all kinds of food credits at Nobu.

The first time I got a folio credit, they forgot to disclose it to me, and I tried to use my credits at Central. When I went to checkout, I found out the bad news that they were not included. I made a big deal about this, as I had no way to know, and after a lot of arguing, they comped off Central, but told me that this was a one-time exception because now I'm aware of it. (I was fine with that.)

RCs are the exception. Central DOES take RCs, but no other form of comps. This is because (as you said), Central is not owned by Caesar's, so Caesar's has to pay them real money for everything redeemed there. At Caesar's-owned restaurants, it's a lot cheaper to simply comp off their own food, as they are not actually losing $100 when you redeem a $100 comp (since their only real cost is the wholesale cost of the food/drinks you consumed, plus a little overhead.)

I have long said that Caesar's erred big time when it comes to Central. It's the only 24-hour dining place on property, and it really sucks that you can't use your comps there. It just leads to nasty surprises and angry customers. There should always be a place to eat on-property where you can use comps other than RCs.

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Originally Posted by ke6cdh

I recently stayed Caesars Palace for my DIAMOND ASPIRATION Level 1: 40,000 Tier Credits reward. I used it for only 2 of the 4 days I could have stayed. When I checked in they told me that I had a $100 folio credit with my offer and all I had to do was to make charges to the room. When I got to my room it was dirty and there were items missing from the mini-bar snacks so I called the front desk and they said that I was not being charged for the missing items and they were sorry that the room was dirty and that they would tell housekeeping and give me an additional $50.00 folio credit. I purchased items at a gift shop and charged them to the room. I also had breakfast with a friend and charged it to the room. When I went to check out; I was told that the folio credit was for food and drink ONLY at Caesars owned restaurants; the gift store purchases were not covered and the breakfast was at a third party restaurant (Central) and was not covered. So I returned the items to the gift store. While I was there someone else was also returning items for the same reason (not covered in their folio credit). What do you do when you find out at checkout, after eating a big breakfast. You do what I did. You check out and tell them they can keep their credits. A very disappointing trip that left me very unhappy.

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I don't blame you for being unhappy. They should have been more clear about what the credit was and wasn't good for. They are actually correct in that the Diamonds Aspirations $100 credit is only good for food and beverage at Caesar's-owned restaurants, but it's not your responsibility as the customer to know this. They need to tell you.

I hope you didn't end up paying for the meal at Central. It sounds like you did. You should call your host and see if they can fix this situation. Threaten to never come back. I think your threats will hold water because you've earned 40,000 tiers already, and I'm guessing you are not squeezing every comp out of them like I am (so they probably will value you). If your host is uncooperative (which is possible, because hosts hate getting in the middle of customer service issues), call and ask for Diamond/Seven Star check-in, and ask for a supervisor. You may get connected to regular check-in, in which case you will need to call back later and try again (preferably at non-peak times, such as 2pm). Once you get to a supervisor at Diamond/VIP check in, explain how nobody told you what the folio is and isn't good for, and that you ended up wasting it because of your nasty surprise at check-out. You can probably talk them into reversing the credit card charge.

I know it probably gave you a degree of satisfaction to say, "You can keep your stupid credits. I'm never coming back", but in reality Caesar's is a huge corporation and doesn't care if you walk out in a huff. At the end of the day, they kept some of your hard-earned money when they shouldn't have, and that's wrong. I would still pursue this if I were you.

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Originally Posted by carolinajacket

And we wonder why CET is going South. Whoever makes these policy decisions is an idiot. They should be trying their hardest to make people happy -- happy enough to tell folks of the great experience, not a frustrating and disappointing one. I fear that if they ever figure this out it will be too late to save the sinking ship.

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100% true. Caesar's really screws up in this department. They are constantly nickel-and-diming people and making people dance around confusing rules (often which aren't understood by their own employees), which leaves customers frustrated and not eager to return.

The funny thing is that none of this is very hard to fix. If you put me in charge of Caesar's (or any other hotel) for a month, I could fix all of this annoying crap, while costing the company almost nothing extra while doing so. It's almost like there is such a culture of incompetence (that stretches all the way to the top) that nobody is allowed to stand up and say, "This isn't right. We are going to fix this and make it easier on both the customers and the employees."

The problem is that Harrah's and Caesar's BOTH had operations problems prior to their merger, and when they came together, it just got worse.

It's like two alcoholics marrying and watching their drinking problems get progressively worse.

We stayed at PH a few weeks ago and had dinner at YOLO the Mexican restaurant which is also not owned by PH. I was planning on getting my $100.00 voucher for 15,000 tc but since they would not give it to me because I was Seven Stars last year we just charged the bill to our room and then when we went to check out they took it off my RC's.

When we went to Vegas in January for our annual trip we used our $500.00 celebration dinner at Center Cut at the Flamingo. When the bill came we had about $80.00 left so they let us take 2 bottles of wine home.

When we went back another weekend for one of our Seven Stars trips we charged 10 lbs. of Starbucks Coffee to our room and used the remainder of our $500.00 folio to pay for it. I'm not sure they will let you do that anymore.

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Originally Posted by Nash

We stayed at PH a few weeks ago and had dinner at YOLO the Mexican restaurant which is also not owned by PH. I was planning on getting my $100.00 voucher for 15,000 tc but since they would not give it to me because I was Seven Stars last year we just charged the bill to our room and then when we went to check out they took it off my RC's.

When we went to Vegas in January for our annual trip we used our $500.00 celebration dinner at Center Cut at the Flamingo. When the bill came we had about $80.00 left so they let us take 2 bottles of wine home.

When we went back another weekend for one of our Seven Stars trips we charged 10 lbs. of Starbucks Coffee to our room and used the remainder of our $500.00 folio to pay for it. I'm not sure they will let you do that anymore.

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The $500 Celebration Dinner, by the way, is somewhat of an exception. A few (but not all) non-CET-owned properties will take that voucher.

In 2012 I had my dinner at the Strip House (steakhouse) at PH. This is NOT a CET-owned restaurant, but they were on the list to take the $500 celebration dinner voucher for some reason. The only difference was that the tax didn't "fall off", so I actually got more like $458+tax. Of course, there was still some fail that occurred. At the end of the meal, they had trouble authenticating my voucher, as apparently they needed to verify with Rio (or have it pre-approved) to take it, and my host didn't realize that. My host was gone for the day, and they couldn't reach anyone. Strip House told me just to charge it to my room and deal with it later. I refused, stating that my host clearly told me NOT to charge the meal to my room under any circumstances. We got in a stalemate, and finally I just said to the manager, "Look, I have this voucher for $500 here from the Rio, and you need to find a way to make it work. I'm not paying you a penny, and you've kept me here for 20 minutes without being able to figure it out. You have 5 more minutes to get this right or I'm walking out of here." Like 30 seconds after I said that, the person working on the matter came running up and said, "Ok, we got approval", and that was that.

I am surprised the Rio gave you an actual voucher. Your host is supposed to arrange the Seven Stars $500.00 Celebration dinner with the restaurant.

The other $500.00 folio gets applied to your room charges and then they take it off when you check out.

I just used my $500 celebration dinner at Gordon Ramsay Steak at Paris. My host said to get a voucher from the TR desk at Paris. But I was over at the TR desk at Caesars to pick up those Level 1 Experience gift cards, and at the same time I asked if I could pick up my celebration dinner voucher for Steak at Paris. Yes, I did get the voucher at Caesars and used it over at Paris without any problem. I also had a small balance left over and Jason went home with some steak knives from their gift display.

Regarding my host being wrong about Central? Well Dan, if she was wrong it didn't matter to me because my $250 folio credit covered my meal at Central plus my gift shop purchase and a room service meal.

But clearly the message here is this: when you check in VERIFY the offer and the details so there is no "check out surprise."

I know you do not need a host involved for the Seven Stars celebration dinner. When I used my $500 celebration dinner in January, I did not get my host involved except to make a regular reservation a few weeks before at Old Homestead Steakhouse. When was a Ceasars Palace, I went to the Total Rewards desk and asked how to use my Seven Stars celebration dinner. I told them it was for the Old Homestead and they printed out a $500 voucher which I handed off at the restaurant. We used up only $438 for a party of five, but we did not have alcohol. It was easy peasy.

Most of you people will never learn. Regnis has the right approach, and the rest of you should listen. And just think--if any of you complainers just took the time to comprehend what it takes to win, then all this moaning and groaning would cease to exist. You win money, you BUY what you want & where you choose. Worrying yourselves to death over all the trivial nonsense is EXACTLY what Caesars expects you to do. END OF STORY!!

I think the phrase, Rob, is "obsessive/compulsive." If you actually play at properties that have lousy odds for blackjack, video poker, and slots, then obsess over the comp rates and execution, then there is an absurd obsessive/compulsive component to your behavior. It's not seeing the forest, but trying to rake up the leaves. Now I give craps a pass as it's hard for CET to ruin craps odds.

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Originally Posted by Rob.Singer

Most of you people will never learn. Regnis has the right approach, and the rest of you should listen. And just think--if any of you complainers just took the time to comprehend what it takes to win, then all this moaning and groaning would cease to exist. You win money, you BUY what you want & where you choose. Worrying yourselves to death over all the trivial nonsense is EXACTLY what Caesars expects you to do. END OF STORY!!

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Rob... remember you owe me dinner. Why don't you use your 7Stars $500 Celebration Dinner and take me to Gordon Ramsay Steak?