With international travel almost impossible right now, hotels and banks are coming together to put together enticing staycation deals for you to have a semblance of a vacation without your passport.
Citi Prestige has updated its staycation offers for cardmembers, offering a complimentary second night stay at three hotels.
Two of the hotels, Singapore Marriott Tang Plaza Hotel and The Fullerton Hotel, were already on offer earlier in July, while the latest deal included St Regis.
Details of the offers below:
Singapore Marriott Tang Plaza Hotel, S$350 net
Deluxe Room for 2 nights
Daily breakfast for up to two adults and 2 children (below 12 years old) or three adults
Complimentary S$100 net dining credit per room per stay
Early check-in at 11am and late check-out till 2pm (subject to availability)
Complimentary parking
Marriott has imposed a blackout date of 25 to 31 December, so the rate will not apply during that period.
To book this offer, you will have to call the hotel (6831 4555) or drop them an email.
The Fullerton Hotel Singapore, S$490 net
Premier Courtyard Room at S$490 net for 2 nights
Daily breakfast for two adults
Complimentary S$80 net dining credit per stay
To book this offer, click here. Note that if you want to book this rate, you will need to select a minimum of 2 nights during your search. A nightly rate of S$209 (before taxes) will give you the magic S$490 net for 2 nights.
The St. Regis Singapore, S$600 net
Executive Deluxe Room for 2 nights
Epicurean breakfast for two adults
Complimentary S$50 net dining or spa experience credit per room per stay
Only the main cardholder can utilise this promotion. Supplementary cardholders are not eligible.
The reservation must be made using a Citi Prestige credit card.
The cardholder must be present and present the same credit card at check-in, and for full payment upon check out.
The cardholder who booked the stays must be one of the staying guests.
Complimentary night is non-transferable and not valid for stays at another hotel.
Complimentary night must be utilized during the same stay as the purchased nights.
Purchased and complimentary nights must be of the same room types.
For the avoidance of doubt, the complimentary night cannot be combined with another “stay a minimum night and get free night” type of offer run by the hotels directly.
Cardholders are also only entitled to a maximum of one free nightper hotel. In other words, you could book one room each at The Fullerton Hotel, Marriott Tang Plaza, and the St Regis, but you can’t book two nights at a single hotel and get two nights free.
While Marriott and SPG’s loyalty programmes merger that took place last year August was probably one of the biggest event in the industry in 2018, there are still more changes coming.
Marriott Rewards to be rebranded Marriott Bonvoy
This has been widely reported in many loyalty and hotel news sites, and the new brand will take effect from 13 February 2019. The three programmes that preceded this – Marriott Rewards, Ritz-Carlton Rewards, and Starwood Preferred Guest – will be abandoned after the new brand kicks in.
The other change that comes with the new brand is that the Platinum Premier tier, and the Platinum Premier with Ambassador Tier will be rebranded as Titanium and Ambassador respectively.
The unified tier charts of Marriott Rewards came under fire when it was unveiled last year for having three platinum tiers.
Marriott hotel category changes; new category 8 kicks in March 2019
Another major change coming is the introduction of category 8 award pricing, a new tier above the current 7-tier chart that Marriott Rewards have. The means that the most exclusive properties in the Marriott portfolio will now require a max of 85,000 points, up from the previous cap of 60,000 – a cool 25,000 more points (which you can actually use for a category 4 hotel).
The good news is that while some hotels are already listed as a category 8 hotel, you can beat the price increase by using your points for these hotels before 5 March 2019.
Some popular properties that are category 8 around the world for your consideration include:
The St Regis New York
Prince de Galles, a Luxury Collection Hotel, Paris
The Prince Gallery Tokyo Kioicho, A Luxury Collection Hotel, Tokyo
W Maldives
The St Regis Maldives Vommuli Resort
W Koh Samui
Fortunately (or otherwise), there are none in Southeast Asia save for Thailand (specifically Koh Samui), so that will be of minimum impact if you live in this part of the world. Loyalty Traveler has compiled a full list here, if you are interested.
Every year, Marriott also make changes to the category listing of its hotels globally, mostly to reflect market conditions (or in my words, the popularity).
The full list of category changes can be found here, but some key things to note:
About 380 hotels globally will be changing categories (a bit over 5% of Marriott’s portfolio)
Of which, 340 will be moving up the category ladder, and
About 40 hotels are moving down to a lower category
Also note that Marriott earlier announced the intention of introducing peak and off-peak award charts too, but it seems like this will not be ready in time for a March 2019 launch.
Having not been to Johor Bahru for a while, I decided to get away for a weekend to the southernmost city of Malaysia as what most Singaporeans love to do. This time round, my hotel of choice was Renaissance Johor Bahru Hotel, a Marriott property about 15 minutes away from the Causeway (the bridge link to Singapore).
Renaissance Johor Bahru Hotel
You can spot the hotel as you drive down the highway towards Permas Jaya, given its unlikely existence in an industrial estate. The hotel is a two-wing, 17-storey building that is set in a V-shape if you view from the top. The building, while only five years old, is fairly weathered: external walls are showing signs of peeling and browning.
The hotel is a standalone property complete with its own car park set as part of the building. The car park is classically basic as with most Malaysian car parks: dimly lit, narrow in most places and looking a little terrifying.
Lobby check in desks
However, that impression changes when you first enter the lobby. Rather immaculately decorated, the lobby is voluminous, with a high ceiling and ample space for large crowds to gather if necessary.
Arriving in the evening after an agonising three hours at the Singapore-Malaysia border, check-in was very smooth as there was no one else waiting to check in. In a couple of minutes after explaining the club lounge service hours, we were packed off to our room.
The room
The hotel consist of 325 rooms and 20 suites, along with plenty of meeting rooms that can be combined to form a ballroom, which is perfect for weddings.
The entry level room is the Deluxe Room, sitting at 34-36 square metres in size, depending on which room you get. For a premium you will get a bay view room, or you could also opt for a room on the 6th floor that gets direct access to the swimming pool (tip: not great). The pool terrace rooms, as well as the Club rooms, do get access to the Executive Lounge on 16th floor along with Club benefits.
Renaissance Johor Bahru Hotel, Club Deluxe Room
There are also two types of suites in the hotel: a junior suite which is about 69 square metres, and a Presidential Suite spanning 153 square metres that comes with a separate living room, lavish bedroom and spacious bathroom on the topmost floor of the property.
I booked myself into a Club Deluxe room this time, and I was given a room on one of the Club floors on 15th floor. There didn’t seem to be any material difference between a club and non-club room, apart from the floor.
The room was fairly standard, with a king-sized bed coupled with a couch at the foot of the bed facing the TV screen. The room overlooks an industrial area with a mall, Permas Jaya Aeon, not too far away, but overall not a great view.
View from the room
Disappointingly, the bathroom didn’t have a bathtub. Modestly sized, the bathroom had a walk-in rain shower, a simple vanity and a segregated toilet. While it’s not my dream setup, of course I’m also concious I’m not exactly at Capella.
Club Lounge
While only a Rewards Category 2 hotel under Marriott’s new charts, Renaissance Johor Bahru Hotel do offer club rooms with access to the Club Lounge.
The Club Lounge is located on the 16th floor and is open from 6am to 10.30pm daily, offering breakfast in the morning, light snacks in the afternoon and evening cocktails and refreshments from 5.30pm to 7.30pm daily with drinks available for another hour until 8.30pm. Confusing, yes I know.
Club lounge on 16th floor
The layout however baffled me a little. Most hotels that I’ve been to have the Club Lounge close to the lift lobby, or tucked away from most of the guest rooms, if not both.
In Renaissance JB’s case, given the unique layout of the hotel, the Club Lounge was located on one end of the building. While this is not entirely strange, what is strange is that the entrance to the Club Lounge faces a guest room — I would hate to be in that room.
Having said that, having arrived at the hotel only at about 7pm, I immediately dashed to the Club Lounge to check out what’s on offer. To my dismay, most of the snacks have emptied out, even though there was still half an hour to go. When I checked with the staff if they were still refilling the dishes, they initially said no, but I think enough people asked them so they eventually did so about 20 minutes later.
Evening cocktails and refreshments – lamb rendang, fish fritters, fried rice
What was on offer that evening was a chicken wrap, salted fish fried rice, a mushroom fritter and a mutton rendang. On the other side, there were some vegetable sticks and dips, as well as cakes. The food was actually quite palatable, even though the selection wasn’t wide. Perhaps I was running a little hungry, I actually went for a second serving of the fried rice.
The evening cocktail hours were also structured in a very confusing manner. Refreshments were available from 5.30pm to 7.30pm, while alcholic beverages were served from 5.30pm till 8.30pm, and non-alcoholic beverages for the rest of the evening until 10.30pm. It would have been heaps easier if they have aligned the food and alcoholic beverage service timings.
The Club Lounge is also furnished in an incredibly uncomfortable manner. All the seating were in the form of dining tables, and there were no sofa seating save for a couple of armchairs with a coffee table in the library corner. This also means that even if I had arrived earlier, I would have been rather unlikely to spend my day in the lounge reading over a cup of coffee.
Club lounge – Not the best latte I had
With a fairly uncomfortable seating for having a drink and reading a book, I lingered in the lounge up to about 9pm over a few more glasses of drinks, before heading back to my room for the night.
The facilities
Beyond the club lounge, Renaissance Johor Bahru also has a swimming pool and a 24-hour fitness centre, both on the 6th floor. For those who fancy some pampering at a spa, unfortunately there isn’t any at the hotel. However, you will be spoiled for choice with an array of options for massages in Johor, so the lack of a in-hotel spa should not be a problem.
Lap pool
There are two pools, a larger rectangular pool that you can do laps in, and a small whirlpool that’s good enough for you to let your kids play in. Alongside the swimming pool are deck chairs for those who love a good tan, as well as cabanas to lie in if you fancy that instead.
The gym is rather well equipped and spacious, complete with a dumbbell rack, cardio machines and various machines. The gym can be accessed with your key card 24 hours daily, so regardless whether you are an early riser who wants to get a workout before breakfast, or a late night gym junkie, you can get your workout anytime you wish.
The gym
For those who love a good spa facility, there’s only a sauna that’s available within the changing rooms, but not a steam room. The sauna is also fairly small size, but usually unoccupied during the few times I used it.
The food
The next morning, I had breakfast at the lobby restaurant. I typically love Malaysian hotel breakfasts as they have proven time and time again to have fantastic Asian offerings, such as the E&O in Penang which offered my favourites such as cooked-to-order roti canai.
As with most larger hotels, the breakfast restaurant is fairly large sized, with seating of over a hundred people from what I saw. Of course, the restaurants are fully halal, so don’t expect bak kut teh (pork ribs soup) here!
Breakfast restaurant at lobby
Just a sampling of what was available at the buffet: dim sum, roti canai, nasi lemak, congee, along with western options of eggs, sausages, waffles, pancakes, cereal, fruits, and more.
Given the glutton I am, I had to try a little of everything. The roti canai was not cooked-to-order, so there was only the plain ones on offer. However, there was thosai that could be ordered so that more than made up for it. The nasi lemak was pre-wrapped in a banana leaf, and offered the standard condiments including hard boiled eggs, sambal, ikan bilis and cucumber. The rice was on point: fragrant and not too soft, and when paired with the sambal, good enough on its own.
Breakfast at Renaissance JB Hotel
There was also dim sum available, although this was a little disappointing. There wasn’t the usual siew mai (dumplings) available, but instead there was many buns (not my favourites) and also some unidentifiable steamed items.
To top off breakfast, there was a soft serve machine too, serving up chocolate and vanilla soft serve, complete with toppings such as crushed peanuts, candy rice and more. This was certainly a great way to end the morning.
My thoughts
Overall, this is a fairly decent Marriott property, taking into consideration the price you pay for a club room.
The room itself was fairly comfortable, and I loved that couch at the feet of the bed, which allowed me a choice of either lounge on the couch or on the bed to watch TV. As with most hotel rooms, I couldn’t get the smart TV to cast my phone content so that was a pity.
The lounge was clearly a disappointment, since it wasn’t exactly designed for one to lounge in it, but rather built almost like a restaurant. Service was acceptable for the category, so I’m not going to lose much sleep over it. However, there are araes where the service can be tightened or simplified, for instance, ensuring that food is available right to the end of the evening cocktail hours.
Club Lounge
The highlight of the stay would most likely be the breakfast. While it was great on its own, it’s certainly not the best I had in Malaysia before. In fact, DoubleTree by Hilton over at Johor Bahru city centre might offer a better breakfast, although it’s immensely crowded.
Despite the above, Renaissance Hotel Johor Bahru is certainly a great value for money especially if you need a cheap option to clock nights to qualify for the new Marriott Elite status!
