"How else will they afford to spend billions on stock buybacks then, on top of paying the CEO $20 million a year? God knows that minimum wage front desk person really cuts into profits."

"I have a close friend who is a GM at a Marriott property in a fairly large US city (top 25 metro population). Their opinion is basically, "Hey, it's business. I'm not turning away a paying guest if they don't have the right ID." In this person's younger days as a front desk agent, they enjoyed catching people trying to use a corporate rate that the guest was not entitled to. As they became higher up and saw the books, occupancy rates, etc... Corp ID's became far less important than filling rooms."

"I don't do mobile check-in if I'm wanting to upgrade. I check the app before I go in to see if any suites are available to book during the duration of my stay. If there is I just say "Would it be possible to get upgraded to an available suite with my platinum benefit?". Of course this is typically at the hotel that I stay in about once a month for 3 day at a time for work. The front desk pretty much knows me and know that I am fairly low maintenance."