AMEX POINTS good at the Portafino

[katboferguson]

I thought I would mention this just in case someone out there may be in a similar situation and have points with American Express. Shocked at how expensive the Universal on-site hotels rooms are compared to the last time we stayed there, I had been delaying making our reservations for this summer. (We'll be at Disney most of the time, but we always like spending a couple of nights on-site at Universal, so that we could use the express pass feature at their parks.) Today on a whim I called American Express to see if I could use my points for anything at Universal and was told that AMEX points can be used to pay for nights at the Portafino. I had planned on staying on-site two nights, and as luck would have it I had enough (30,000) points to pay for one night. I booked this one night through the American Express "land and sea" team. They were terrific. Then we tied that reservation to a reservation I made directly with Universal using a AAA rate for the second night.