Background

For a while, we had been planning a family trip to Las Vegas. The theme was basically eat, eat, eat, with a side goal of letting the kid see something new. On our must-eat list were Caesars Bacchanal Buffet, two Japanese izakayas off the Strip, one Chinese roast meat spot, plus several Korean BBQ and conveyor-belt sushi places as backups. Caesars Bacchanal Buffet is famous, and the wait can be brutal, so I thought of Caesars Total Rewards elite status, which seemed to offer access to a priority line and a shorter wait. Also, since many of the restaurants on our list were off the Strip, and our child needed a car seat so Uber wasn’t convenient, we were definitely going to rent a car. With Caesars elite status, you can park for free at all Caesars casinos, which is a great deal. So after reading online data points, I completed the Hilton Gold -> Wyndham Diamond -> Caesars Total Rewards Diamond status match process online about two months in advance.

Caesars Total Rewards Match Process

Here’s a quick overview of each match step and the relevant websites.

Hilton Gold -> Wyndham Diamond

The above is Wyndham’s status match page, and it accepts status matches from several hotel programs. My Hilton Gold came from the AMEX Hilton Ascend card, but you can also match from other hotel elite statuses. Common options include Marriott Rewards Gold Elite or above and IHG Platinum Elite or above. If you have a Chase IHG or Marriott credit card, there’s a good chance you already have a qualifying hotel status. After submitting the form, you should receive a successful status match email in about 5-7 days.

Note that this status is only valid for 90 days, unless you complete 14 qualifying nights within those 90 days. Still, 90 days was plenty for us, and after that you can match back from Caesars.

Wyndham Diamond -> Caesars Diamond

This is the Wyndham Diamond to Caesars Diamond match page. The match usually goes through within about a week, and you can log in to the Caesars website to check your status.

Caesars Total Rewards Diamond Benefits

Now let me go through the benefits we used in Las Vegas on this trip with Caesars Total Rewards Platinum.

No resort fees on hotel stays

This is an especially valuable benefit if you stay at a Caesars property. On weekdays or during slower periods, the resort fee can be almost the same as the room rate, or even higher. On this trip, because we were traveling on a weekend, had both an older family member and a young child with us, and also had a rental car, we chose a family-style hotel off the Strip instead, so we didn’t use this benefit. Still, I’m listing it first because I think this is one of the most commonly useful perks.

Free parking (both self-parking and valet parking)

At this point, it’s hard to find many casinos on the Strip that still offer free long-term parking. For anyone renting a car, this perk can save a decent amount of money each day. You can check parking fees for Caesars properties here. Of course, the first hour is free for everyone. On the official site, I saw that you must have a physical card to get free parking.

At the time, I assumed you needed the card when entering the garage, so we first went to Rio to get our physical cards issued there (parking at Rio is free), and then went to Caesars Palace for the buffet. However, based on M Life’s parking policy, it seems very possible that you only need to show the card when exiting. Would love more dp on this.

Priority Line

When we went to the Caesars Rewards Center at Rio/Caesars, we found that Caesars had separate VIP lines for each elite tier: Seven Stars, Diamond, and Platinum. Since Seven Stars members are relatively rare, we were able to get our business done almost immediately with barely any wait.

The biggest use of this perk is obviously at Caesars Bacchanal Buffet. When we arrived, it was after 7 pm. The regular member/general customer line had already wrapped around several rows, and there were also lots of people lined up near the elevators on the other side. Based on my previous experience, that would have meant at least a 1-1.5 hour wait. By contrast, in the VIP lines, there was no one in Seven Stars, one party in Diamond, and maybe two to three parties in Platinum. Worth noting: even though we arrived later than several Platinum parties, we were still seated before them. Our total time, including payment and waiting, was under 15 minutes.

The crowded area on the left is the regular member/general customer waiting area. Each elite tier has its own VIP line.

Show Vouch

Diamond members can see two free shows each month, and there is a specific list published every month. Click here to check it. When we got our physical cards at Rio, the representative suggested that we print the vouchers first, and then once we decided which show to see, we could take the voucher to the box office to exchange it for tickets. There weren’t any especially famous shows, but options like Paranormal and Jeff Civillico were still rated quite well on tripadvisor, so the selection and schedule seemed pretty decent.

Celebration Dinner Credit

This was, in my opinion, the most valuable benefit. Diamond members get a $100 dining credit each membership year, and for 2019 the valid period was 2/1/19 - 1/31/20. There are lots of participating restaurants, including Bacchanal Buffet, Gordon Ramsay Hell's Kitchen, and more. Details are here.

My LD and I each had $100, which worked out perfectly to cover a weekend dinner for 3 adults at Bacchanal Buffet for a total of $195 ($64.99/person). Yes, when using this credit, we didn’t even have to pay tax. Otherwise, the post-tax total for three people would have been about $211. One important thing to note is that this credit must be used all at once. We had about $5 left over, and that remainder was forfeited.

Both the Caesars website and the representative who issued our physical cards told us that we could just present the card and ID to use the credit. But in actual use, my LD’s card worked fine, while my card didn’t have the credit attached. The cashier and the rewards center staff made a phone call, then told me to go over there and print a dining voucher before coming back to use it. When the Rewards Center printed my voucher, they explained that this issue happens fairly often, though they didn’t know why. So to save time, you may want to print both the show voucher and dining voucher when you get your physical card. One thing to keep in mind: the printed dining voucher has an expiration period, roughly about a week. I’m not sure whether you can go print another one if it expires unused, so if anyone has dp, feel free to leave a comment.

M Life Match

Caesars -> M Life

I looked at other people’s dp in advance and found that MGM Grand was the place most often mentioned for matching Caesars Total Rewards to M Life, so we made a special trip to MGM Grand one morning. When we got to M Life Rewards, we found that they only had two lines: one VIP line for Platinum/Noir, and one line for everyone else. In other words, matched M Life Gold doesn’t really help with wait times.

After waiting 20 minutes, it was our turn. We said we wanted to match from Caesars Diamond, and the representative seemed very experienced and immediately said that was fine, but only for new M Life members. At the time, they were only offering status match to brand-new members. As it happened, neither my LD nor I had ever signed up before, so we successfully matched to M Life Gold. After getting the card, my LD wanted to play a slot machine a couple of times, but the card showed as invalid. We asked about it, and were told not to keep it next to a phone or room key card because it could get demagnetized. They reset it for us. This time we kept it in hand the whole time, but it still didn’t work when we exited the parking garage, and we had to call for assistance to be let out. Compared with the Caesars card, it was honestly pretty lousy.

I looked up the benefits of M Life Gold online, and they really seemed pretty underwhelming. Free parking appeared to be the only practical one.

M Life Gold matched from Caesars Diamond, valid through September 2020

M Life -> Hyatt

After getting home, I logged in to M life’s match page (click here) and matched M Life Gold to Hyatt. This was instant, and my Hyatt status was upgraded to Explorist right away.

Summary

The treatment that comes with Diamond status at Caesars hotels far exceeded my expectations. It made our weekend trip to Las Vegas much more convenient and also saved us a good amount of money. So whether or not you currently have a trip to Vegas planned, I’d recommend matching into it in advance just in case. Of course, Caesars Diamond also comes with other benefits we didn’t use. You can check this page for the full list of benefits.