Lesser Known Hotel Redemptions

This week got off to an interesting start with my three-part series on Gobank, the new Bluebird competitor which can radically reduce your cost per point when manufacturing spend using a number of popular methods (part 1, part 2, part 3).  I'l be returning to that subject as Gobank increases their accessibility and we learn more about the product's capabilities.

Today I'll take a look at three hotel redemptions that are lesser known, but potentially lucrative redemptions of your hard-earned (or not so hard-earned!) hotel points.

Hyatt Upgrades

With Hyatt Gold Passport, you can use 3,000 Gold Passport points to upgrade to a Regency or Grand Club room for up to 4 nights during any paid stay.  Similarly, you can use 6,000 Gold Passport points to upgrade to a suite.  Moreover, you're able to guarantee these upgrade at time of booking, so you don't have to wait on pins and needles for an upgrade to become available.

These points upgrades can only be used when you're staying on a reservation that's at least the "Hyatt Daily Rate," the flexible, non-prepaid reservations business travelers and those making last-minute reservations tend to make.

Over at View from the Wing there's a great discussion of this feature, under the fitting subtitle, "Why Do I Ever Stay in a Regular Room at a Hyatt?​"

Hilton Award Upgrades

A similar benefit offered by Hilton HHonors is per-night point upgrades on award stays. Each property prices these awards out different, but there are some great values to be had here.  For example, in March I was able to book an executive floor room at the Hilton Prague, with access to what is arguably the best executive lounge in Europe for 39,129 Hilton HHonors points; that's just 4,129 more points per night, or about $17, for a self-serve open bar that runs from noon until late at night, every day.

You can spend your HHonors points on these upgrades after making your initial award booking, and the price can fluctuate quite a bit as the property gets a better picture of its upcoming reservations, so it's worth checking back periodically to see if the upgrade price has made it worth making an upgrade with your points (or if you've earned more points since making the original booking).

Marriott Instant Redemption Award

This next award needs the following caveat: if you are aggressive about redeeming your Marriott Rewards points for high-value award night redemptions, then Marriott Instant Rewards will not provide you with the same value per point as those redemptions.​  But as anyone who's read my book knows, the least valuable point is the one you don't redeem.  In that spirit, I think Marriott instant rewards can be a great redemption if you have Marriott Rewards points that you don't foresee a more valuable use for in the immediate future.

​So what is a Marriott Instant Redemption Award?  According to Marriott you can:

redeem points instantly at any participating Marriott across the US (except Hawaii), Canada and Europe (includes the United Kingdom, France and Germany).

You can only redeem your points for an Instant Redemption Award during an eligible stay, which is most stays that you book as an individual and have provided your Marriott Rewards number with the reservation.  When you redeem points for an Instant Redemption Award, you ​can apply a credit against charges made to your room during your stay, according to the following redemption chart:

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​As you can see, these Marriott Rewards redemptions give you between .2 and .53 cents per point in value.  Low compared to award night redemptions, but high compared to letting them expire.

Maximizing fixed-value travel rewards points

Today I'd like to take a closer look at the value proposition offered by some of the cards discussed in Chapter 2 of my book: fixed-value travel rewards cards.  When looking at any card, you should ask three questions: is it worth signing up for; is it worth making purchases with; and is it worth renewing when the annual fee is due?

Signup Bonuses

The first question is easy to answer: since the annual fee is waived for all these cards, you can apply for any of them when the signup bonus is high enough to justify the hard credit inquiry, and you aren't applying for any other cards from the same issuer in your current application cycle.

Here are the current signup bonuses available for these cards: 

• Capital One Venture Rewards.  10,000 Venture miles after $1,000 in spending within 3 months.  Earn 2 points per dollar, redeem them at 1 cent each for statement credits against travel purchases made with the card.  No partial redemptions (you must have enough points to pay for the entire travel purchase).  $59 annual fee, waived the first year.
• US Bank Flexperks Travel Rewards Visa Signature.  17,500 FlexPoints after $2,500 in purchases within the first 5 months.  Earn 1 point per dollar, 2 points on airfare, groceries, or communications expenses, 3 points per dollar for transactions coded as charity.  Redeem points for travel redemptions using the Flexperks travel booking tool at up to 2 cents per point, in defined tiers.  No partial redemptions.  $49 annual fee, waived the first year.
• Citi ThankYou Premier.  25,000 ThankYou points after spending $2,000 in the first 3 months.  Earn 1 point per dollar, 1.2 points at supermarkets, gas stations, commuter transportation and parking.  Redeem points at 1.33 cents each for travel purchases using the ThankYou Rewards booking tool, with partial redemptions allowed.  $125 annual fee, waived the first year.
• BarclayCard Arrival World Mastercard .  40,000 points after $1,000 in spending within 90 days.  Earn 2 points per dollar spent on the card.  Redeem points for statement credits against travel purchases made on the card at 1 cent per point, and receive a 10% rebate after each redemption.  No partial redemptions.  $89 annual fee, waived the first year.
• Priceline Rewards Visa Signature.   5,000 points after first purchase.  Earn 2 points per dollar spent on the card, and 5 points per dollar spent on Name Your Own Price reservations.  Redeem points at 1 cent each for statement credits against purchases made on the card, with no partial redemptions.

As you can see, the Priceline Rewards card has a signup bonus worth $50, the Venture Rewards card's signup bonus is worth about $100, the Flexperks card $260-$350, ThankYou Premier $332, and Arrival World $444.  In general, it's never worth signing up for the Venture Rewards card except during the periodic promotion when they offer a signup bonus of twice the number of miles you earned on a competing card during the previous calendar year, which can be quite lucrative.

Earning Points

All these cards, except the Venture Rewards and Priceline cards, are worth applying for and spending enough on to earn the signup bonus.  But are any of them worth making purchases on after you've spent enough to trigger the signup bonus?  The answer is usually no, since the Fidelity Investment Rewards American Express card offers 2% cash back on all purchases and the Fidelity Visa Signature card offers 1.5% cash back on the first $15,000 in spending each calendar year, and 2% thereafter, while also having no annual fee. The chart below illustrates the value proposition offered by spending on each of these cards:

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This chart makes clear that the standout value among these cards is the US Bank Flexperks Travel card, which offers up to 6% back on charitable spending (which earns 3 Flexpoints per dollar), but also up to 4% back on airfare, gas, or groceries (whichever you spend most on each billing cycle), plus telecommunications expenses, when you redeem your points using the Flexperks booking tool.  

Redeeming Points

This brings us to the most fundamental difference between these cards: the method of redemption.  As you saw above, fixed-value rewards points are divided into two groups: those that require you to make prospective bookings using your points through their travel tools (ThankYou, Flexperks) and those that allow you to redeem your points for a statement credit against a purchase you've already made with the card.

When you have a choice, you should redeem for statement credits against paid hotel stays, and use rewards booking tools for airline reservations.  This is for the simple reason that unlike airline frequent flyer programs, hotel loyalty programs generally only award points for paid reservations made through the hotel's own website.  By booking a paid hotel reservation through the hotel's website, then redeeming your points for a statement credit against the cost of that reservation, you'll earn hotel loyalty points for your reservation, while you won't do so when you make a hotel reservation through a loyalty program's award booking tool.  This increases the value of your fixed-value points by allowing you to double-dip.

Summary

For everyday purchases, only the US Bank Flexperks Travel card can compete with the Fidelity Rewards 1.5% (Visa) and 2% (American Express) cash back cards.  However, several of the other cards discussed here can offer great value when you take advantage of their lucrative signup bonuses.  Just don't be suckered into paying an annual fee for a card that isn't worth keeping!

Amtrak Double Days and AGR award redemptions

Registration is now available for Amtrak’s Double Days Spring promotion.  Between March 18 and May 18, 2013, you can earn double Amtrak Guest Rewards points for up to two one-way trips per day.

This is a great opportunity to discuss some of the valuable redemptions offered by the Amtrak Guest Rewards program.

Earning AGR Points

On most Amtrak travel you’ll earn 2 Amtrak Guest Rewards points per dollar spent, with a minimum of 100 points per one-way trip.  You’ll earn 500 points per Business Class ticket and 750 points per First Class ticket on Amtrak’s Acela high-speed service between “select city pairs” (see Amtrak’s website for details).

Buying AGR Points

Additionally, you can purchase between 500 and 10,000 points per year for 2.75 cents per point.  As we’ll see, there are lots of redemption opportunities which can make buying points an excellent value, even speculatively.

Transfer Partners

Amtrak Guest Rewards is a transfer partner of both Chase Ultimate Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest.  Points transfer from both programs to Amtrak Guest Rewards at a rate of 1 : 1 (Starwood 20,000 point increment bonuses don't apply to Amtrak transfers).

Co-branded Credit Card

Chase offers a co-branded Amtrak Guest Rewards credit card, which earns 1 point per dollar spent and an additional point per dollar on Amtrak purchases, and has a number of valuable benefits:

• ​The card has no annual fee.
• 12,000 point signup bonus after spending $500 within 3 months.​
• Whenever you redeem for Amtrak travel, you'll receive a 5% ​rebate on the points used (you must have enough points to make the redemption before the rebate is applied).
• ​Finally, one valuable benefits of the co-branded card is available to customers who spend more than $200 per calendar year on Amtrak travel using the credit card.  Cardholders who qualify can transfer up to 25,000 Amtrak points per year into Hilton HHonors points at a rate of 1 Amtrak Guest Rewards point to 2 Hilton points.

Redeeming AGR Points

Some of the most valuable Amtrak redemptions are for travel on Amtrak's high speed Acela service and for long-haul passenger sleeper accommodations.

Acela Travel Redemptions

There are three ways to redeem Amtrak Guest Rewards points for travel on Acela (however, see blackout dates below):

• You can redeem 8,000 points for an Acela Business Class ticket.  Looking at sample dates between Boston and Washington, DC, tickets can cost between $195 and $279, meaning you’ll receive between 2.43 and 3.49 cents per point for Business Class redemptions.  On the higher end of this range, purchased Amtrak points are already worth redeeming for a small profit.
• You can redeem 12,000 points for a First Class ticket, which costs between $321 and $405 on the same Boston to Washington route, giving 2.68 to 3.38 cents per point in value.
• Finally, you can redeem 10,000 points for 5 coupons that can be used for space-available upgrades from paid Business Class reservations to First Class.  Since a First Class ticket costs $126 more than Business Class, this redemption offers an incredible 6.3 cents per point.

Long Haul Redemptions

Some of the most valuable Amtrak Guest Rewards redemptions are for sleeper accommodations on Amtrak’s long-haul passenger routes.

For the purpose of these redemptions, Amtrak divides the country into three zones.  The important thing to keep in mind is that the cost of the redemption is the same for any valid routing between two cities, based only on the zone in which the origin and destination cities are located.  For example, a two-zone bedroom redemption between Chicago and Portland, OR, costs a flat 40,000 Amtrak Guest Rewards points.  For this price you can take the direct route between the two cities on the Empire Builder, a $1778 value on a sample date in May, or 4.44 cents per point.  However, for the same number of points you can first take the Southwest Chief to Los Angeles, then the Coast Starlight from Los Angeles to Portland, a $2562 value, or 6.4 cents per point.  You can check what routings are available between two cities by making a simple one-way reservation search at amtrak.com.  Since Amtrak offers last-seat award availability, any seats or sleeper accommodations which are available on amtrak.com are available for award redemption, subject to the blackout dates below.

Blackout Dates

All Amtrak Guest Rewards redemptions are subject to the following strictly-enforced blackout dates:

On Acela service, weekday travel origination may not occur from any boarding point between start-of-service and 8:59 a.m. inclusive, or between 2:00 p.m. and 5:59 p.m. inclusive (weekend Acela travel is permitted at any time except on any weekend dates defined below). Select Plus and Select Executive members may redeem for travel during blackout dates by using our "rule buster" awards, but Acela blackout times still apply.

Upcoming blackout dates are as follows:

• December 20–23, 2012
• December 26–30, 2012
• January 2, 2013
• February 15, 2013
• February 18, 2013
• March 28–29, 2013
• April 1, 2013
• May 24, 2013
• August 30, 2013
• September 2, 2013
• October 11, 2013
• November 26–27, 2013
• November 30, 2013
• December 1, 2013
• December 20–22, 2013
• December 28–29, 2013
• January 3–5, 2014
• February 14, 2014
• February 17, 2014
• April 17–18, 2014
• April 21, 2014
• May 23, 2014
• July 3, 2014
• July 6, 2014
• August 29, 2014
• September 1, 2014
• October 10, 2014
• November 25–26, 2014
• November 29–December 1, 2014
• December 20–24, 2014
• December 26–31, 2014

Hotel loyalty program devaluation roundup

Now that the last hotel programs have announced the changes to their loyalty programs for 2013, we can survey the landscape and see which programs lost value and which retained it (it would be too much to ask for a loyalty program to gain value).  

​As we'll see, the programs that changed the least were Starwood and Hyatt, which adjusted the award redemption categories of a number of their properties, but maintained the same basic earning and redemption structure (although Starwood Points and Cash redemptions got more expensive, as previously announced).

Almost all the other hotel loyalty programs underwent drastic devaluations.  We'll look at each program in turn.​  As each program's changes goes into effect, I'll update the point density analysis you can find on my page discussing Chapter 6 of the book in more detail.  All these loyalty programs allow award reservations for dates after the category changes at the old redemption level, as long as the reservations are made before the effective date. 

Hyatt Gold Passport

Effective date: February 7, 2013.​

Hyatt's loyalty program underwent almost no changes this year.  Only 17 hotels changed redemption category, and 10 of those ​moved to lower categories, costing fewer points.  You can find the list of all 17 properties on this Hyatt webpage.

Starwood Preferred Guest

Effective date: March 5, 2013.​

As of March 5, 2013, the new Cash & Points redemption rates will go into effect (read more about those new rates here).  Additionally, Starwood has announced a preliminary list of hotels that are changing categories, moving either up or down in the cost of both free nights and Cash & Points redemptions.  You can find that list in this pdf file.

Marriott Rewards

Effective date: May 16, 2013.​

Marriott is introducing a new hotel category, Category 9, which will cost 45,000 Marriott Rewards points and will initially have the following hotels:​

• Boston Marriott Long Wharf
• Le Merigot, A JW Marriott Beach Hotel & Spa, Santa Monica
• London Marriott Hotel County Hall
• London Marriott Hotel Grosvenor Square
• Grosvenor House, A JW Marriott Hotel
• London Marriott Hotel Park Lane
• JW Marriott Essex House
• New York Marriott Marquis
• Paris Marriott Hotel Champs-Elysees
• St. Pancras Renaissance London Hotel
• Renaissance New York Hotel Times Square
• Renaissance Paris Vendome Hotel
• Renaissance Paris Arc de Triomphe Hotel

This pdf has a list of all the Marriott properties that are changing at least one category in 2013.​

Here's my updated analysis of the rebate value of Marriott stays for different combinations of elite status and cardholder status:

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Hilton HHonors

Effective date: March 28, 2013.​

Hilton is radically changing their loyalty program by adding 3 new award redemption tiers, ​introducing seasonal pricing, and changing the current elite discounts on award stays of 4 or more nights into a more straightforward 5th night free on award reservations.  It's widely assumed that after March 28 they will also change the current discounts on stays of four nights for Hilton American Express cardholders, which I discussed in this post.

The new award chart will look like this:​

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And here's the updated point density analysis:​

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"Seasonal pricing" is Hilton's new way of charging a different number of points for hotels within the same category.  However, many have been quick to point out that at Hilton's aspirational properties, for example the Conrad Hong Kong, the supposedly "high season" pricing is in fact in effect year-round (80,000 points at the Conrad Hong Kong, for example).  That's a long season!

Finally, ​elites will no longer receive the variable discount they currently receive on longer award stays.  As I wrote earlier this week:

Elite members of the Hilton HHonors program receive a discount on stays of 4 or more nights at Category 3-7 hotels.  The discount is 15% of the points required for a 4-night stay, 20% of on a 5-night stay, and 25% of on a 6-or-more night stays.

After March 28, elites will instead receive every 5th night free on award reservations, up to 4 free nights on award reservations of 20 consecutive ​nights.