Difference between revisions of "Earn hotel points from stays"
From Travel Strategies
(→Getting value from your points) |
(→Consolidating your miles in a small set of accounts) |
||
| Line 39: | Line 39: | ||
<li>'''You should have an account anyway'''. Once you've set up your hotel loyalty account to unlock special member rates and benefits, it only takes a second to add it to your reservation. If you are booking directly, signing in will fill in all your extra reservation details, so it actually takes less time than doing a "guest" checkout. And if you are using AwardWallet, it is easy to retrieve any forgotten account information.</li> | <li>'''You should have an account anyway'''. Once you've set up your hotel loyalty account to unlock special member rates and benefits, it only takes a second to add it to your reservation. If you are booking directly, signing in will fill in all your extra reservation details, so it actually takes less time than doing a "guest" checkout. And if you are using AwardWallet, it is easy to retrieve any forgotten account information.</li> | ||
</ul> | </ul> | ||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
| − | |||
=== When you should earn miles with a different account === | === When you should earn miles with a different account === | ||
Revision as of 00:59, 14 January 2021
If your hotel has a loyalty program, you should always join it before your stay.
You might as well earn hotel points on each of your stays. In most cases, you should be able to get some value from them. And simply signing up for the programs will give you special member rates, benefits, and promotions.
Jump to
Jump to:
Special member rates and benefits
Even if you knew you weren't interested in earning points, you should always join a hotel's loyalty program before you book.
Joining the hotel's loyalty program provides access to special member rates and at least some minor extra benefits, such as free internet access or bottled water. It only takes a minute to sign up and a free service called AwardWallet takes all the effort out of remembering and managing your account. With some programs, you may be able to take shortcuts to earn elite hotel status and unlock additional benefits.
Getting value from your points
It might take a long time before you can earn enough points for a free night, but that shouldn't stop you from taking the time to earn points on your stay.
- With the major hotel programs, you should eventually be able to put together enough points for a free night. Your points won't expire as long as you have some activity every 1-2 years (depending on the program). Even if you don't wind up staying again during this time, there are some easy ways to keep your account active. And if you have the hotel company's credit card, your points will either remain active or you will be able to keep it active with a single credit card charge.
- You might be able to combine points you earn from your stays with points you get from your credit card. For example, any Ultimate Rewards points you earn can be combined with your Hyatt points to either book more frequent or more expensive award nights.Or you can add a lot of extra points to your account with a Hyatt signup bonus.
- Even if you never earn enough points for a free stay, you can still get some value from your points. Realistically you may never earn enough miles in some programs for a free ticket. Fortunately, most programs allow you to redeem smaller number of points for other things—allowing you to get some value from the points you earn. For example, you can use Spirit Airlines miles to purchase magazine subscriptions.
- You should have an account anyway. Once you've set up your hotel loyalty account to unlock special member rates and benefits, it only takes a second to add it to your reservation. If you are booking directly, signing in will fill in all your extra reservation details, so it actually takes less time than doing a "guest" checkout. And if you are using AwardWallet, it is easy to retrieve any forgotten account information.
When you should earn miles with a different account
It usually makes sense to choose to earn miles with one of your core frequent flyer accounts. However, it may sometimes be worthwhile to set up or choose a different account instead (even if that means spreading your miles over multiple accounts).
- Each frequent flyer program will give you a different number of miles for the same flights. Every frequent flyer program maintains their own mileage earning chart that controls the “multiplier” used for different classes of service. Class of service doesn’t just mean whether you are flying in the economy, business, or first-class cabin. Each of those main types of tickets has several different “classes of service" buckets, which are indicated by a single letter, such as "R" class. Each fare bucket has different rules and pricing. For example, highly discounted coach tickets will be in one fare class, more expensive coach tickets will in a different fare class, and fully refundable coach tickets in yet another class. If you fly on a super-discounted rate, you might earn 50% of miles flown with one program, 25% of miles flown with another, and no miles at all with yet another program. If you fly on a premium ticket, you might earn double the miles with one program and only regular miles with another. Or a program may give you “miles” based on the actual price you paid for the ticket. Determine How Many Miles You Will Earn for Your Flight.
- If you will be flying a lot of miles on a trip and you can receive a significant number of extra miles with a specific program, you should consider choosing it, instead of your normal account. Most of the time, we prefer to concentrate the miles we earn in our core set of frequent flyer accounts. However, if we are taking a long trip, we will sometimes choose to credit the flight to an alternative program that will credit us with a lot more miles.
- You might also consider crediting to an alternative program if you are trying to take advantage of a special promotion or status-earning opportunity. For example, you might be in a position to take a status challenge with a particular program or to take advantage of some other frequent flyer promotion.
