Global Entry 
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RE: The Frequent Traveller Thread - Perks, points, and deals for beginners and experts
(01-31-2017 04:01 AM)asdfk Wrote: Hey everyone, since I'm continuously traveling by plane and staying in hotels... Are there any frequent flyer programs Europeans travelling internationally can benefit from?
I know this is a n00b question, couldn't find any post on the subject. (feel free to redirect me)
ASDFK - here's a post for how to choose hotels and benefit from stays. Its a few years back, but you should get the idea.
(03-21-2015 04:07 PM)Global Entry Wrote: This is a bit of a primer on booking hotel rooms.
There are a lot of options for booking hotel rooms these days, including a million apps, the hotel websites, intermediators, and even just walking up and booking at the hotels themselves. All these need to be weighed against each other, AirBnb, and even Couchsurfing.
The best route for you is going to depend on a few factors:
1. Do you have or are you pursuing status with a particular hotel chain? Approach this reasonably, if you don’t have much travel planned for the year, then pursuing status based on staying 25 or 50 nights at a chain may not be realistic. For those traveling more frequently, this choice will be based on how much you value things like bonus points, free breakfast, lounge access and upgraded room opportunities (which are typically what is afforded by status). Wifi is pretty much out of the calculation at major chains, as they’ve all jumped on board and are providing it free in exchange for registering for their programs.
2.Do you want to use points in some way to pay, or book using a credit card (which card), or some combination of the two.
3.What is the most important factor to you? Status (as discussed above), getting the absolute minimum price, or perhaps earning airline miles or free rooms in the future.
There are obviously a lot of other factors that go into choosing a hotel, such as location, guest friendly policies, and security. Obviously, you need to weigh these factors apart and aside from the above criteria, and only you can decide how they rate, relative to the more objective factors I’ve mentioned.
You may also want to consider AirBnB, not only for reasons of price and ease of access, but also because of the impression it gives to local people about your permanence in the area (I did this in the Philippines, and no one ever asked how long I’d stay in the apartments, which is a very different reaction from when you tell a new friend that you’re staying in a hotel).
It may also be relevant to you whether an employer is paying for the hotel, as you may be indifferent to an employer spending a marginal amount of money extra, and that may affect your decision regarding how to book.
Going for Status
Basically, looking at the options, one pursuing or optimizing based on attaining or retaining status, the first option is always going to be to seek out a hotel in their network in your intended destination. If one exists, check the rate on the website for the hotel chain (spg.com, ihg.com, hyatt.com, etc.) and see what the rate is. This is, in general, the only way you’ll earn points and status with a hotel chain (points being used to book future stays for free or at a discounted rate; status giving you business lounge access, free breakfast, room upgrades, bonus points for spending/stays, and other benefits potentially, depending on the level of status, the chain, and availability). That being said, I’ve had hotels give me stay credit and points for non-website bookings, but it was a mistake on their part, and an anomaly (it happened with SPG early in my points player days last year). Don’t count on this happening, so if you’re resolute about pursuing status, look at what must be achieved to get the status that includes the perks that are important to you (e.g., if you’r employer reimburses for breakfast, maybe you don’t care about getting the free breakfast provided by the hotel (looking at you Cid)), and if its within reason that you can achieve it, then book through the website if that chain is available and in your price range.
Its generally a good idea to look at your stay as a single stay, and then if you have time, look at the rate of each individual day. Sometimes you’ll see a rate for, e.g., 159 per day for each day of a three day stay but when you check day by day, you’ll see the rate at 159, 159, 149 or something like that. It’s a bit of a fuck you built into these websites, assuming people don’t check prices day by day. You wont get additional stay (how many times you checked into the hotel during the year on distinct stays) credit (just the one stay credit for the consecutive bookings at the same property) towards elite status if you stay consecutive nights on different reservations, but perhaps you can save a few bucks. Honestly, I usually don't bother.
What I do sometimes bother to do is to switch hotels within a city during a visit, to bang out 2 or even three different “stays” towards status on a single trip. For example, in Vegas, SPG has the Las Vegas Spa and Resort, the Element (in Summerlin) and the Westin on Flamingo across from Caesars. I’ll often stay a day or two at one hotel, before switching to another for the balance of the stay. These get treated as separate stays, despite being consecutive and in the same city. If you’re trying to reach status based on stays, this is an effective way to short cut the process.
The chains also usually each have a quarterly promotion (sometimes only targeted to certain members of their programs, or providing varying offers) which allow you to earn bonus points, nights and/or stays. SPG does double night bonuses towards status for people approaching status levels gold and platinum to encourage you to stay more with them. As the incremental cost to hotels of status is not particularly high, it makes all the sense in the world for them to help you achieve status if that means future stays are much more likely coming their way.
There may also be promotions whereby status with one chain will get you status with another, through a status match. Hyatt has offered me status match to Platinum bc of my SPG status, and I’ll probably take them up on it around October (not before, because i want the match to last through the whole next year, not just til the end of 2015). Check the website statusmatch.com (airline status matches are also available, e.g. Air Berlin just mentioned a match for non-One World Elites).
The Cards.
The big chains all have credit cards issued by banks, and some of these cards give some head start towards status, and some give status right off. They all give bonus points for spending, and significant bonuses for spending at the hotel chain which is the co-issuer.
To me, the best of these cards is the SPG card, as it has 31 transfer partners, including most airlines, and at 1:1 ratios. It also gives a 25% bonus for transfers in blocks of 20,000 points, and also provides 2 stays and 5 nights credit toward gold status (and platinum, gold being pretty mediocre). Club Carlson has a card that basically gives you a bonus night for every stay, which basically amounts to a 2 for 1 for every short term stay. Thats a very high end benefit - unfortunately they lack desirable properties in many of my intended travel destinations. IHG has a low annual fee card ($49) that occasionally has decent signup bonuses, gives Platinum status to holders and gives one free night per year at any IHG property (that can easily be worth more than $300 in exchange for the 49 annual fee). Marriott’s card also provides status, and Hyatt has several cards with varying bonuses and perks.
If you plan on pursuing status with a chain, it may make a lot of sense, if you have the flexibility to pay however you’d like, to get the co-issued card. It provides a headstart towards status in some cases, can more than double the points earned by a stay at the hotel in question, and again, cards like SPG and Hyatt transfer points to multiple partners (though not always at good ratios in the case of the Hyatt card). Keep in mind that chains like Hyatt don't have that many hotels compared to IHG and Marriott, and so your opportunities to earn stay and night credit may be tougher to come by if you choose to pursue Hyatt (check your intended destinations and see if the chain in question has a hotel or two in the vicinity).
Otherwise paying with a card that gives bonus points for spending on travel, such as Citi Thank You Rewards cards, or the Chase Sapphire, are your best bet.
Which Rate?
Apart from using cards to pay to maximize earnings in points, hotel websites typically allow you to pay in points earned in your frequent traveller account with them, or in some combination of their points and cash.
Typically, this is just the same exercise as one would make with airline points. Check the cash rate of the hotel on their website, divide by the number of points required to book using points and see if the trade is worth it. If an SPG hotel is 220 per night, and the cost to book in points is 10,000, then you’re getting 2.2 cents per point. Consider whether that return is sufficient by comparing it to the return you’d get from using those SPG points to book airline tickets. Similarly, using cash and points is a similar calculation - just subtract the cash portion from the cost of the room, and then do the math based on the reduced cost and points. It used to be that many hotels didn't give nights and stay credits, and didn't provide perks, on awards stays, but many chains have now moved towards providing all benefits on paid and award stays. If the chain with which your pursuing status doesn't give credit for full awards, but does for mixed cash and points stays, during your “push” for status, you may opt toward these mixed stays to earn the nights/stays credits.
There are also bonuses available with certain points to buy their points cheaply, and IHG does a quarterly program, PointsBreak, where they mark certain hotels down to 5000 points per night (an amount that can be acquired for $35). By subscribing to their email updates, you can keep aware of these possible deals and see if they fit your intended travel.
Other Booking Methods.
If you’re not pursuing status or there isn't a hotel at your destination that fits your budget/needs and is part of that chain, then you have several other options for booking.
hotels.com has its own award program. Basically, ten nights earns you a free night, which is a pretty good deal, as it allows you to stay in whatever hotel you want, so long as you book through them. Orbitz apparently has a good rewards program, and I’ve found some value (and good pricing) on agoda.com, which give credits against future spending. (Actually I’ve found very low rates for US hotels on Agoda’s website, probably because its mostly marketing to frugal asian customers).
There are also three primary websites that provide hotel booking and give airline frequent flyer bonuses for booking through them. They have varying amounts of inventory, and the prices tend to be pretty similar to those of expedia, etc., but not nearly the amount of hotels available. These sites are Kaligo, Pointshound, and Rocketmiles. It doesn't take long to compare the bonuses for a specific hotel between the three sites, and these are my primary choice when I’m not booking into a chain.
For example, there are very few chains in Sri Lanka (just Hilton mostly, and a single Shangri-La) so I was not booking through hotel websites. Instead, I checked agoda (via Kayak), and the airline miles hotel sites. I ended up booking between a combination of these, with some through Agoda, and some through Kaligo. Typically, Kaligo, PH and RM will give bonus points for your first booking (up to 10K bonus miles) on any number of airline partners, and its worth checking that out, particularly for longer or more expensive stays (the more you spend, the bigger the bonus, not surprisingly). I earned 4000 AA miles for stays in Sri Lanka (four nights of booking) and around $75 cash back on around 12 more days of bookings. Not huge, but I didn't pay more for those rooms than I would have on a site like expedia.com, whose award program is largely useless. I also earned airline miles for recent stays at RVF favorite Napolitano Hotel in Santo Domingo, and for several recent stays in China.
If you have a sapphire or ink card from Chase, and you book through chase.com, you’ll get a bonus point for each dollar spent through the portal. You can do the math yourself to see if this is worth it for a non-chain stay. I do find Chase to show significantly higher rates on many things than other consolidators, so I’d definitely check around.
Finally, there are apps like Hotel Tonight that show last minute rates for unoccupied hotel rooms same day. Deep discounts may be available and that may more than make up for not getting the perks awarded by status, or earning airline miles/consolidator awards. You can also walk into many one-off/boutique hotels in various cities in Asia and ask them to give you a walk in rate. In countries like China and the Philippines, that rate can be higher or lower than the published rate, and is often negotiable (even if the rate isn’t, perhaps they’ll give you breakfast buffet access, which in some Chinese hotels is quite extravagant, or in manila/cebu, a free filipina  (not really) ).
(01-30-2017 01:08 PM)Hypno Wrote: (01-30-2017 07:53 AM)Global Entry Wrote: Hypno - thanks for the shout out. But NO, you don't need any status to use those points for redemptions.
Oh sure, i have redeemed plenty of miles without airline status, but I have to work hard to get a value equivalent to 1.3 cents per mile. So while i have a Delta and an American credit card, and pay the annual fee since its worth it for the free baggage allowance alone, I tend to accrue miles on my cash back or hotel cards.
Delta is seemingly trying to force redemptions on its own metal to 1c/point. However, sky team redemptions from asia at 70K-80K one way in business have a higher value than the amounts your quoting And in general premium class redemptions should be above 2.5-3c/point. If they're not, I'd probably buy the ticket. Flying economy only, I guess 1.3 is as fair a number as any for someone in one programs using those miles for all purposes. If you want to fly economy, a cash back card is a fine choice (or a hyatt card, etc. if you value that).
I've referral links for most credit cards, PM me for them & thanks if you use them
Strip away judeo-christian ethics ingraining sex is dirty/bad & the idea we're taking advantage of these girls disintegrates. Once you've lost that ethical quandary (which it isn't outside religion) then they've no reason to play the victim, you've no reason to feel the rogue. The interaction is to their benefit.
Frequent Travs
Phils SZ China
(This post was last modified: 01-31-2017 12:16 PM by Global Entry.)
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The Frequent Traveller Thread - Perks, points, and deals for beginners and experts
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