Choice Privileges - How do they come up with the int'l award chart?

One oddity of the Choice program is that the value you receive overseas seems to vary dramatically from country to country. Like somebody told me that Australia redemptions were once a great deal, and then they dramatically devalued the program, making Australia redemptions significantly more expensive than elsewhere.

Meanwhile, I've noticed that some European countries offer better bang for your buck than US redemptions. Tonight, for example, I was looking at Swedish hotels (thanks to today's DL mistake airfares) and realized that some of their properties charge less than half what a comparable US Choice hotel would charge.

I guess the only thing you can do is take a look at the Choice website when you're headed abroad and see what the situation is for the country you're visiting. But can anyone shed any light on these inconsistencies? Does each country's Choice management essentially set up their own program, and little concern is attached to making it "equivalent" to foreign programs?

EDIT: Looking at this further (we've been discussing it a little on yesterday's DL mistake fare thread), I see that Choice has significantly reduced the point requirements for some European hotels. Like, 3 years ago, I paid 25,000 points/night for the well-located Bolivar hotel in Rome, and that's now only (an astonishing) 8,000 points/night. And as I alluded to above, there are very nice (and expensive) Swedish hotels for only 10,000 points.

Can anyone explain what happened?

This caused me to also look at the transfer possibilities to obtain more Choice Privileges points (I still have enough from last year's Discover America promo, but I thought others might want to take advantage of these European redemption options). You apparently can still "launder" 5000 OnePass miles through Amtrak and receive 15,000 Choice points. Seems like a great deal if you're headed to Europe. True?

First, you have to have a $200 Amtrak purchase showing (in the current year?) to be able to transfer Amtrak into hotel points (Choice or otherwise). Maybe once you could sneak it by purchasing a refundable ticket, doing the transfer, and then cancelling the ticket, but I wouldn't necessarily count on that if you would want to do such a transfer again in the future.

Of course, whether you will be able to do a transfer from Continental II (aka United after the FFPs merge) into Amtrak at all, that remains to be seen. No word yet on what the FFP of the combined UA/CO will take from UA and what from CO.

Now, Sweden is a bad example for "European" hotels, because Choice Scandinavia uses a totally separate points program (not Choice Privileges). Through a cross-arrangement between Choice Hotels International (US, UK, "mainland" Europe, and some other places) and Choice Scandinavia whereby you can redeem Choice Privileges points for hotels in Scandinavia but you can't earn there.

So what you are seeing in Sweden is true across the Scandinavian/Baltic world but only there. And the reason for the high value is because the hotels in Choice Scandinavia are more upscale than other places (including other places in Europe on average) and yet need the same number of points needed for less upscale places outside Scandinavia. (In pure numbers of points, little if anything in Scandinavia is below 16k. You can stay in 8k, 10k, 12k hotels elsewhere. The value is that few are aboe 16k either, and 16k is often getting you a $200+ room. And if you search back in this forum a couple years, you'll find a thread about $$$$ suites in Bergen, Norway, being supposedly available for those same 16K points!)

I think (but I'm writing off the top of my head, so may not be correct) that there may be a similar situation in Australia, where the Choice chain there is also distinct from Choice Hotels International.

Thus it's hard to make comparisons by region of the world, without knowing exactly which countries are in Choice Privileges and which ones aren't (but you can still redeem there somehow).

One easy way to figure out who is really in Choice Privileges in Europe is to see whether you can earn Choice Privileges in that country. I think you'll find the "award chart" more consistent within that part of Europe (which includes most of Europe outside of Scandinavia/Baltic).

Finally, there is no Choice "award chart" that I know of. You are presumably referring to the award mini-calendar you see for each Choice site online. Well, that doesn't cover the whole year (for some hotels, far from it). So just because you saw 25k at one time of year and you're looking at it now and it's 8k now and in the near future doesn't mean it's going to stay 8k all year. Unlike many other hotel programs, Choice is able to change the redemption rate, drastically if needed, to deal with high and low seasons on a per-property basis.

Thanks for your input, sdsearch.

Yeah, the Amtrak transfer stuff is certainly complicated. Are there any other transfer options? I'm set for the moment because I'm working off a huge Discover America point purchase.

Interesting stuff about Scandinavia. In Stockholm, you can certainly get an excellent 4-star Choice hotel (like the Sign) for 10,000 points. Obviously a great deal.

Not sure what's going on in Rome, but 8000 points now for the Bolivar is amazing.

I'm also seeing a plausible hotel in Paris for 8000 poiints.

You don't get that kind of value redeeming in the USA. :)

Yeah, the Amtrak transfer stuff is certainly complicated. Are there any other transfer options?
The only other one I'm aware of is Diners Club, but so far they're still not taking new card applications, so it doesn't matter if you don't already have one.

(Not sure about Membership Rewards since I don't have that. And since Choice's card is not with Chase, no Chase cards.)

Redemption amounts go both directions. The Comfort Hotel Post in Chur, Switzerland, was 8k points per night, and now is 20k, while I know that when I checked Choice properties in Rome and Milan a couple of months ago they were generally 20k-25k a night.

similarly, Zurich recently went from 10k to 25k per night.