Fwiw...
It looks like the HiltonHonors redemptions might be processing a bit faster* as I redeemed $100 for 7,000 HH points on December 31st** (with the "processing delays" warning showing on the e-rewards redemption page) and the points posted yesterday (January 8th)
*the $100/7,000 points redemption I did on September 30th got "lost" in Hilton's I/T update and was manually posted by Hilton in mid-November
**I was a bit gun shy after what happened on my previous redemption getting lost but I wanted to get my redemption in before the end of the year