GoAmtrak

So far I've found a good example that seems to underscore the advantage of booking an award in advance anticipation of paid rates increasing (and the property increasing award prices to the top of its category, assuming the property is good about flexing to begin with): On the first day of the deval, I booked the HGI Washington, DC at 41K/night with only about $0.05 value at the time. Since then, other bookers (perhaps a group block) snapped up most remaining standard rooms. Awards are now 60K/night, and with the prevailing AAA or Honors paid rates, I could say I'm now getting $0.009 out of the 41K redemption.

The stay isn't till after Labor Day, and I usually don't book this far in advance. For popular properties, I think I'll start to make a habit of it, even if my plans might change. Since penalty-free changes to advance booking seems to be one of the few remaining levers to get outsized value from a revenue-based program, here's hoping that doesn't go away either.

craz

You could say you're now getting .009 if it was me I wouldnt say Im getting anything more then what it was when I made the res, unless I was looking sell what I have

Happy

If OP needs the stay (date fixed) and the revenue rate remains this high, it is fair that the OP has gotten an outsize value.

gengar

I think you mean $.005. In any case, you're not getting $.009 out of your original 41k, because presumably the alternative was that you would have booked the room at the $.005 rate. You did save 19k/night, though, which is the point of your post.

fscher

HH "Yes, that is correct.....108.00 for a standard room or you can use 10k points and 204.00. "

Me "that makes no sense. Is there a supervisor"

HH "we recently made a change. This is how it works now. It looks like you are better of not using points."

Yes, this was recorded for quality control.

GUWonder

These kind of outcomes -- where points+cash bookings have a higher cash charge than a cash-only booking -- are encountered repeatedly at Choice hotels too. But I get better value out of Choice points than out of Hilton points at this point, so I'm not surprised to see this more with Hilton than with Choice.

craz

the room can go up to $1500 per night,IMO I saved only what the rate was at the time I booked my res.

Theres a WA Ive been wanting to stay at but my reg hotel (non Intl chain) costs me apx $95-110 a night and couldnt justify using 320K for 5 nights at the WA since all Id save was $500 and 320k can offset a heck of alot more used elsewhere, the rates at the WA are a min of $600. So yes 320k would save me $3k but in reality all I would have saved and kept in pocket was $500 the cost of my reg hotel

TTL

In my experience, saving £100 to 150 from the rack rate (hhonors cancelable) may take 8000 to 24000 points, as seen in my future bookings. I have most of my stays in London, UK. So the realistic per-point value would be anywhere between 0.15 US cents to 0.04 US cents.

nomad420

As I am starting to book more with Hilton now as I am LT Gold with them and a Hilton Club member I am more than dismayed at reading this as well as several of the other above statements. This is absolute craziness, is this some way of basically pushing some properties off of points and only into a cash only bookings? I have stayed in the past at some "Hilton" brand hotels that did not honor points or credit you for stays but those were rare. HGVC/HC member have been complaining for the last several years that given the reduced value of HH points the conversion of the HGVC/HC points to HH points is now basically loose loose situation. With this new "perks" plan it now looks even worse!

Jaimito Cartero

Not sure about voting rights, but Blackstone had less than 50% of shares, and are now selling a majority of their shares to HNA, a Chinese conglomerate.

Happy

I can see your argument but that needs to be the 2 rooms are comparable.

If the substitute you are willing to pay is a much inferior product than the 320K room, then the argument does not work.

If the substitute you are willing to pay is a very similar or just a tad lower quality, then your argument is a good one.

craz

I disagree with the above, what is important is what a person is willing to accept and the 2 rooms need not be similar in any way. If however a person prefers a luxury hotel and instead is staying at say a 2* and hates it there then Id agree.But if they are satisfied with that 2* although it doesnt reach the ankle of a 5* then I disagree with you

The same can be said using miles, a person can say use 160k and fly r/t in Biz and save say $1200 which is the Y fare, they didnt save the $6k fare for biz but saved only $1200. I know folks that would rather use that same 160k for 2 Y trips instead and keep $2400 in their pocket. Yet Biz and Y arent similar So their goal is to use their miles to keep as much $$ in their pockets so 2 Ys will do that although Biz is a much more comfortable ride and sleep

mingzie

Points have a value. By redeeming those points in Biz, you aren't saving $1200 for the economy ticket. You are consuming points, which have value that is almost identical to currency (just limited to that company). That's like saying using a $1000 flight gift card saves you $1000 if you pay with the gift card. This is especially true with the new Hilton Honors changes. You could say that it saved you from spending additional cash. However, this is not a point that anyone contested or made.

Whether someone would rather spend 160k points or spend $2400 does not relate whatsoever to the point the poster you responded to was making. He was stating that you can not compare the 'savings' in two significantly different products, given that one of the products are markedly inferior.

I.e. it is nonsensical in most cases to say every time someone books an economy flight, that they saved $2600 on not flying business, or $16000 on not taking the private jet. Or since you chose to eat McDonalds instead of Fine Dining, you saved $250 with each Big Mac Meal.

I disagree that what is important is what someone is willing to accept. If that were true noone would be staying in 5 star hotels except the truly spoilt. Comparing a better, comfortable or more luxurious experience to a much inferior product and saying you saved x amount only makes sense when you are saying that the better experience is actually not that much better. Since this was not accompanied by 'x regular hotel' is the same quality as Waldorf Astoria, telling us you only actually saved a small amount in a Hilton Honors point redemption thread because you could be staying at an inferior hotel is kind of strange.

So saying things such as 'I saved $2k by flying economy instead of business, if I use my points to upgrade to business then I'm only saving $500 for my economy ticket', when there are many business flyers happy to pay the premium is not very helpful and not a very fair comparison or accurate picture of savings.

iahphx

My primary hotel loyalty strategy is to have points in all the programs to take advantage of the "oddities": the hotels that are under-priced on points for one reason or another. While Honors new system seems a bit confusing, it also seems like you can almost never get outsized value from the program. The effective elimination of cash & money ends one of the few worthwhile "oddities" in the Honors program, and now you can no longer find the odd "underpriced" hotel (like the La Quinta Embassy Suites in season, that had room rates north of $350, but went for only 30,000 points). Now, it seems taht in almost all circumstances, if the property is cheap in dollar terms, it will be cheap in points terms. And the reverse seems mostly true as well. If that's the case, why do I want to hold Hilton's currency? It would seem like I don't. So I guess I won't be doing anything like putting my supermarket spending on my Honors Surpass card. I would think that even a 2% cash card would be more valuable for this spending, given the much greater flexibility of cash.

ChinaShrek

Currently, there is a maximum amount of points that Hilton can charge for any given hotel based on the category the hotel was before the devaluation/enhancement. It is only a matter of time before the old category classification disappears entirely and points will be precisely worth .5 cents for all redemptions. This creates a great deal of predictability for the consumer, on the one hand. You know what your points are worth at all hotels at all times. On the other hand, you are right, all of the sweet spots disappear from the Honors program. The question everyone needs to answer is .5 cents enough to keep you loyal to Hilton.