Holiday Inn: Hasselt - 13EUR or 5k IHG Points per Night
Mar 15, 2023, 12:18 pm
#16
Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: BRU
Programs: A3 *G & FB G
Posts: 640
Unfortunately IHG added this a few years ago, I think it's minimum $30 a night before taxes and fees. Still I'd rather spend €13/nt than 5k which I value $25. Similar concept when I choose to fly basic fares and ULCC when price is right despite not earning anything.
BTW, Hasselt is good city to visit and so underrated. I stayed at HIE when they had points break for 5k. Every night when I declined housekeeping, they'd give me a €5 coupon to use at a restaurant nearby this HI. It was a decent restaurant with a good selection of beer (just like many restaurants in Hasselt).
BTW, Hasselt is good city to visit and so underrated. I stayed at HIE when they had points break for 5k. Every night when I declined housekeeping, they'd give me a €5 coupon to use at a restaurant nearby this HI. It was a decent restaurant with a good selection of beer (just like many restaurants in Hasselt).
Dec 23, 2023, 8:45 am
#17
Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: BRU
Programs: A3 *G & FB G
Posts: 640
Not sure this qualifies as a deal because it's so limited, but I'll post it here should somebody find it useful.
A room at the Holiday Inn: Hasselt in Belgium can be reserved for 13 EUR + tax or 5k IHG points on Dec 30 - 31. The night of Dec 23 - 24 is also available for 5k IHG points for the night and the usual 117 EUR.
Unfortunately the deal is extremely limited! The calendar for the rest of the year looks pretty normal.
A room at the Holiday Inn: Hasselt in Belgium can be reserved for 13 EUR + tax or 5k IHG points on Dec 30 - 31. The night of Dec 23 - 24 is also available for 5k IHG points for the night and the usual 117 EUR.
Unfortunately the deal is extremely limited! The calendar for the rest of the year looks pretty normal.
Thanks alot cruser1! We miss your deals.
Last edited by unusualtravelblog; Dec 26, 2023 at 7:27 am
Dec 24, 2023, 1:01 pm
#18
Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: Netherlands
Posts: 4,287
Unusual traveler missed you by a day. I checked in yesteday at 5k - but as Plat no breakfast, but was upgraded to an Executive room with complimentary minibar.
Alll in all, having stayed at this property, I am happy with the 5k charged. Although you will have to pay the city tax - for me (2 pax) was 5 Euro.
Cheers!
Alll in all, having stayed at this property, I am happy with the 5k charged. Although you will have to pay the city tax - for me (2 pax) was 5 Euro.
Cheers!
Dec 25, 2023, 9:50 am
#19
Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: BRU
Programs: A3 *G & FB G
Posts: 640
Unusual traveler missed you by a day. I checked in yesteday at 5k - but as Plat no breakfast, but was upgraded to an Executive room with complimentary minibar.
Alll in all, having stayed at this property, I am happy with the 5k charged. Although you will have to pay the city tax - for me (2 pax) was 5 Euro.
Cheers!
Alll in all, having stayed at this property, I am happy with the 5k charged. Although you will have to pay the city tax - for me (2 pax) was 5 Euro.
Cheers!
Dec 25, 2023, 4:03 pm
#20
Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: NW London and NW Sydney
Programs: BA Diamond, Hilton Bronze, A3 Diamond, IHG *G
Posts: 6,347
I would be interested to know how much IHG will pay the hotel for the points stays (which you can see after it posts) - will it be more than 13 euros??
Dec 25, 2023, 6:33 pm
#21
Join Date: May 2002
Posts: 213
Hi cruser1 , interesting in graph form, though let's look at step 1 "scraping" / grabbing data.
1. How / where to find the data (daily rate, by room type)?
a. IHG is the only major loyalty program that does not , at start of booking, have Flexible Dates / show Calendar View of Rates. Booking [dot] com displays monthly view, so they must be grabbing / scraping the data. [IHG . for the Mr&Mrs Smith properties did display Calendar of blank (available) and grey (not available) but no rates -- rather useless as needed to click each blank date to see the rate. Recent (mid-autumn 2023), for some/all brands, if hotel is totally booked for a specific date, a click box appears asking if want to see available dates ...but this should be available at start of booking.
b. Hilton has a map of properties which displays either a) Rate or b) Points, and can choose a single currency eg. USD, and values appear quite quickly as scroll across world
So, manually with eyes, can see lowest rate or points, during specific date or within next months, for a particular city / country / region / world . Though it's only for Standard Room, best or single date, and manual, it gives an idea of properties with low points/money rates. .
2. How to specify room type other than Standard? Perhaps Standard and Suite are the only types?
3. Are you able to grab/scrape the incremental cost to purchase 5,000 points when booking BFR (Best Flexible Rate) ?
Two items to identify / scrape: a) only properties offering option to purchase 5k (not 3k,2k,1k) . Generally these are IC, Indigo, sometimes Crowne. some Voco's, a few Holiday Inns
b) the additional cost. For example, in 2022 the IC Warsaw could purchase 5k Points per night for $9 (and ofc add the amount to move from Advance Purchase Rate up to BFR) , but in 2023 same property, the cost for 5k points per night is $50 or $99
By manual process over past couple years, have an idea of which properties offer 5k Points and lowest additional cost
1. How / where to find the data (daily rate, by room type)?
a. IHG is the only major loyalty program that does not , at start of booking, have Flexible Dates / show Calendar View of Rates. Booking [dot] com displays monthly view, so they must be grabbing / scraping the data. [IHG . for the Mr&Mrs Smith properties did display Calendar of blank (available) and grey (not available) but no rates -- rather useless as needed to click each blank date to see the rate. Recent (mid-autumn 2023), for some/all brands, if hotel is totally booked for a specific date, a click box appears asking if want to see available dates ...but this should be available at start of booking.
b. Hilton has a map of properties which displays either a) Rate or b) Points, and can choose a single currency eg. USD, and values appear quite quickly as scroll across world
So, manually with eyes, can see lowest rate or points, during specific date or within next months, for a particular city / country / region / world . Though it's only for Standard Room, best or single date, and manual, it gives an idea of properties with low points/money rates. .
2. How to specify room type other than Standard? Perhaps Standard and Suite are the only types?
3. Are you able to grab/scrape the incremental cost to purchase 5,000 points when booking BFR (Best Flexible Rate) ?
Two items to identify / scrape: a) only properties offering option to purchase 5k (not 3k,2k,1k) . Generally these are IC, Indigo, sometimes Crowne. some Voco's, a few Holiday Inns
b) the additional cost. For example, in 2022 the IC Warsaw could purchase 5k Points per night for $9 (and ofc add the amount to move from Advance Purchase Rate up to BFR) , but in 2023 same property, the cost for 5k points per night is $50 or $99
By manual process over past couple years, have an idea of which properties offer 5k Points and lowest additional cost
Lennys26v2 and HEOH - Probably not what you want to hear, but the chart was generated with Splunk. I scrape hotel and flight data for some cities that I'm always interested in visiting and output / chart that data with HTML and a traditional JavaScript charting engine, but I also use Splunk for cities and flights that I'd like to watch for a while, but I'm not as interested in. I don't want to invest the time to hard-code something that would display the data, so I use Splunk.
I realize Splunk is usually for displaying server logs and machine generated data, but I use it at work for that and I'm used to seeing and using it, so I have my scraping scripts output into CSV format which free Splunk on my VPS then consumes. It makes it easy to add or remove stuff as my interests change! I just have to make sure my data never exceeds 500MB per day since that's the maximum amount of data the free version of Splunk will consume in a day.
Sorry for going off-topic! Just thought I'd explain why I was doing something unconventional.
To get back on track discussing deals - if you want some value for your IHG points, you can get over 15 cents per point in value by booking a night at the Intercontinental in Athens from Sept 21 - 22. The Presidential Suite is the only room available with cash at over 6,100 EUR + tax, but you can reserve a standard room for 40k IHG points.
I realize Splunk is usually for displaying server logs and machine generated data, but I use it at work for that and I'm used to seeing and using it, so I have my scraping scripts output into CSV format which free Splunk on my VPS then consumes. It makes it easy to add or remove stuff as my interests change! I just have to make sure my data never exceeds 500MB per day since that's the maximum amount of data the free version of Splunk will consume in a day.
Sorry for going off-topic! Just thought I'd explain why I was doing something unconventional.
To get back on track discussing deals - if you want some value for your IHG points, you can get over 15 cents per point in value by booking a night at the Intercontinental in Athens from Sept 21 - 22. The Presidential Suite is the only room available with cash at over 6,100 EUR + tax, but you can reserve a standard room for 40k IHG points.
Dec 26, 2023, 7:26 am
#22
Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: BRU
Programs: A3 *G & FB G
Posts: 640