thehonestaviator

Has anyone done HAwaiian air to Hilton Honors to US air?

Fevsi

They run a 75% promo, where you got 25% in any case, + 25% if you had a US Air credit card, +25% if you are elite Dividend Miles member. The current offer is less lucrative, but more straightforward: 50% for everyone.

TheBOSman

And Amex wasn't running a concurrent bonus transfer to SPG. I'm quite happy to have near 1:1 Membership Rewards to US Airways.

GGE

I am trying to decide the most valuable way to take advantage of this offer - or not.

I have 70,000 Marriott points, which would become 37,500 US Airways miles, which is good for what, one roundtrip flight?

Or I could keep saving them, try to get to 135,000 points, and redeem them for $1000 of Marriott cheques.. I am over halfway there with 70K points, so they're worth over $500 as they sit here.

So.. would I get more than $500 out of them if they were to become 37,500 US Airways miles?

Hmm...

thoughts appreciated, since I'm admittedly rather new to "this" despite reading for a year or more, off and on, here.


(edit - my own thoughts on using SPG points for this offer - SPG points are WAY more valuable as they sit. My husband had 13,000 SPG points and we just booked two suites for four nights each in Florida for the cash + points cost of $266 total plus 12,800 points. We paid over $2K last year, cash, for the same exact rooms for the same exact time!)

metoo

With this bonus, what is the exchange for Club Carlson Points to U.S. airways miles?

GGE

Here is the offer page in case anyone else has a similar question -

http://www.usairways.com/en-US/divid..._to_miles.html

For Club Carlson it says for me to sign in to see details, but I do not have a CC account at this time.

infamousdx

Yea some of those links are just messed up. Try Hyatt, sign in, and prepare to be taken to the standard home page

jcmitchell21

the 25% - 75% bonus you speak of is not based on a 1:1 Marriott to US, it's based on whatever the correct transfer ratio is.

Example: 10k Marriott = 3k US. With a 50% bonus, 10k = 3k(1.5) = 4,500 US miles

TheBOSman

50,000 CC points to 8,000 miles normal, so 50,000 points to 12,000 miles with the bonus.

GGE

That happened with Marriott too - was prompted to login then was taken to the home page. So I then clicked the link again and went to the offers page.

lkar

CC redemption ratios change depending on how many points you are transferring.

If you transfer 2,000, you get 250 miles (1 for 8). If you transfer 50,000, you get 8,000 (1 for 6.25). If you transfer 100,000 you get 18,000 (1 for 5.56).

Unfortunately, you need to transfer in round 50k or 100k amounts to get the bonus. So, if you wanted to transfer 80k CC points to US, you'd have to do 1 50k redemption plus 15 2k redemptions, which would net you 12,500 US miles. With the 50 percent bonus, a total of 18,750.

lkar

Your best use of Marriott points is to get to 270k and redeem them for a travel package, which gives you miles plus a one-week Marriott stay. But if you don't stay at Marriotts or accumulate points using the credit card, it's hard to see getting to 200k in the foreseeable future, and who knows when they might change the program.

I think your second best use of Marriott points might well be to use them to stay at a Marriott. I can get around $1200 value out of 75k Marriott if I use them right for stays.

But I think, beyond that, if you don't see yourself accumulating Marriott points, this is a good promo and 37.5k isn't that bad.

GGE

This reply is quite appreciated, as it has me thinking now.. that is always a good thing. I believe another trip is in my near future... and the flight will help to finish meeting my spend on my AA card.

Draino3112

Just curious. Why are US Airway points better then AMEX MR points? I have 60K MR points and do alot of traveling. Trying to figure out if I should do the transfer as well but don't want to give up MR points if they are better.

lkar

If you don't have a planned use, you might be better to just hold on to your Membership Rewards points. In some people's view, MR points aren't as great as they once were, because there aren't many transfer partners who don't charge hefty taxes or fuel charges on redemptions.

People like US miles because US has a good awards chart and can be reliably used for good redemptions for star alliance flights. There is nothing really equivalent that you can transfer your Membership Rewards miles to if you want to book on *A. Aeroplan is a good option, particularly because it permits one-way awards for less than full round trip, but they now impose taxes. ANA and Singapore are also options, but they have some downsides -- I think ANA requires you actually to transfer miles before you can check for availability, for example. Accordingly, people who like to redeem for *A travel will generally prefer US. When UA was an Amex transfer partner, it was easier, but now occasions to get near 1:1 value to US for Amex is rare.

All that said, you need to know what your needs are. You are losing a small number of miles in the transfer, even with this bonus. The best rate you can get by doing Amex to SPG to US is .94 to 1. Also, the only way to maximize the bonus is to do transfers that result in you having 20k chunks in SPG, because you need that amount to get the 5k bonus. So, for example, if you only have 60k MR and you don't have any SPG, the best you can do is transfer MR to SPG at 2:1, which results in 30k SPG. If you transfer all 30k SPG to US, you only get one 5k bonus -- you would need to transfer 40k to get the second 5k bonus. So, you're transferring 35k to US, which nets you 52.5k US. Many would find this to be worth doing. But if you don't have any US to combine them with to book a larger award, you're probably best off just holding the 60k in MR and waiting for the next deal to come along.

My personal view on these hotel bonuses, which have been popping up a couple of times a year for the last two years, is that unless I have a present or likely near future need for the miles, I won't just do it on spec unless the bonus rate is at least +50 percent for *A or +35 percent for AA. At those rates, I don't mind stockpiling miles and taking points out of a multi-partner program and losing the flexibility. Last year, when US had a 75 percent bonus, I basically cashed out of SPG, because the effective rate was 43,750 US for 20,000 SPG. At less than those rates, I'd rather keep my transferable points flexible. You're talking about actually losing 7.5k miles in the transfer. I wouldn't do it.