Miles and Points Travel

Make the most of your flexible points

You’ve signed up, earned the bonus and have a stash of points. Now how do you turn those points into a free hotel night? It’s one of the easiest ways to redeem for travel. I’ll help you with this generalized overview.

The biggest mistake here is using a ton of points for a hotel booking. To be honest, in most cases, you’ll be using your points for flights. But here is one hotel chain that is an excellent use of points-and that’s Hyatt. Why? It’s simple. Their hotels start at 5,000/nt and go up from there. Some of the most elite properties are “only” 45,000 points. Compare that with Marriott. Their basic hotels run close to 25,000/nt to start, and their top hotels? They can be 125,000/night! As you can see, if you’re going to dig into your points stash, you want to use as few points as possible. So chose wisely!

The process is similar regardless of which platform you earned the points-Amex, Chase, CapOne, and so on. First, check your credit card points account to see if there are any transfer bonuses. From time to time, there may be a bonus when transferring points to your hotel accounts. For example, if Chase is offering a 30% bonus to transfer points to Hyatt, that may be a better deal than a straight transfer to Marriott. This may sway you towards a particular hotel chain for your trip.

For our example, we’ll assume there are not current bonus options. So your next step, do some research. Find the hotel (or two or three) that you like. Verify how many points you need for the night(s) you want to stay.

Third, make sure you have a Loyalty account with that hotel chain, and make sure the name matches the way you have it with you credit card. A common mistake is to have one that reads a maiden name, or uses a nick name, and a points transfer will not go through if the names do not match exactly.

Lastly, go into your credit card account and link your hotel Loyalty card. For example, with American Express, you can add them under your travel profile.

Now, for the big step-making the transfer. Go to the travel section of your card and select “Travel” or “Using Points”. Then select “Transfer Points”. Find the hotel chain you want. It will show you the conversion ie. 1,000=1,000. Make sure your hotel loyalty number is there and follow the prompts. That’s it!

In most instances, the transfer is instant. Go back over to your loyalty account and refresh. Your points should be there. If not, give it a minute or two and refresh again. Once they are there, just select the points option for the hotel you wanted, and book it. Simple!

Caution-be sure to verify the cancellation policy before booking! Some hotels DO have cancellation penalties even on points bookings so be thorough prior to booking, as I hope you always are.

It’s very easy to book hotels with flexible points! And if you get stuck, you can always drop us a quick email through the link on the first page of our site. We’re happy to help!

Safe travels!