Hilton and British Airways have launched a joint promotion which is running until November 30th.
It is simple enough. You need to have your Hilton HHonors account set to ‘points and miles’, which means that you will earn 10 Hilton points and 1 British Airways Executive Club Avios point for every $1 equivalent you spend.
(The other alternative when staying at Hilton is ‘points and points’. This would earn you 10 Hilton points plus a bonus of a further 5 Hilton points per $1 spent, with no airline miles.)
You will earn QUADRUPLE Avios points – 4 per $1 spent – when staying at any of these London hotels.
You will earn TRIPLE Avios points – 3 per $1 spent – when staying at any of these hotels across the rest of the UK, Europe, Africa and the Middle East.
You MUST register for this promotion in order to earn the bonus via this page.
Is this worth it?
I tend to value a Hilton HHonors point at 0.3p and an Avios point at 0.75p – 1p.
Under normal circumstances, I would recommend taking ‘points and points’ for Hilton stays. The additional 5 Hilton points per $1 are worth 1.5p. The additional one Avios point is only worth 0.75p – 1p.
With this promotion, though, the maths changes sharply. Triple Avios is worth up to 3p per $1 spent and quadruple Avios at the London hotels is worth up to 4p per $1. This is at least twice as much value as taking the extra Hilton HHonors points.
Disappointingly, the new Conrad Westminster (or Conrad St James – both names are now being used) – ie the current InterContinental Westminster – is not taking part.
Don’t forget to register before your next stay or you won’t receive the bonus!
PS. Whilst I didn’t want to confuse the debate by bringing in additional calculations, remember that you would normally earn 50% more Hilton points by crediting miles to Iberia Plus and not BA. However, Iberia Plus is not taking part in this promotion.
(To see our complete list of all current hotel promotions for the major chains, click here to visit our ‘Hotel Promos’ page or use the link in the menu bar at the top of the page.)
About Head for Points
On a separate note, but still Hilton linked, Hilton have dropped the free breakfast perk for gold and diamond members.
Where did this come from? I’ve got a stay booked over the weekend and the confirmation states “HH Breakfast My Way” as having spoken to the property it was clear I just needed the room only rate, not the B&B one.
Are you sure? This would be a major loss!
I had this given to me just past week.
It’s still on the mobile website, when will this come in to force?
Still on the main website this morning, too
http://hhonors3.hilton.com/en/explore/benefits/index.html
This is not correct. Hilton Hotels still offers free continental breakfast for Gold and Diamond members.
Just as well Iberia are not participating as they do not appear to be fortcoming in awarding an miles earned do they? My account remains at zero.
They seem to do transfers in batches. Takes ages but then you get a few months’ worth at once.
How does something like this work for prepaid stays?
I’m staying at the Hilton T5 again soon, but booked and prepaid using their summer promo offer.
99 per cent certain you get the bonus
I assume that if you go for this promotion, you will no longer be eligible for the Hilton extra points promotion, which I understand is more interesting.
Annoyingly this is for new bookings, not existing reservations.
I don’t see that in the T&C
It is in the T&C of the email I got from BA Exec Club 3 days ago, along lines of “For new bookings between 11 Aug & 30 Nov”.
The t&c on the website says “register online at http://www.hhonors.com/BAQ32014 before November 30 2014 – member must register prior to check out;”, it doesn’t say anything about new bookings. Surely they can’t change what you’re signing up to AFTER you’ve signed up?!
And here are the T&C I was on about…..
This promotion is only open to Eligible Participants. An Eligible Participant is a person aged 18 or over and is a British Airways Executive Club (“BAEC”) Member (membership terms and conditions apply).
By taking part in this promotion, Eligible Participants confirm that they accept these Terms and Conditions.
To be eligible for this promotion, members must enrol with Hilton HHonors, select British Airways Executive Club Avios as their earning preference and ensure their earning style option is set to Points & Miles when making the necessary reservation.
All Hilton HHonors terms and conditions apply. See full terms and conditions on http://hhonors3.hilton.com/en/terms/index.html
Offer available for new bookings made between 11 August 2014 and 30 November 2014 for stays from 11 August 2014 until the 30 November 2014 (“Promotional Period”) at participating Hilton Worldwide hotels (“Participating Properties”) only. Click here http://www.hiltonhhonors.com/BAQ32014 for a list of participating hotels.
Quadruple Avios is applicable for stays booked and completed at the Participating Properties in London. Additionally triple Avios is applicable for stays booked and completed at the Participating Properties across the rest of Europe, Middle East and Africa at any rate except those through wholesale/tour operator packages; contracted crew rates; travel agency discounted rates; stays secured utilizing Hilton Grand Vacations Club and Hilton Club timeshare programs. Hilton Grand Vacations marketing packages with a sales presentation requirement, complimentary or barter rooms; NET Group rates; Series Group or IT Group rates; third party websites bookings (irrespective of rate paid); and “opaque” channel bookings where the brand may or may not be known at the time of purchase. A stay is defined as consecutive nights spent at the same Participating Property, i.e. from check-in to check-out irrespective of the length of stay.
Offer may be applied to two standard guest rooms per stay, Eligible Participant, based on double occupancy during the Promotional Period. There is no maximum on the number of stays per Eligible Participant during the Promotional Period.
Offer is subject to availability, advanced reservation is required.
Reservations can be made at http://www.hilton.com
Bookings need to be guaranteed by credit card.
Bonus Avios is non-redeemable for cash.
Bonus Avios is issued subject to BAEC Terms and Conditions http://www.britishairways.com/travel/ec-terms-and-conditions/public/en_gb
Bonus Avios per stay will be credited to the Eligible Participant’s BAEC account within 4-6 weeks of the stay.
Base Avios will be earned for each paid stay during the Promotional Period in addition to the Bonus Avios.
This offer is non-transferable and cannot be used in conjunction with any other British Airways or Hilton HHonors Worldwide offer or promotion.
The promoters reserve the right to withdraw the promotion or amend these terms and conditions without prior notice at any time, for whatever reason, and without any liability to customers for doing so.
By taking part in this promotion, participants agree to the personal data they supply being used by the promoters or their agents or subcontractors to administer this promotion, who will only use the information provided for the purpose of administering the promotion.
Is this the BA T&C? Looks very different from the Hilton T&C
Yep – cut & paste from the bottom of my BAEC email.
Odd, I enrolled but didn’t get an email from BAEC
Don’t worry, whatever the rules may say it is very rare that the date of booking has any impact.
Hmm, well!
I just noticed an interesting glitch on my account. I signed up for this promo last week (thanks Raffles) and have just seen on my HH account that the last 2 Hilton stays, one from mid July and one early August have had the BA Q2 2014 Offer applied to them – retrospectively despite changing the myway preference AFTER the points were awarded.
—
18 Aug 2014 BRITISH AIRWAYS Q2 2014 OFFER – STAY 2 – Hilton XXXXXX 0 2000
18 Aug 2014 BRITISH AIRWAYS Q2 2014 OFFER – STAY 1 – Hilton XXXXXX 0 1500
—
These entries are totally separate from the earlier statement items.
I don’t think I’ll rush to complain about it, I’ve already triple tripped these too 😀
In fact – as an illustration of the vagaries of the system, check these 2 stays out:
—
BASE BONUS MILES
2014 HH2 DOUBLE YOUR HHONORS OFFER 0 6224 0
Base Points 6224 0 0
50% BONUS ON BASE POINTS 0 3112 0
DIAMOND VIP BONUS – 50% 2014 0 3112 0
DIAMOND MYWAY BONUS 0 1000 0
—
So, 19672 points for a 4 night stay at a cat 8 hotel , whereas:
—
BASE BONUS MILES
2014 TRIPLE YOUR TRIP OFFER 0 5544 0
Base Points 2772 0 0
DOUBLE POINTS OFFER 0 2772 0
EMEA OTA 2500 POINTS OFFER 0 2500 0
50% BONUS ON BASE POINTS 0 1386 0
DIAMOND VIP BONUS – 50% 2014 0 1386 0
DIAMOND MYWAY BONUS 0 1000 0
—
… 17360 for a 1 night stay at a cat 5.
Might give that a go, got some chunky Hilton stays which credited in July!
Would this promo stack with the “Triple your trip” promo?
Should do. Triple your trip works independently of earning style.
I reset mine to points and points for ‘triple your trip’. Suppose I’ll have to set it back again now!
Got a free breakfast yesterday btw
In my experience all Hilton promotions stack, and you get the bonuses irrespective of when you have booked the stay (even though it normally says something in the T&Cs and about bookings made after a certain date).
You just have to make sure you have signed up to it and stay before the end date.
Do you put you BA or Avios number on the Hilton website preference change field for British Airways (Avios) ?
I don’t think you can change the miles partner online after you’ve made a booking. The hotel should be able to do it for you though.
Indeed – any changes made to preferred earning partner made after booking are ignored, you need to get the hotel reception to manually change them (I normally do this at check-in and double check at check-out!). Earning preference (points+points vs points+miles) changes made on the website are however honoured up to booking and until 23:59 CST post checkout.
Wrt the breakfast change mentioned above – unless the OP has something they can point to regarding this I’d just take it as a bit of trolling and ignore!
And one learns something new again. It also explains why I received BA avios instead of the expected VS miles on a recent stay.
Will have to keep close watch on this at check-in/out as I already have some bookings where BA was not the preferred partner.
Yes it takes a bit of getting your head around! I learnt the hard way on a Route 66 trip with lots of stays!
It must be a BA number, Hilton is not an avios.com partner
I notice on the list of UK hotels that two Hamptons say Pre-Sell date TBA
Does this mean that the hotels are for sale and will fall out of the Hilton Group ?
Just curious…
No, I reckon it is some wierd internal stuff Hilton forgot to remove!
I’ve got a few US bookings coming up so it’s far from handy that this promo completely ignores them 🙁
Some hotels have started to enforce the rule that only continental breakfast is free to gold and diamond members, and not the hot/cooked breakfast. For example at the Hilton Croydon, they charge £5 extra if you want the hot/cooked/ options!
I’ve been told that at other Hiltons occasionally, but got a full brekky at Croydon a couple of weeks ago. Just depends who serves you.
I got full brekky at Hilton Munich City recently – and that was on a hotels.com booked night (Hilton generally respects your benefits on third party website bookings even though you get no points). Breakfast was usually Euro 29 – I won’t say I ‘saved’ Euro 29 since if it wasn’t included I would have nipped into a local baker and spent Euro 7 or so on something!
I’ve noticed this as well. £5 extra is still not terrible but it still devalues HHonors imo.
Conrad New York offers a limited number of options (everything is cooked to order, no buffet) for Gold members. The alternative is a $20 credit towards the full menu, not that $20 goes far!
When I used an Avios bonus weekend from Lloyds TSB to travel and stay in the Dublin Doubletree I never received any points despite running a bar bill to £150!
I stayed at the Hilton in San Diego last week and on checking in was told that Hilton had pulled the full cooked breakfast for gold and diamond members and I got a voucher for two for a drink and one food item at a Starbucks below the hotel. Needless to say there was a long queue in the morning. At Palm Springs the next day I was given a certificate for continental breakfast only and had to pay extra for a hot breakfast. It appears that it varies from hotel to hotel
Lol that’s quite different to what you said in your initial post 😀 A cooked breakfast was never part of the benefits – it’s only a ‘continental’ breakfast (see http://hhonors3.hilton.com/en/explore/benefits/index.html). Most properties in Europe and Asia go well above this, but the US properties are notoriously stingy, perhaps due to how easy it is to gain Gold/Diamond there via credit cards. So it sounds like it’s just that property that has changed what they offer, it’s not a change to the overall offering.
I’ve just had points and miles posted for a stay this week and the quadruple miles have not posted for me. In fact I seem to have had a disaster by changing my preferences to points plus miles. I got 6273 base points but only 4136 bonus points and 627 miles. Not happy.
I stayed at Hilton Watford on Thursday, and have only received the standard BA Avios. I await Hilton Customer Service team’s response.
Two stays for me last week and only the standard miles have tracked, too… It does say allow 6 weeks so maybe the bonus miles get swept on at the end???
Only standard for me too from a stay in a London hotel on Tuesday night.
I contacted Hilton and got this response
HHonors points usually appear as soon as the stay is credited to your account. BA miles may also show in your HHonors account when you view your account online. It is after the promotion has been completed and ended that BA will award the bonus miles to your frequent flyer account. BA has advised us that the bonus miles will be added after the promotion had ended. I am very sorry for any confusion or inconvenience this may cause.