IHG UK flash sale underway – rooms from £39, guaranteed to count for Accelerate promotion

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• Kathy says:

  6 Nov6 November 09:07

  Since I have already booked my 4 nights at the local HI, I’m quite relieved to see that it’s still £49 in the sale, so I would have only saved a few quid a night.

• CV3V says:

  6 Nov6 November 09:12

  The rooms being offered at the HI Kensington Forum are the Deluxe rooms which are described as Executive rooms with lounge access. (£89)

  • Rob says:

    6 Nov6 November 11:03

    Not bad. Worth noting CP Kensington gave me (as a Spire) free club access as a Spire member recently and that is far nicer property – although there is no guarantee that they give lounge access to every Spire, every night.

    • CV3V says:

      6 Nov6 November 13:27

      Unfortunately the CP doesnt price in the sale for the dates i require, have the HI booked on points (in Exec room, the suites look rather 80’s).

    • Waribai says:

      6 Nov6 November 13:35

      Are there any official Spire benefits at CP? Just got back from Heythrop Park.
      Aside from a room upgrade to King Exec, we also got 1 free drink per person in the bar.
      But breakfast was not included and even though it was relatively quiet, a suite upgrade was non-forthocming too…

      • Rob says:

        6 Nov6 November 13:38

        No official Spire benefits anywhere! In theory you should the offer of a free drink or a few hundred points at check-in. Nothing else is guaranteed or even promised. You will never get free breakfast, the best you could expect is club lounge access which would give you the reduced breakfast in the lounge.

        • Waribai says:

          6 Nov6 November 20:07

          Ok, maybe I’m getting my expectations up. Yes, I tried to do my usual ‘turn up for breakfast and see if it appears on the bill’. Often it doesn’t. But it was clear that being so empty they had the breakfast list well and truly under control 🙂
          In the old days was breakfast not given free if there was no lounge?

          Anyway, it was a great stay. A lovely estate with beautiful scenery and walks. Lots of interesting wildlife and a decent childrens adventure playground!

    • Brian says:

      6 Nov6 November 13:50

      Must say that the lounge in the HI Kensington Forum is much better than the CP one – and, unless you fancy your chances of an upgrade and/or lounge access at the CP, I’d have thought an Exec/Deluxe room at the HI wouldn’t be much worse than a standard room at the CP. Yes, the CP is a nicer property and has a lovely garden at the back, but a) how much time would you be spending in the hotel itself in London? and b) the garden isn’t so attractive in winter.

      • CV3V says:

        6 Nov6 November 15:00

        I’ll be at the HI Kensington in January, so hanging out in the gardens wont be on the list. Thanks for the opinion on lounges, helps take the doubt out of where to stay! The CP wasn’t a real option as i never seem to get an upgrade, even as Spire, my account must be black flagged!

• Gulz says:

  6 Nov6 November 09:23

  When you do a mattress run, don’t you need to return the key/keycard back to the reception when leaving. So if you left just 20 min after checking in, would that not be a problem?

  • Nigel says:

    6 Nov6 November 09:27

    No you do not need to return the key.

    You can either keep it or leave it in the room.

    The room needs to be a prepaid rate.

    • JQ says:

      6 Nov6 November 10:50

      What do you do with the key then?

      • Rob says:

        6 Nov6 November 10:59

        Leave it in the room.

    • trickster says:

      6 Nov6 November 13:14

      Why does it need to be pre-paid – as long as you check in and give them a card to charge to, surely they will charge you the next day.

      • Rob says:

        6 Nov6 November 13:26

        I always pre-pay when I do this, it seems easier.

        • Waribai says:

          6 Nov6 November 13:38

          Careful if you do this for more than one night though. At HEX T5 I had a two night mattress run a couple of years ago and left after 5 minutes. I then found I had only been credited for one night. A quick email to IHGcare sorted it all out though.

• EvilGazebo says:

  6 Nov6 November 09:30

  Slightly OT but my Accelerate target includes getting the IHG Visa. Problem is I’ve already got it! Suspect it was probably a timing thing where I applied for it just as they were generating the promo targets. Anyone else had this and had any joy getting them to either mark it as achieved or substitute another target?

  • carpentr says:

    6 Nov6 November 11:00

    I have the opposite problem – they want me to use my Credit Card which I cancelled just before the promotion. Three attempts on the phone have yielded no results, sadly.

    • Kai says:

      6 Nov6 November 11:52

      I managed to convince them to deposit the bonus points (1,500) into my account. Just tell them you are disappointed as it will be impossible to accomplish all tasks, and you will consider switching your business to other chains for the rest of the year…

      It seems that they are not able to change the tasks for technical reasons.

  • Rob says:

    6 Nov6 November 11:01

    In theory, they should do it. In reality, all these requests end up going to the Philippines contact centre and I wouldn’t put money on it. I would put in a request now and definitely not book mattress run nights until you have clarification, even it means you end up paying a few £ more.

• Fad says:

  6 Nov6 November 09:46

  I appreciate this will depend on what’s available in your area, but these sale prices aren’t great for a mattress run to get the new member Accelerate bonus. When that launched I was able to book rooms for under £30.

  • Brian says:

    6 Nov6 November 13:52

    I don’t think IHG has organised the sale in order to help people get the Accelerate bonus, to be fair…

• Helen says:

  6 Nov6 November 10:42

  Managed to get 3 bookings at the HI Express in Glasgow for £39

• Mr(s) Entitled says:

  6 Nov6 November 11:17

  MAN Airport at 5 miles from me and for £39 it appears a decent outlay with regard getting two free nights elsewhere in 2016. I’m tempted but undecided.

  I’ve a ton of Hilton Points so I tend to favour their properties but coverage in Europe can be sporadic. Are IC hotels generally decent or do they vary significantly?

• Ammar says:

  6 Nov6 November 12:04

  Need some advice on how to get Spire Status the cheapest way:
  1) I need around 4000 qualifying points to get to Spire Status, my current plan is to transfer my Virgin FC miles to IHG and trigger the status that way…However, I was wondering

  2) If I stay one night with the accelerate promotion i get 5000 bonus points – do they count towards status? as a £89 stay even if paid with my IHG card is probably not going generate enough points. I think I would need to spend £2000 to get enough qualifying points..

  Any thoughts and comments welcome….

  • Rob says:

    6 Nov6 November 12:09

    If you book a ‘Bonus Points’ package at a hotel (ie those hotels which offer a room for £99 or a room and 5,000 points for £120) then, yes, those 5,000 count for status.

    However, the points from Accelerate do not.

    If you’ve got the Virgin miles then I would just move those over. Your alternatives are slim – even if you applied for the IHG credit card today, for example, you probably wouldn’t be able to earn 4,000 points via spend (the sign-up bonus does not count) before the end of the year because of the delays in the points posting.

    • Ammar says:

      6 Nov6 November 13:55

      Thanks Rob. I already have the IHG Premium CC, just want to confirm the VISA Spend points ie 2 points for every £1 spent count towards status, I can’t find your old article about which earning methods count towards status.

      • Liz says:

        6 Nov6 November 14:17

        Your credit card spend does qualify at 2pt per £1 but the points can take 3-6 weeks after your statement to post to your account so that could be too late to hit the target you want.

    • Ammar says:

      6 Nov6 November 13:55

      Also, how long did Virgin take to post the points on your IHG account, i.e if i do it today, it should be done before calender year over?

      • Rob says:

        6 Nov6 November 15:03

        Takes about a week

      • FormalHall says:

        6 Nov6 November 17:54

        Similar question, how long do they take to update your status to Platinum? I have just received my first statement for the IHG Platinum CC and the 40,000 points posted some time ago but my status has not been upgraded.

  • Andy says:

    9 Nov9 November 16:20

    Hi,

    I regularly book the 5,000 point package and the points from that are credited as qualifying points. Hope that answers the question.

    Rgds

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