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Bits: Radisson / Park Inn one-week sale launched, up to 50% discount on buying Hilton points

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News in brief:

Radisson Dream Deals sale now on – one week only

Today, Radisson has launched another “Dream Deals” sale – there was a private pre-sale period last week which was exclusive to existing Club Carlson members.

The sale covers 350 Radisson Blu, Park Inn, Park Plaza, Quorvus Collection and Radisson RED hotels across the UK, Europe, Africa, Asia-Pacific and the Middle East. The home page for the sale is here.

The standard saving is 30% off Best Available Rate, although your actual saving will be lower as these are non-refundable rooms and you should really compare it to the previous non-refundable price.  You need to be a Club Carlson member (free to join) to get the full 30% discount – the non-member discount will be 25%.  The stay must be paid for in full at time of booking.

Even better, Club Carlson members get 2,500 bonus Goldpoints per stay.  We would value these at £7-£8 which makes a real extra impact on cheap one-night bookings.

These “Dream Deals” need to be booked before 25th June. You need to stay between 19th June and 3rd September.

These sale deals will also stack with standard Club Carlson promotions.  The current Triple Points offer runs until 30th June.

You can find out more about Dream Deals on the sale website here.

The giant fish tank below, by the way, is in the lobby of the Radisson Blu Berlin.

Up to 50% discount when you buy Hilton Honors points

Hilton Honors is currently offering a 50% discount when you buy 5,000+ points – see this page and click through.  A 50% discount is equivalent to getting a 100% bonus.

This may or may not be a bargain as it depends how you redeem them.  At the top end, you can buy 80,000 Hilton points for $400.  That is 0.5 cents each.

Regular readers of Head for Points will know that I tend to value Hilton points at 0.33p each, which is roughly what you are paying here.

Five star Hilton, Conrad and Waldorf-Astoria hotels typically run to 80,000 points per night.  The Conrad New York, which I reviewed last week, has a cap of 80,000 points per night.  In this sale, if you got the full 50% discount, you would be paying $400 for 80,000 points.  Given that the Conrad New York sells for over $600 on many dates, it can represent a saving.  Similarly, buying points would often be a good deal at Conrad Tokyo which I reviewed here.

Hilton Honors is also a decent deal at cheaper point levels.   The Hampton by Hilton in Sheffield, for example is capped at 10,000 points per night.  At 0.5c per point you would be paying roughly £39 per night if you bought the points.  That is a 65% discount on the typical nightly rate of £100.  Hampton properties include free breakfast as well.

On the other hand, the Hilton Sheffield is 30,000 points per night.  Even with 50% off your points, you would be paying around £117.  Whilst a bit less than the typical £125 cash cost, it is not a great deal – especially as you would earn points and miles back on the cash rate.  One upside of a reward night, of course, is that it is cancellable without penalty.

At the most extreme, you could buy the Hilton Salalah resort in Oman, reviewed here, for £19 a night assuming a 50% discount.  That would be the rough cost of buying 5,000 points in this promotion.

(Remember that if you have Hilton elite status, and you get Silver status just for taking out their free credit card, you get 5 redemption nights for the price of 4.  That takes the Hilton Salalah resort down to £15 per night!)

What I can say is that, if you got the full 50% discount, you shouldn’t lose money buying Hilton Honors points at 0.5 cents.

If you just buying a handful of points to top off your account, the price per point doesn’t matter anyway.  If you a few thousand short of a redemption then this is a decent opportunity to top them up.

The link to buy is here.

The offer closes on 23rd June.


How to earn Hilton Honors points and status from UK credit cards

How to earn Hilton Honors points and status from UK credit cards (April 2024)

There are various ways of earning Hilton Honors points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

Do you know that holders of The Platinum Card from American Express receive FREE Hilton Honors Gold status for as long as they hold the card?  It also comes with Marriott Bonvoy Gold, Radisson Rewards Premium and MeliaRewards Gold status.  We reviewed American Express Platinum in detail here and you can apply here.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Did you know that the Virgin Atlantic credit cards are a great way of earning Hilton Honors points? Two Virgin Points can be converted into three Hilton Honors points. The Virgin Atlantic cards are the only Visa or Mastercard products in the UK which can indirectly earn Hilton Honors points. You can apply here.

You can also earn Hilton Honors points indirectly with:

and for small business owners:

The conversion rate from American Express to Hilton points is 1:2.

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which can be used to earn Hilton Honors points

(Want to earn more hotel points?  Click here to see our complete list of promotions from the major hotel chains or use the ‘Hotel Offers’ link in the menu bar at the top of the page.)

Comments (50)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Sandgrounder says:

    I have two stays in 5k Hamptons coming up in August, four nights in Minsk and two rooms for three nights in Krakow. This is a well-timed opportunity to replenish my points and feel super-pleased with myself for saving hundreds off the cash price for my stays 🙂

    • Pangolin says:

      Sandgrounder, see my post below. The Minsk Hampton is excellent value on points (I effectively paid $25 for a $67.50 room by using a 50% discount on points purchase). The other benefit from paying with points is you avoid a surcharge when they convert to BYR at the front desk. Even if you tried paying with actual USD (or EUR) banknotes you can’t avoid the conversion charge – and it’s hard to check how much they’re gouging you as the official rate isn’t reliable. Paying by points avoids this issue.

  • Michael says:

    The Radisson Blu Berlin is a beautiful central hotel – my go to central Berlin hotel, highly recommended though you can go into the fish tank via Sea World if you’re not staying.

    • Cate says:

      Agree the Radd in Berlin is lovely. You can take the lift via Sea World which takes you up the fish tank, but you can’t go into the tank 🙂

  • JamesB says:

    I have not quite got my head around the detailed implications of the new points and money option yet. How does the sliding scale of points and money generally compare with buying points at 50% discount/100% bonus? Are there any generalisations that can be drawn? Apart from buying points for an all points redemption to get a 5th night free, does buying points make any sense at all unless one has a very low points balance?

  • tim rooke says:

    Just checked my Hilton account and it’s only offering a 40% discount

  • FLYGVA says:

    I agree with tim rooke, the Hilton Promotion is staggered and not everybody gets the 50% discount, some have lower discount. I was only offerd 35% as a Hilton Diamond since ten years, who occassionally buys between 5k and 10k pounds annually.

  • Ben says:

    If I am booking 2 rooms for 3 nights each, would I get the 5 for 4 deal?

    Thanks

    • Joe says:

      No, its 5 “nights”.

    • JamesB says:

      You cannot, you need to book one room for five consecutive nights at thd same hotel to take up this offer. You need to be logged into your account which will show the cost of four nights spread over five nights giving you what appears to be a lower nightly rate (for example a 20000 points per night hotel will be displayed as 16000 points per night over five nights which is same as one night free).

  • Kevin H says:

    I’ve only just joined the scheme – and am being offered just a 30% discount.

    • Clive says:

      What do you mean ‘just’? The discount is 30% for members. 🙂

      • Kevin H says:

        It’s “just” 30% (in my case) compared with the 50% discount Rob mentions in his lead article

        • Genghis says:

          That’s the trouble with a Bits article – two different articles and people getting confused over what people mean.

  • totaltool says:

    My HH account won’t let me buy as I already bought the maximum amount on the previous promotion. Mrs totaltool recently opened an HH account and she is being offered 30% discount. This makes a point 0.7 cents which completely skews the calculation as to whether its worth buying. Still tempted to buy them because I recently stayed in Hilton hotels with very high cash rates and having points and using them made sense. Also planning to spend a lot of time in USA next year and having points keeps options open for 5 night stays. However as the last offer was in April/May and its only June is it likely that another offer, perhaps a better one, will come along before the end of the year. Does anyone know how often these have appeared historically?

    • JamesB says:

      Would not be unusual of Hilton to follow this soon after with 100% bonus open to everybody. Personally I would wait but it’s the chance you take.

      • Choons says:

        Good point. Didn’t they run one around Easter that was 100% bonus?

      • Pangolin says:

        100% bonus is the same as a 50% discount so that would be fine but clearly not everyone is getting offered the 50% discount on this current deal. I got the 100% bonus about a month ago.

        If you’re not going to the USA till next year then I think it’s fine to wait. These things come around quite often. Personally, I’d avoid buying at 30% unless you need it immediately to bag a good points redemption.

    • Genghis says:

      They must be some expensive stays vs points you’ve had. 0.7c = 0.55p and when Hilton usually have such great points back promos, it’s not unreasonable to get say 20-30% back in points. Taking 20% to err on the side of caution, that’s c. 0.66p per point as your comparison vs cash prices.

      • totaltool says:

        Due to visiting someone in hospital often at short notice I was “forced” to stay in the Hilton Strathclyde…very little elsewhere. Mid week as a business hotel it is often close to full and the only rooms available were often the higher end ones at £130 to £150 per night. However at 20k points it was a better deal to use points even if I was missing out on getting points back.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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