What are the best hotel promos for February 2019?

UPDATE – APRIL 2024:  This article is now out of date, but don’t worry.  We produce a monthly summary of the top hotel bonus point offers – please click HERE or use the ‘Hotel Offers’ menu above.  Thank you.

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Welcome to our regular round-up of the best hotel promotions currently running.

All of the information in this article can also be found on our ‘Hotel Offers’ page which contains details of all of the current offers, together with links to our major articles on each hotel scheme.  However, a positive response from readers – especially our 13,000 email subscribers – means I am now running this monthly article as a handy summary of what is going on.

Where should you credit your stays in February?

With most, possibly all, of the Spring promotions now launched, we have a clear view of what is on offer.

IHG‘s offer has personalised targets so it is impossible to tell if yours are worth doing or not.  In general, you should find that your offer is more attractive than it has been for a while.  I am certainly making more of an effort this time and moving a few stays to IHG.

Hilton‘s offer is the easiest – 2,000 bonus points per stay plus an additional 10,000 points for every five stays or ten nights by 5th May

Accor‘s offer for 7,500 Avios or €150 in hotel credit for completing 3 x 2-night stays by 11th June is certainly generous.  Some people will find the 2-night minimum stay tricky and you need to book by 28th February.

Radisson‘s deal is good if you have a lot of stays coming up.  You will get 120,000 bonus points, which I’d value at £400, for completing 20 nights by 31st March.  The bonus is proportionately worse if you do fewer nights.

The schemes to avoid if you are seeking bonus points are Marriott Bonvoy (unless you were sent a personalised promotion) and World of Hyatt which are not offering any global promotions.

IHG (Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza, InterContinental, Indigo, Staybridge Suites etc)

IHG is running a new promotion called Rewards Night. Faster.  It runs from 15th January to 30th April.

Everyone has personalised targets which, in general, are easier or more generous than we have seen for a while.  This is my article on the offer.  You can register on the IHG site here.

I got the following targets:

10,000 bonus points for staying five nights

19,200 bonus points for staying at three different IHG brands 

5,600 bonus points for 2 x 2-night weekend stays (Saturday plus another night)

8,000 bonus points for four stays booked on the corporate rate of the company I haven’t worked for since 2011, and which has special rates at very few properties anyway ….

3,000 bonus points for one stay in February

42,800 bonus points for completing four of the five targets above

There is no way I can hit four out of five for the full bonus.  The 19,200 points bonus for staying at three different brands is an interesting one, however.  If I value an IHG point at 0.4p then I’m getting almost £80 of points back from those three stays – plus my standard points and the 3,000 points for a February stay – which is a good deal.

Realistically, I might be able to achieve 32,200 bonus points.  This would involve staying five nights over the next four months, taking in three different brands and ensuring one stay is in February.

My wife got the following targets:

10,000 bonus points for staying five nights

28,800 bonus points for staying at three different IHG brands

8,400 bonus points for two Holiday Inn stays

10,800 bonus points for 3 x 2-night weekend stays (Saturday plus another night)

6,600 bonus points for booking two ‘Bonus Point Packages’ (this is when the reservation system offers you additional points on your stay in return for paying a slightly higher rate)

This is VERY interesting:

she could earn 35,400 bonus points from just three nights, as long as each was at a different brand and two were ‘Bonus Point Packages’

she could earn 58,000 bonus points (worth £232 based on my 0.4p valuation) from just five nights, as long as they included two Holiday Inn nights, three different brands in total and two of the bookings were for ‘Bonus Point Packages’

Take a look at what you’ve been offered.  You need to register for ‘Reward Nights. Faster.’ – the link is here where you will also find your personalised targets.  The IHG home page is here.

Hilton (Hampton, Conrad, Waldorf-Astoria etc)

Hilton is currently running an offer called ‘Points Unlimited’.  You can register here.

You will earn 2,000 bonus Hilton Honors points for every stay between 4th January and 5th May.

Even better, you will earn an additional 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points for every FIVE stays OR TEN nights you complete, whichever comes first.

There is no cap to what you can earn and there are no minimum stay requirements.  The bonus should also trigger on reward stays given how similar promotions have worked in the past.

Given that I value a Hilton Honors point at around 0.33p, you are getting a good return on your spending here.  Someone who only ever spends one night at a time in a hotel would be earning – when you include the 10,000 bonus points per five stays – 4,000 bonus points per stay.  I would value that at £13 which is a VERY good return especially as it doesn’t include your base points or any status bonus.

If your hotel stays are generally just for one night then you should seriously consider moving them (in chunks of five) to Hilton this Spring.

There is no small print except that you need to register in advance via the Hilton website here.  Existing bookings count, there is no minimum stay rule and all Hilton Honors hotels are taking part.

Hilton is still status matching too.  If you have status with another hotel programme, Hilton will match you to Gold or Diamond for 90 days – I explain how to do it in this article.

The Hilton booking page is here.

Le Club AccorHotels

Le Club AccorHotels, which covers Novotel / Ibis / Mercure / M Gallery / Sofitel / Pullman / Raffles / Swissotel / Fairmont etc, has brought back its potentially generous promotion to earn 7,500 bonus Avios or €150 of hotel credit.

You will earn €150 of Accor hotel vouchers or 7,500 Avios (or a variable pile of other airline miles) if you complete three x 2-night stays at Accor properties between 15th February and 11th June.

You must book your stays between now and 28th February.  You will earn an additional 500 bonus points per stay if you book by 12th February.

Existing bookings do NOT count. These need to be cancelled and rebooked.  All stays must be completed by 11th June.

The bonus is dropped into your account in the form of 6,000 Le Club AccorHotels points:

Your first 2-night stay comes with 500 bonus points

Your second 2-night stay comes with 2,500 bonus points

Your third 2-night stay comes with 3,000 bonus points

In addition, you earn a further 500 bonus points per stay if you book before 12th February. This takes you to a maximum bonus of 500 + 2,500 + 3,000 + 500 + 500 + 500 = 7,500 bonus points for 3 x 2-night stays.

To maximise your Avios you need to send the points to Iberia Plus.  Whilst you can send them to BA, you want to credit to Iberia Plus because the exchange rate is doubled.  Accor points transfer 1:1 into Iberia Plus whilst they only transfer at 2:1 into British Airways Executive Club.  You can move them from Iberia to BA via ‘Combine My Avios’.

My full article on the 7,500 bonus points promotion is here.  You can find out more and register via the Accor website here.

Marriott Bonvoy (Renaissance, The Ritz-Carlton, Sheraton, Westin, W, Aloft, St Regis, Luxury Collection, Moxy etc)

Following the merger of Marriott Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest on 18th August, the two companies are now operating as one.  The two brands will remain until 13th February when Marriott Bonvoy launches.

There is no global promotion running at present, although some members have been sent personalised offers – I discussed that in this article.

Let’s see if anything happens to accompany the Marriott Bonvoy launch next week.

Radisson Rewards (Radisson Blu, Park Inn, Park Plaza, Radisson Red)

Radisson Rewards is the loyalty scheme for Park Inn, Park Plaza, Radisson, Radisson Blu, Radisson Blu Edwardian and Radisson RED.

It rarely offers global promotions but is currently offering one which could work for heavy stayers.  You can earn up to 120,000 bonus points for completing 20 nights by 31st March.

It is a simple one, based on the number of nights you do:

• Stay 1 night, earn 1,000 bonus points
• Stay 2 nights, earn 3,000 bonus points
• Stay 5 nights, earn 10,000 bonus points
• Stay 10 nights, earn 50,000 bonus points
• Stay 20 nights, earn 120,000 bonus points

The bonus posts cumulatively.  You receive 1,000 points after your first night, an additional 2,000 (total 3,000) after your 2nd night, an additional 7,000 (total 10,000) after your fifth night etc.

I value a Radisson Rewards point at around 0.33p.  This means that you are getting a very modest £3.33 return if you do just one night.  If you do exactly 20 nights, however, you will have received a bonus of 120,000 points which is worth around £400 – this is a VERY attractive £20 per night.

My full article on the deal is here.  You can register here.

World of Hyatt

World of Hyatt is not running a global promotion at present.

And finally …..

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Click here for details of our luxury hotel booking service in association with Bon Vivant / Virtuoso.  Feedback from readers who have used this service so far has been excellent and we have booked over £930,000 of rooms so far.

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Hotel offers update – April 2024:

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.

Want to buy hotel points?

• Hilton Honors is offering a 100% bonus when you buy points by 14th May 2024. Click here.