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Earn bonus Accor points or Avios on every hotel stay with the ‘Places’ app

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I have written before about the points-earning ‘Places’ app run by Le Club AccorHotels (the loyalty scheme for Ibis, Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure, M Gallery etc). 

I had never managed to try it until last month, when I found myself in the Mercure Sheffield St Paul’s hotel.

(Whilst I’m not reviewing the Mercure Sheffield St Paul’s hotel, I do recommend it.  It is far better than your average Mercure – the only reason it isn’t a Novotel is that there is a Novotel directly behind it, and with minor upgrades it could be a Pullman given its good swimming pool and a restaurant which opens out into the Winter Gardens.  The junior suites are a good size and overlook the dancing fountains outside.)

Accor’s ‘Places’ app offers bonus points on every stay when you do a ‘virtual check-in’ via their special app during or after your visit.

You will need to download the Places’ app for your iOS or Android device.  The links for the downloads are here.  There is also a Facebook app you can add if you don’t want the smartphone version.

Here is a dummy screen which shows lots of activity:

Accor Places screenshot

Here is my actual screenshot which shows very little activity!  Click to enlarge:

Accor places app

Each time you are staying at an Accor property – you cannot earn points simply by popping in – you open the ‘Places’ app and register. 

As long as your Le Club account shows that you are staying at the property, you will earn points.  Accor is very slow at adding new hotels to the app, unfortunately, which I why I couldn’t use it when I reviewed the new Novotel London Blackfriars a couple of years ago.

You do NOT have to access the app whilst you are physically in the property.  You can check in retrospectively for up to six months after checking out.

The different ‘badges’ that you can collect are listed in the app.  You start by earning 50 Le Club AccorHotels points on your first check-in and then proceed to higher bonuses based on multiple stays at different brands (or the same brand) or different countries.  Three stays at the same hotel earns 300 points, for example, whilst five stays at different Accor hotels also earns 300 points.

The 50 points from my Mercure Sheffield St Paul’s check-in posted promptly to my Accor account.  They were automatically sent over to my Iberia Plus account which got me 50 Avios, as my account is set to auto-transfer.

I would got better value saving them up for a hotel voucher – Accor points have a fixed value of 2 Eurocents per point – but you need a minimum of 2,000 points to convert and I will never reach that.

Whilst none of the ‘Places’ bonuses will make you points rich, there is enough there to justify the few seconds work required to ‘check in’.  You can find out more by watching the short video here.

Accor Live Limitless update – April 2024:

Earn bonus Accor points: Accor is not currently running a global promotion

New to Accor Live Limitless?  Read our review of Accor Live Limitless here and our article on points expiry rules here. Our analysis of what Accor Live Limitless points are worth is here.

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

Category

Accor Live Limitless

Comments (16)

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

  • Jamie says:
    2 Mar2 March 04:18

    Just note that the ‘phone app’ is actually just a link to the Facebook app requiring a facebook login..

    • Jamie says:
      2 Mar2 March 05:15

      Certainly worth doing though – I’ve accrued a reasonable amount of Accor Points by triggering various badges over the years.

      • TokyoFan says:
        2 Mar2 March 09:24

        I’ve had over 12,000 points through this method – not to be sniffed at. Of course much of that activity was when LCAH was a decent(ish) scheme. Bring back Happy Mondays!

        I now have 21 badges. I just wish they continued to reward continued stays – you’d think that if you got the ‘addict’ badge for 30 stays they might then introduce one for 40, 50 stays etc. But no.

  • Nick Burch says:
    2 Mar2 March 05:17

    Note that, whichever way you access it, you must have a Facebook account to use Places

    Places was a bit flaky for a while, but currently seems fairly stable. They’ve also improved the descriptions of some of the badges in the last year, especially the event ones, so it’s easier to figure out what you need to do

    My one remaining annoyance is timezones. If you do a checkin using the app for right then, not a retrospective one, it sometimes manages to put it down for the wrong day when you’re a long way off Paris time. Quite a few times now, I’ve done the checkin, looked at the checkin list, then had to go and do a retrospective one for the actual date as it has put me down one day out…

    Otherwise, apparently I’ve now earnt 20 badges with it!

  • Colin JE says:
    2 Mar2 March 08:32

    This is rant (and also my AppStore review). Apologies.
    This could be the worst app I’ve come across. Login only via Facebook. No account? Tough. Initial screens in French with no way of changing. Enter your Accor number then to be fair it starts working in English. So Accor must be sharing my account with Facebook. GDPR? They probably haven’t heard of it.
    Then to take the biscuit, the only Hotel I regularly stay at Ibis Styles at Blackfriars isn’t on the app.
    Pointless, literally.

  • Jim says:
    2 Mar2 March 08:58

    Does this post updates on your Facebook timeline etc? Wouldn’t want the world to know I was staying at an Ibis Styles!
    J

  • Anna says:
    2 Mar2 March 10:37

    OT as no bits but hotel points – I’m hoping to use Marriott points to book 2 or 3 nights at a current Cat 6 hotel at Easter 2020 but it’s not available to book yet. Are the category and peak season changes definitely going ahead on March 5th? The hotel I want to book is due to go into Cat 7 and I am now thinking I won’t have enough points!

  • Rob says:
    2 Mar2 March 11:38

    Interesting! Thanks

  • Roger Wilco says:
    2 Mar2 March 12:12

    I’ve have a few badges that still haven’t posted since last September. Pathetic.

  • Lady London says:
    2 Mar2 March 12:32

    Another Accor fail.

    I refuse on principle to use Facebook. Loads of people I know have stopped using Facebook after having too much of their data pawned around.

    Would be nice if Accor could offer another way. Maybe even a straight login? obviously they’re mining and selling our data, otherwise why else make it Facebook only and app only?

    • TGLoyalty says:
      2 Mar2 March 12:34

      The whole point of this is to share Accor related posts on your social media as advertising and effectively paying you in points.

      • Cat says:
        2 Mar2 March 19:37

        Nothing ever appears on my social media…

      • Jamie says:
        3 Mar3 March 04:35

        I use a dedicated Facebook account that is connected to only 1 person (who never logs in…) and only used for these sorts of marketing promotions.

        • Lady London says:
          5 Mar5 March 19:17

          I did that for a while until Facebook got all heavy, unmasked me and closed the account.

          For the reason above I’ll never open a real one. I know Google is as bad or worse, and Yahoo also has been known to sell things about you that they shouldn’t, but Facebook has too many times flagrantly disrespected even its own privacy promises.

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