What are the best hotel promos for April 2019?

UPDATE – SEPTEMBER 2024:  This article is now out of date, but don’t worry.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.

Hilton Honors is offering a 100% bonus (some may see less) when you buy points by 24th September. Click here to buy.

Marriott Bonvoy is offering a personalised bonus when you buy points by 23rd September. Click here to buy.

World of Hyatt is offering a 20% discount when you buy points by 8th October. Click here to buy.

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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 Promos’ 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 13,300 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 April?

This is what you have to choose from:

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 have certainly made more of an effort this time and moved a few stays to IHG.  My Glasgow night last week triggered over 20,000 points.

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 only has a Europe / Africa / Middle East offer of 2x, 3x or 4x points on one stay only, with the bonus depending on which month you stay (4x is August)

Marriott‘s offer of double base points on every stay until 4th June is valuable on expensive trips – but it only starts from your 2nd stay during the promo period.  Some people may want to do a cheap mattress run if their first stay after registration is going to be very expensive!

Hyatt‘s offer of 1,000 bonus points per night (1,500 points at its budget chains) could work out nicely for longer stays – but, like Marriott, it won’t pay the bonus on your first stay after registering.  Registration is now closed.

The scheme to avoid if you are seeking bonus points is Radisson Rewards which is not offering any global promotion at present.

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

IHG is running a  promotion called Rewards Night. Faster.  It runs from 15th January to 30th April, so there are only a few weeks left.

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 but I have already got the 19,200 points for three different brands.

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 month.

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 no global promotion at the moment.

There is a good niche offer, however, for your next stay:

• You MUST register via this page of the Accor site
• You need to book by 12th May
• Your stay must be in Europe, Middle East, Africa, French Guiana and Saint Martin (French part)
• You can only get the bonus ONCE
• Rooms must be 100% paid in cash, not ‘part cash, part points’
• If you stay in April, May or June you get DOUBLE points
• If you stay in July you get TRIPLE points
• If you stay in August you get QUADRUPLE points

Existing bookings do NOT count. These need to be cancelled and rebooked.

Let’s look at how generous this deal could be for a Platinum top-tier member who books a stay in August.  You would receive:

• 2.5 Accor base points per €1
• 7.5 additional Accor points per €1 as your quadruple promo bonus
• 1.9 additional Accor points per €1 as your Platinum status bonus

That is a total of 11.9 Accor points, worth 23.8 Eurocents, per €1 spent.  On a pricey trip this could be very lucrative.

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’.

Don’t forget to register before booking (existing bookings will not count) via this page.

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

Marriott’s current offer is called ‘Double Take’.  You can register here.

It is valid for stays until 4th June, although registration closes on 21st May.

In theory it is very straightforward – you receive double base points on all paid stays.  Marriott has chosen to complicate matters by insisting that you only get the bonus from your second stay after registration.  This means that, if you have a very expensive Marriott stay coming up, it might make sense to do a cheap mattress run night first.

Our full article on Double Take is here.  You can register for Double Take here.  The Marriott booking page is here.

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

Radisson Rewards is not running a global promotion at present.

World of Hyatt

World of Hyatt is running a ‘per night’ bonus promotion valid across all of its brands.

Registration for this offer is now closed so it is not worth considering if you are not already signed up.

Until 15th May, you will earn 1,000 bonus points per night, increased to 1,500 at budget brands Hyatt Place and Hyatt House.

Like Marriott, Hyatt is insisting that your first stay after registration does not count.  This means that if you had a 10+ night stay coming up it might be worthwhile doing a cheap mattress run night first.  Reward nights count and will earn the 1,000 points.

Our full article on the promotions is here.

And finally …..

PS.  If you booking a luxury hotel, remember that we can offer you exclusive additional benefits at Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, Peninsula and similar hotels.  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 almost £1m of rooms so far.

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Hotel offers update – September 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 (some may see less) when you buy points by 24th September. Click here.

• Marriott Bonvoy is offering a personalised bonus when you buy points by 23rd September 2024. Click here.

• World of Hyatt is offering a 20% discount when you buy points by 8th October 2024. Click here.