Hotels.com launches a credit card in the United States – here’s how it works

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• BJ says:

  4 Oct4 October 06:58

  The guesstimate for a UK variant seems to be at the generous extreme. This, with any other benefits, would almost certainly require a fee variant. Although I appreciate its attraction, I’ve never really been convinced by the hotels.com scheme, even for independent hotels. With a little more flexibility and effort on a booking by booking basis, the potential for substantially greater returns exists.

  • Leo says:

    4 Oct4 October 11:29

    Such as? – Genuine question not sarcasm.

    • Doug M says:

      4 Oct4 October 12:27

      Offers direst from the hotel, and use of their loyalty programs. Use of c@shback and e-shopping portals. Sites like Trivago or Hotels Combined. There are so many variables that you have to do your own research. As a usual solo traveller I don’t care about breakfast or hotel lounges. For a family of 4, included breakfast and switching one snack to a hotel lounge/reception type function might mean only paying for one meal/day and a huge saving. If you really want the best deal you have to work at it, and read sites like this, including the comments which can offer up some real nuggets.

    • BJ says:

      4 Oct4 October 13:00

      My approach for independent hotels is along the lines stated by Doug and Erico. I have top t8er in Hilton and IHG so will only rarely fail to book direct with those.

• alex says:

  4 Oct4 October 07:37

  elite status with free breakfast for 2, lounge access and room upgrade is worth MUCH MORE than 10% credit. often worth more thna the actual hotel rate paid

  • Jonathan says:

    4 Oct4 October 07:48

    Only if you’ve got that status in the first place……….

    • Jonathan says:

      4 Oct4 October 07:52

      Exactly! Assuming diamond from the above benefits & that requires a decent spend to achieve plus it ties you to Hilton which can be dire outside big cities.

• Mikeact says:

  4 Oct4 October 08:36

  When your touring around in off beat places I think it can make a lot of sense. We did two separate trips in 2018/19… three months in Australia and two months in NZ. Clocked up quite a few ‘free’ nights, which we then used in South Africa during late ’19.

  • meta says:

    4 Oct4 October 08:52

    If you’re paying for business trips/conferences, it can make sense too. I forgot how many times I actually paid for other people travelling with me or coming to UK on business. I do know that I used them on a nearly free week in Thailand (paid just taxes), five free nights in a Royal Suite at Le Meridien Mauritius for £100 couple of years ago and most recently six days on a beach villa in Seychelles for £200 after applying all the free night vocuhers.

• meta says:

  4 Oct4 October 08:41

  You can get hotels.com Gold status for £50-60, so Siliver status is meaningless if there is an annual fee of £50 or more.

  • meta says:

    4 Oct4 October 09:00

    *Silver

  • Doug M says:

    4 Oct4 October 10:00

    What actual value in status with hotels.com though.
    I like the scheme, having never cared about breakfast or lounge access at a hotel it’s a very good loyalty scheme, but like IHG it’s reward based not benefit based.

    • Andrew (@andrewseftel) says:

      4 Oct4 October 11:00

      I found the silver customer service pretty good. No experience of the regular one though.

    • meta says:

      4 Oct4 October 11:40

      I get upgrades most of the time when booking with hotels.com as Gold member and people who I book for often get upgrades as well. For a few of the last bookings, I also got refunds straight away. They appeared the following day on my Amex. I even got a refund for non-refundable booking for my parents. It was outside their refund/rebooking policy, but as a Gold member they said they’ll give the refund. Also I’ve been issued with refunds/vouchers whenever I had issues with the hotel and the hotel was unwilling to resolve the issue.

      Between my partner and I, we have status with most of the chains, but it’s good to diversify. This actually gives us much more options to choose from wherever we go.

      • Doug M says:

        4 Oct4 October 12:34

        Hotels.com gold since 2013, except one break of a few months. Never remember an upgrade. Have had upgrades at hotels, but not specific to hotels.com status. In my experience most hotels see Expedia and think dump him in the cheap rooms. Are you saying these are upgrades when you book, or on arrival they note your hotel.com status, I’d be amazed if they were even aware of it.
        One issue of a non-existent balcony on a room in Florida was handled very well, whether because I was gold, or because they didn’t give me what I pad for is anyone’s guess.
        I have a non-refundable booking for 7 days later this month in Florida, my future relationship and use of hotels.com may depend on how they handle it.

        • Prins Polo says:

          4 Oct4 October 13:12

          My thoughts exactly. No upgrades as Hotels.com gold since 2014. Often given the worst room as the front desk just sees this as an “Expedia booking”. I do stay a lot in places where there are no chains or chain hotel are not attractive, so use hotels.com quite a lot, but never use it if I can book eg a Marriott hotel directly.

        • meta says:

          4 Oct4 October 13:59

          Both on arrival and sometimes at the time of booking I get offered better rooms for the same price as standard rooms. I would say this happens 90% of the time. Most recently at Sofitel Abu Dhabi last year where I booked Luxury club room (base room) and got upgraded to Imperial Suite their top suite covering half of the floor. They said this is because of my hotels.com Gold status.

        • RussellH says:

          4 Oct4 October 14:21

          > In my experience most hotels see Expedia and think dump him in
          > the cheap rooms.

          Back in my tour operating days someone asked me for a quote for a complex itinerary. He did not take it up because he could get cheaper prices through HRS (rather than Expedia, but same idea). I e-mailed the hotels in question to cancel the options; one stated outright to me that they would only sell their bad rooms to their HRS bookers. They made a point of giving my clients their better rooms, making the point that the person in question was not comparing like-with-like.

        • Doug M says:

          4 Oct4 October 14:31

          I overcome this by simply booking the room I want. Part of the upgrade game is how frequently it works when I don’t care. City break for 4 days and get nothing, overnight at airport hotel when I’m going to sleep and nothing else and get some upgrade I couldn’t care about. Much prefer to book what I want.

  • TGLoyalty says:

    4 Oct4 October 11:51

    30 stays in £2 hostels in Cambodia?

    • meta says:

      4 Oct4 October 14:04

      Less than £2 sometimes. I don’t aways need to do 30 stays or any extra stays though as usually have 20 or more stays anyway. There are so many double nights and extra night offers every year that the credit card will need to do something really extraordinary for me to sign up for it. It will definitely have to be no fee.

• Tony says:

  4 Oct4 October 10:09

  Probably a bit of a schoolboy comment … but are the interchange fees set to change due to the Brexit situation ? Sorry to bring the B word into your Sunday.

  • Rob says:

    4 Oct4 October 10:36

    It was the UK’s idea to bring in this law in the first place, so very unlikely.

    I’m sure politicians are queuing up to introduce a piece of law that is likely to lead to increased prices in the shops in order to enrich three massive US corporations.

    • Tony says:

      4 Oct4 October 10:55

      Thanks.

      So that’s prob why the Accor credit card has quietly died a death ?

      “I’m sure politicians are queuing up to introduce a piece of law that is likely to lead to increased prices in the shops in order to enrich three massive US corporations.” – you never know with this lot …

    • TGLoyalty says:

      4 Oct4 October 11:51

      It might change the Uk Amex situation though?

      • memesweeper says:

        4 Oct4 October 13:41

        in theory you could end up with different interpretations of the rules between EU and UK … but I’d not get any hopes up just yet. For the time being the rules stay consistent and I’d expect the implementation will be so too.

• Ben says:

  4 Oct4 October 11:52

  It is very depressing to see the credit card market in the USA….

  Welcome bonuses right now:
  IHG card bonus 140k Welcome bonus
  Bonvoy card – 5 free nights up to 50,000 a night
  Amex gold – 60k MR
  Platinum – 75K MR

  Sigh…

  • Prins Polo says:

    4 Oct4 October 13:16

    In practice most of the good cards (Sapphire, BA, IHG, Hyatt, etc) are issued by Chase, which has a strict 5/24 rule, which in turn limits churning. Also no partial/pro rata refund of fees (unlike in the UK) when cards are cancelled. And a lot of the ones with high sign-up bonuses come with $500-600 annual fee.

• Genghis says:

  4 Oct4 October 12:24

  Having such a low basis for a night (£50) wouldn’t appeal to me as I’d feel I’m not getting value for money (ie if a room is £150 ex VAT I’m losing out on £10 reward). I appreciate I’m very much in the minority of trying to extract as much value as possible. I’d much prefer a points system which convert to a free night of the value you request.

  • Doug M says:

    4 Oct4 October 12:39

    Minority maybe, but at least one other is with you. I’ve tried endlessly to explain to people how using low value nights on an expensive night is a sucker move. You want your free nights to equate as closely as possible with the room rate you’re using them against.
    I’d guess this makes the scheme cost hotels.com a lot less than it would seem.

    • memesweeper says:

      4 Oct4 October 13:45

      Correct — and I have the opposite problem, a hotels.com credit so damn expensive I can’t ever find anywhere to use it! Nearly four hundred quid… and I’ll never allow myself to use it on a cheaper room and loose the balance…

      • TGLoyalty says:

        4 Oct4 October 20:17

        Times like this you need a couple of hostel nights to bring the act value down.

        Maybe a suite somewhere in the countryside for a night? Early check in and late check out. Chewton Glen or Clivedon house or the like?

        • memesweeper says:

          4 Oct4 October 20:29

          Nice idea but too late. Booked a week in a bonkers expensive ski chalet through hotels.com hence the funky-high credit I can’t use.

      • Lady London says:

        4 Oct4 October 21:10

        I’m thinking spa to use that up

      • John says:

        5 Oct5 October 04:13

        You need to have several hotels.com accounts, as long as you don’t care about the status

• memesweeper says:

  4 Oct4 October 13:23

  strangely, I’ve often found the opposite… factor in the Hotels.com rewards and , if they have the hotel and room I want, they are often the best deal. Where it falls downs they do not have the range of hotels you find on booking.com.

  I (usually) book direct with those hotels I have status with and actively collect the points (Marriot, Hilton, IHG), but occasionally even with these chains hotels.com makes sense (ie as a solo traveller on business not wanting an upgrade or breakfast and when there’s no points promotion ongoing). For chains like Accor it’s hotels.com every time for me.

  • Lady London says:

    4 Oct4 October 15:41

    Accor does, however, have their only globally lucrative promotion still able to be booked for the next few days.

    I have to pass as airlines have completely stopped flights on my most used routes so I can plan nothing.

    But for anyone who can see 3 stays of more than 1 night between now and 15th December and can use Accor the promo covered by Rob 2-3 weeks ago is a no-brainer.

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