Points 7: Priority Club

Priority Club is the hotel loyalty program of the Intercontinental Hotels Group (IHG) and includes such well-known brands as Holiday Inn, Crowne Plaza, and Staybridge Suites. As I mentioned in my last post, it was the program that got me started in the points game.

About six years ago, we were staying at a Holiday Inn in Montreal with a group of friends and one of them suggested that we join the program because we'd get a free continental breakfast. When I got home I checked my points total online and discovered I was a long way from a free night. I started searching for other ways to add points to my account and a points junkie was born.

I earn a lot of points with Starwood because of the credit card. Unfortunately, Priority Club doesn't offer an affiliated card to Canadians (they do in the U.S.); but I still collect their points for the occasional stay rather than crediting to an airline because Priority Club offers so many other ways to earn points.

To illustrate: I have only one stay at an IHG property this year, which netted me 1500 base points (10 points per dollar spent, room+dinner+bar tab), but I earned thousands more bonus points using codes I entered online prior to my stay. You can find a list of these codes at the Rewards Canada site. And I've earned thousands more, nearly 20K in all, through a variety of other ways, such as surveys and contests.

For example, right now Priority Club is running a contest called The Anywhere Challenge. Each week, you have to guess the mystery location based on a photo and word clues. A new challenge appears each Tuesday and awards 2,000 points to every person who guesses correctly the first day, declining to 500 points for the correct answer on Friday. You can enter by clicking the link, above. And if you're not a Priority Club member yet, you can join.

I won 3,000 points in the first two weeks (the contest runs for eight), but not because I'm a geographical genius. It's because there's a thread on a points hound website called flyertalk where people even more obsessive than I am quickly come up with the answer. Here's the link. Be sure to go to the last page for the latest discussion.

Free nights begin at 15K points, though occasional PointBreaks rates offer some hotels for only 5K. So my one stay, and persistent point-grubbing has earned me a free night. Not only that, because I've earned 20K points in a year, I've qualified for gold status, an elite level of membership (platinum is tops) that gets me preferential treatment, such as free room upgrades.

IHG (especially the Holiday Inn brand) is one of the biggest hotel chains, so there's almost always an HI where you want to stay, whether you're earning or redeeming. And with easy to earn bonuses, you don't have to stay a lot in order to earn status and free nights. So if you want to focus on only one hotel program, I'd recommend Priority Club.

Points 6: Starwood Preferred Guest Program

Last time, I explained how joining hotel loyalty programs, even if you stay only once, is worthwhile, because it allows you to credit points to your favourite airline frequent flier program.

Of course hotel programs can be valuable for themselves, especially if you are loyal to one chain. Wyndham (Ramada, Super 8, Howard Johnson, Travelodge, Days Inn), Marriott, and Best Western each have several thousand properties worldwide, which makes it easy to find one in the location you're staying. And if the rate is competitive, earning points toward a free night might be the deciding factor. I belong to all these programs (of course), but only in order to credit stays to airline plans. I focus on two plans for actually collecting points: Starwood and Priority Club.

I've told you that I have a Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) American Express card. Before Amex, it was affiliated with MBNA, a division of Bank of America that issues credit cards in Canada. It was a no fee card then and was the best travel rewards card on the market, given the value SPG points have both for redeeming for hotel rooms and for swapping (with bonuses) into airline plans. Over the last five years, I've earned over 150K SPG points, which I've redeemed for flights, airline miles, and hotel stays. I've also earned points for stays at Starwood hotels (Sheraton, Westin, Le Meridien) when the rate was a better deal than burning points. And sometimes bonus offers, like last year's "Stay twice, get a free night" offer make paying for a room worthwhile.

I've just done that again recently, something points hounds call a "mattress run". The idea is to find a rate which earns points or rewards that are more valuable than the rate paid. Here's what I did. I recently received two offers from Starwood: one was the current general offer of double points for each stay; the other was a targeted offer (since I hadn't stayed at a Starwood property in a while) of 25% off my next reward redemption if I had a stay by October 31. So I went to the Starwood site and looked for a low rate. I found the Four Points by Sheraton Niagara Fallsview for $69 night. And then I found a package deal for $99 a night which included a $45 dinner credit, so I booked that.

Here's how it works out for me. I earn 2 SPG points per dollar spent, so I'll get 200 points. But double points means 400. Taxes, parking ($20), and anything I spend on dinner over $45 (perhaps a glass of wine?) also earn points. And since I'm charging everything to my SPG Amex card, I'll earn another point for every dollar. I expect to get over 700 points. But at that rate I'd have to stay 10 times to get a free night at the Westin Harbour Castle, so that's not the real reason for our little jaunt.

When you redeem your SPG points for a 5-night stay, you receive the fifth night free. But that 25% discount offer earns another free night. Remember Palm Springs? The Westin Mission Hills Resort and Spa (I know, sounds swank) is 10K points a night, so a 5-night stay will cost me 30K points, not 50K. Put another way, since a night the Westin Mission Hills etc. is a little over US$300, my night in Niagara more than pays for itself.

I'll really hate it if I have to give up the SPG Amex next spring. I'm hoping that if the droves of former MBNA cardholders, like myself, who accepted the card because the annual fee was waived for the first year threaten to cancel, Amex either will reduce the annual fee or give a retention bonus.

Looks like I've gone way over my 500 words, so there'll have to be a separate post on Priority Club. That's only fitting, because Priority Club was where points collecting all began for me.

Points 5: U.S. Airline Frequent Flier Programs

When I described the SPG Amex card I explained the advantage of belonging to American frequent flier programs. But even if you don't have the annual spending that makes this card's fee worthwhile, there are other ways to earn miles in these plans.

Most of the airline programs offer a joining bonus. It's usually only 1,000 miles, but it's a nice start. However, you'll need to find ways to keep earning miles because most plans' points expire if you have no activity during a 12-24 month period.

You can, of course, take a flight, but for most of us leisure travelers, that's an occasional thing, and our choice of airline usually depends on price and schedule, not loyalty points.

But you can also fly on one airline and credit the miles to another airline, as long as they are both members of the same alliance. There are three global airline partnerships: Star Alliance, SkyTeam, and oneworld. For example, you can fly on United Airlines and credit the miles to Aeroplan, and vice-versa, because both Air Canada and United are members of the Star Alliance.

Remember I told you to join the loyalty program of every hotel you stay at? Here's why: you can earn miles in your chosen airline's frequent flier program. That's right: you can stay at the Hampton Inn or the Super 8 and earn Aeroplan miles (for example). You don't have to accept the hotel program's points. Join online prior to your stay. When you set up your account, in your "profile", set your earning preference to the airline program of your choice (you'll have to register your frequent flier number). You can change it as often as you want in order to keep the points in different plans alive.

And if you've earned a significant number of hotel points, but not enough for a free night, you may be able to swap them for airline miles. Many hotel plans let you do this, but they all have differing minimum point levels and exchange rates.

There's another way to keep frequent flier points alive and that's through Points.com. It's a free point tracking and swapping website and it allows swaps between HBC points and airline programs, including Aeroplan, Alaska, Cathay Pacific (Asia Miles), Delta, and US Airways. They do exact a hefty premium for their service, but if you want to keep points alive, or boost your total to the level where you can redeem for a flight, it might be worth it. You can even swap Petro Points, if you first exchange them for Asia Miles at the Petro Points site and then swap Asia Miles at Points.com.

There are also several annual-fee credit cards available to Canadians that earn points with U.S. airlines. I'll tell you where to find out about them when I describe the blogs and websites that I find useful. But first, I want to go into a bit more detail on hotel programs.

Points 4: Double-dipping

A faithful blog reader asks, "What about double-dipping?"

A very good question. So, before we continue with the advanced course material on hotel loyalty programs in Points 301, I'll explain how "double-dipping" can earn you extra credit (pun intended).

Essentially what points hounds mean by double-dipping is getting two sets of points on the same transaction, and it's a powerful strategy for padding your point and mile balances. For example, if I use a credit card that earns points, at a retailer that offers points, I'm getting points twice for the same purchase. In fact, the banks that issue Aeroplan VISA cards encourage this and point to it (groan) as an added benefit of their cards. They further encourage double-dipping with frequent bonus point promotions. For example, CIBC is currently offering to double the points earned when purchasing tickets on Air Canada. Earning bonus points while you're double-dipping might even be considered "triple-dipping".

So say you buy gas at Esso, using your CIBC Aeroplan VISA card, and you present your Aeroplan card. You earn 1 point per dollar because you used your credit card, and another point for every $3 dollars in gas because Esso is an Aeroplan retail partner. In effect, you earn 1 and 1/3 points per dollar you put on your card at Esso. You can make this easier for yourself and earn an extra 200 Aeroplan miles if you sign up for a Speedpass and link you credit card to your Aeroplan account. It's actually not as complicated as it sounds and here's the website that explains it all.

But it works with any point-earning card. You can earn AirMiles at the LCBO, or Shell, or Metro grocery stores, as well as Aeroplan miles, if you use your Aeroplan-branded credit card and present your AirMiles card at these (and other) AirMiles retail partners.

The same goes for the Club Sobeys BMO MasterCard I told you about in Points 201, part 1. You not only earn ½ Aeroplan mile for every dollar spent, but when you present your Aeroplan card (at Esso, or Home Hardware, for example) or AirMiles card, you earn those points too.

That means using the no-fee Club Sobeys MasterCard at Sobeys earns 1 Aeroplan mile for every dollar: you receive 1 Club Sobeys point for every dollar in groceries, which transfers into ½ Aeroplan mile, plus ½ Aeroplan mile for every dollar you put on the card.

If I shop at Sobeys and I use the SPG Amex card I told you about in Points 201, Part 2, (which I always do) and then transfer to Aeroplan and receive the 25% bonus, I'm getting 1 and 3/4 Aeroplan miles per dollar spent. Yes, I dipped, and then I dipped again.

In Points 301, I'll explain why you should sign up for multiple hotel and airline loyalty programs.

Points 3: Starwood Preferred Guest American Express Card

The problem with collecting Aeroplan miles is that millions of other Canadians do too. So when it comes time to redeem that flight on Air Canada or one of its Star Alliance partners, you're competing with a lot of other people for a few seats. Of course you can always pay more points for "extra access", but that could end up costing more than twice as much as a regular award.

However, few Canadians belong to the plans of the major U.S. airlines – American, Delta, United, and US Airways – so flights from Canadian cities are often readily available at the lowest rate, typically 25K points for a return economy class flight in North America.

That brings me to the Starwood Preferred Guest (SPG) American Express card. Starwood is the chain that includes Sheraton and Westin hotels, among others, and SPG is their loyalty program. You earn 2 SPG points for every dollar spent at Starwood hotels (bonus offers let you earn faster) and free nights start at 2,000 points, with most hotels in the 7-10K range. For example, both the Sheraton Centre and Westin Harbour Castle in Toronto are 7K points for a free night.

The SPG Amex card earns 1 SPG point for every dollar spent. MBNA used to be Starwood's partner, and the card was no-fee, which was a terrific deal, but early this year they switched to Amex and now their card costs $120 a year. Given Amex's limited acceptance and the less generous insurance benefits, it's generally not as good a deal as the Aeroplan bank cards.

Except SPG has one really big advantage: you can trade its points one for one with almost any airline's. And if you swap 20K points, they give you a 5K bonus, resulting in 25K airline miles. This amounts to 1¼ miles for dollar spent. So if you have the annual spending to justify a $120 annual fee card, the 25% extra miles and ability to redeem with virtually any airline might make this card worthwhile to you.

You can apply online, there's a 10K point sign-up bonus, and you'll be automatically enrolled in the SPG program.

I accepted the card last spring because Amex waived the annual fee for former MBNA card holders for the first year. They also offered an 11K point sign-up bonus and my wife got a card too. We recently swapped 20K of those points for 25K American Airlines Advantage miles for free return flights from Palm Springs to Toronto.

I plan to cancel the card next year unless Amex lowers the annual fee (in the U.S. it's only $65 a year) or offers a hefty renewal bonus. Otherwise, it won't be worth it to me. I'll bring the Club Sobeys MasterCard out of mothballs and focus on earning free Aeroplan miles with it.

The SPG card enables you to benefit from membership in a host of airline plans. In Points 301 I'll explain why you should join the plan of every hotel chain you stay at as well.