Club Carlson, SPG, Wyndham and Hilton are the best hotel chains for earning American Airlines AAdvantage miles from hotel stays. SPG is the best earning for the top elite, well-traveled Super 75 Platinum. Still, even if your lifestyle is only Super 8, Wyndham Rewards will get you there on an AA or partner airline flight by earning miles nearly at the same rate of hotel spend as SPG.
My Loyalty traveler series on hotel points-to-miles exchange rates for frequent flyer miles continues with a look at 9 major hotel loyalty programs and points-to-miles exchange rates. These tables look at the miles earned at set levels of hotel spend. Top-tier elite hotel status and the best earning hotel cobranded credit card for hotel stay payment are additional factors in the miles calculations.
Table 1: Comparing Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates in 9 major hotel loyalty programs for American Airlines AAdvantage miles.
This table shows the actual exchange rate based on hotel spend for hotel stays. Credit cards and elite status are not considered.
Table 2: Top-tier elite membership factor when comparing Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates in 9 major hotel loyalty programs for American Airlines AAdvantage miles.
This table shows how top-tier elite membership earning rate alters the total number of points earned at each level of hotel spend.
Table 3: Co-Branded Hotel Credit Card with hotel loyalty top-tier elite membership when comparing Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates in 9 major hotel loyalty programs for American Airlines AAdvantage miles.
This table shows the influence of top tier elite and credit card spend.
Basic Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates Compared to Rate Points Earned from Hotel Spend without consideration of:
- Elite Status
- Cobranded Credit Card
Table 1: Comparing Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates in 9 major hotel loyalty programs for American Airlines AAdvantage miles.
This table was discussed in my Loyalty traveler post yesterday.
The main point I’d like readers to see is Wyndham Rewards is a great program for earning small levels of points for points-to-miles exchange. Wyndham Rewards has a high rate of exchange at 10 points = 4 miles. The minimum transfer is 8,000 Wyndham Rewards points = 3,200 miles. This is $800 in hotel spend at Wyndham Hotels.
Most programs take $1,000 in hotel spend to earn the minimum number of base points for a points-to-miles transfer.
Club Carlson is the minimum hotel spend leader for its ability of a base member (no elite status) to earn 2,000 points for the minimum points-to-miles transfer at 2,000 points = 250 miles after just $100 in hotel spend.
SPG Platinum members have no minimum exchange rate and even 1 Starpoint can be exchanged into 1 mile in several programs. This is useful for some promotion offers where partner activity earns a bonus and 1 Starpoint can be transferred into a frequent flyer program for that partner activity.
Table 2: Top-tier elite membership factor when comparing Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates in 9 major hotel loyalty programs for American Airlines AAdvantage miles.
Table 2: Discussion
The numbers here do not factor additional points for online booking bonus (Club Carlson) or Welcome Amenity points earned per hotel stay in many of the programs.
Club Carlson is one of the top three highest standard points-to-miles exchange rates among the 9 leading hotel loyalty programs. Club Carlson has the second highest top tier elite bonus at 75% base points earning rate.
SPG Platinum-75 (sounds radioactive) earns 100% elite bonus points as of March 1, 2012 and moves up in ranking for this AAdvantage miles comparison.
SPGÂ asterisk * in the $13,000 column for SPG Platinum/Gold elite is due to using $13,334 since this small $334 incremental hotel spend raises the points earned from 39,000 to 40,000 points and increases miles earned by 5,000 miles.
Hilton HHonors has so many earning variables that predicting how many AAdvantage miles you will earn after $5,000 in hotel spend is mind-boggling. But guaranteed Hilton is better than Marriott Rewards for earning AAdvantage miles. Marriott Rewards and American Airlines cut their ties in 2010 so you can’t earn any Advantage miles through Marriott hotel stays.
Choice Privileges and IHG Priority Club sit in the middle of the pack, but pale in comparison to the Club Carlson miles earner.
Hyatt Gold Passport and Best Western Rewards top-tier elites both suffer from the lowest elite bonus points percentage at just 30% when most programs are 50% and Club Carlson at 75% and SPG at 100% leap-frog ahead in points-earning ability.
Table 3: Co-Branded Hotel Credit Card with hotel loyalty top-tier elite membership when comparing Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates in 9 major hotel loyalty programs for American Airlines AAdvantage miles.
Here is a comparison of major hotel loyalty programs for the fastest earning AAdvantage Miles from hotel stays for the high elite frequent guest using a hotel co-branded credit card to pay for hotel stays.
Non-hotel spend on the cobranded hotel credit card is not considered in this analysis. It is far easier to compare earning for non-hotel spend in isolation from hotel stays.
SPG jumps to the top for American Airlines AAdvantage miles when the credit card is added to the mix. Earning 2 points/$1 for Starwood Hotels spend is a 100% base points bonus and no other hotel program offers that high a proportion of base points as a credit card bonus for hotel spend.
Hilton HHonors American Express Surpass is close at 90% base points. Hyatt Visa is 60% base points. The other chains are 50% bonus for credit card spend at hotels.
Club Carlson is the only program without a co-branded credit card. Supposedly a credit card deal is in the works for 2012 and that will push Club Carlson higher in the ranking. Club Carlson still fares well against SPG considering the Club Carlson program does not even have a cobranded credit card to help its position in this race.
Concluding comments:
These tables tell me that American Airlines AAdvantage members seeking miles from hotel stays are in one of the best frequent flyer programs for maximizing miles earning. Hilton HHonors looks impressive in this matchup, but lower points-to-miles transfer rates will lower its ranking for most other airlines. Marriott Rewards will take a top rank place for several other airline frequent flyer programs with its high points-to-miles exchange rates.
American Airlines AAdvantage miles can be earned at a high rate from hotel stays regardless of your market segment with Wyndham Rewards, Club Carlson and Starwood Preferred Guest all offering high points-to-miles rates.
This series will continue with a look at Delta Airlines SkyMiles. This is a program where the rankings will change as Marriott Rewards shows its competitive edge and Hilton HHonors reveals its poor points-to-miles exchange rate for most frequent flier programs.
P.S. There is a load of data here. Hopefully no math errors. Please leave a comment if something doesn’t look correct.
Feel free to ask questions and carry on a discussion in the comments.
- American Airlines Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates for 9 Hotel Programs. (Feb 5, 2012)
- American Airlines Points-to-Miles Exchange Rates for Elites and Credit Card members. (Feb 6, 2012)
- Delta Skymiles hotel points-to-miles rates in 9 hotel programs. (Feb 7, 2012)
- United Mileage Plus hotel points-to-miles rates favor Marriott, Club Carlson, Wyndham. (Feb 8, 2012)
- Hotel Loyalty Program Airline Partners: 10 programs compared on one spreadsheet. (Feb 9, 2012)
- Why Change hotel points into airline miles? (Feb 9, 2012)
- Hotel points conversion into Southwest Rapid Rewards points favors Marriott, Choice and Hyatt. (Feb 10, 2012)
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