My purchases of 172,000 Choice Privileges points from this year’s Daily Getaways posted this week. I have been checking out hotels to see what kind of value I can find for points. I had planned to burn Choice Privilege points for our summer vacation in Denmark, Norway and Sweden. Those plans might change in consideration of Club Carlson Visa card one free night on award stays benefit ending June 1, 2015, but available for July stays if booked before June 1.
Spent some time today checking out Nordic Choice Hotels and saw plenty of great value with Choice Privileges points in Norway. Last September I stayed in several hotels in Norway with published room rates of $500 per night. The value of the Norwegian krone dropped 25% against the dollar since September and those $500 per night hotels are now posting rates around $350 to $375. Norway is still expensive. Most Nordic Choice Hotels are 16,000 points per night and that is about $64 in points purchased from Daily Getaways.
One of the other great values for Choice Privileges points is Venice, Italy with two Choice Hotels, both at 10,000 points per night.
Comfort Hotel Diana is 10,000 points per night with a prime location beside Piazza San Marco, St. Mark’s Square.
80,000 Choice Privileges points buys an 8-night stay at Comfort Hotel Diana in Venice, Italy. Daily Getaways sold 80,000 points for $320.
Choice Privileges points have an incredible return on investment at some hotels like Nordic Choice Hotels in Norway or Comfort Hotel Diana where 80,000 points buys nearly $2,500 in rooms.
The primary purpose for this post is to share one of the changes I noticed on the US version of Choice Hotels website. There is a new website design, however, not all the functionality is there yet on the new design, like the ability to book Choice Privileges Points + Cash reward stays as seen in the first image of this post.
The piece missing from the old style Choice Hotels website is the notation on hotel pages stating the Choice Privileges seasonal reward rates. This information is handy when posted on the hotel’s webpage, since reward rates change every three months for many hotels. A couple of weeks ago when checking rates for a hotel in downtown Victoria, British Columbia at 8,000 points per night, my excitement receded when I realized the hotel reward rate changed to 20,000 points per night as of today, the start of the high season and my trip is this weekend.
Choice Privileges is unique from other hotel loyalty programs in having posted seasons with seasonal reward rates. I recently learned Best Western also has seasonal rates, but Best Western, like Hilton HHonors, requires searching by month to determine when reward rates change.
Comfort Inn Diana Venice shows no reward rate information on the hotel page when checking the standard US website ComfortInn.com.
Since I have been studying Vancouver Canada hotel rates, I noticed seasonal reward rates are still posted on the Choice Hotels Canada site.
Comfort Hotel Diana, Venice, Italy
Points required for Choice Privileges reward night redemption:
- Thursday April 16 2015 – Tuesday June 30 2015: 10000
- Wednesday July 01 2015 – Tuesday September 15 2015: 10000
Seasonal Reward rates are still posted on the ChoiceHotels Canada website.
Hopefully these rates will return to the U.S. site, but if not, then look to Canada for information on seasonal rates.
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