PointsBreak is a promotion that runs about 4 times a year where you can redeem points for a hotel room at a discounted rate. Pretty much any hotel can show up on the list and you can book for 5,000, 10,000 or 15,000 increments. Each member may only book 2 reservations per hotel during the special offer period.
Hilton Honors added a new option to redeem their points with Lyft. This is only available in Canada and the U.S.
There are two transfer bonuses in Canada that are ending this month to look out for.35% AeroplanThe first one is Air Canada’s 35% Aeroplan transfer bonus when you convert Marriott Bonvoy points to Aeroplan miles with an added bonus. Below is the earning potential, depending on whether you take advantage of the additional 5,000 transfer bonus. This offer ends on June 26, 2019.
Marriott Bonvoy is offerings its first ever significant promotion since it re-branded itself, called “Double Take”. Marriott has 30 brands reaching 130 countries with over 6,900 hotels. In Canada, there are currently 230 hotels.
Promotion Details
The details of the offer are as follows:
Register by May 21, 2019.
Stay between March 19, 2019, and June 4, 2019. Note that a “stay” is defined as consecutive nights spent at the same hotel, regardless of check-in/check-out activity.
Earn 2x the points starting with the second stay.
Best Western and Marriott Bonvoy are the only two hotel chains that have a co-branded credit card in Canada (unless you count Hilton as an AMEX transfer partner). Not coincidentally, along with Marriott is another one of my favourite hotel chains. Marriott has gone through many changes in the past few years, namely buying out The Ritz-Carlton and Starwood Preferred Guest. You may still see the names of these two brands still floating around, but they are mostly merged under Marriott now.
Let’s give a rundown of what are the most relevant highlights of Bonvoy for Canadians.
A couple of days ago, we wrote about Best Western, where we mentioned that there are very few hotel chains left in Canada that are affiliated with a credit card company. Another one of these rare hotel chains Hilton, which uses Hilton HHonors as their loyalty program. HHonors ties to Canada is being a transfer partner of the American Express Membership Rewards program, which we will explain more below. Furthermore, it has been over 3 years since I last updated, so this post was due for an refresh.
Best Western‘s Rewards program is one of two remaining hotel chains that have a co-branded credit card in Canada (unless you count Hilton as an AMEX transfer partner). Also, Best Western is one of my favourite hotel chains. It might…
From now until December 28, 2018, when you book a premium room, you can earn elite status faster (with Radisson Rewards) by earning double elite qualifying nights and stays, as well as double the points by entering the promotional code: RRDBLDBL.
Aeroplan is offering a 35% conversion in bonus miles, along with another 5,000 bonus miles (up to) offer (for every 60,000 points exchanged) when converting Marriott, SPG or Ritz-Carlton loyalty points into Aeroplan miles. The offer is valid between September 13, 2018 and September 17, 2018.
Below are some samples of mile earning potential:
There have been quite a few changes since my last post Comparing Canadian and U.S. SPG American Express; namely the merger between Marriott Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest. As a result, this post is definitely due for a major update.
One major change is that 1 Starpoint (in my previous post) is now worth 3 Marriott points. So we need to factor in this correlation if comparing to the old versions of the cards. However, for today’s post, I will focus on comparing the Canadian and U.S. version as they are currently, rather than worrying about the past.