Travel Tips

Travel Tip: Which Hotel Loyalty Program is the Most Generous?

hotel2While the airlines are making their frequent flyer programs tougher—both in earning miles and then trying to redeem them—many hotels seem to be making their frequent stay programs easier to use.

Consulting firm IdeaWorks ran the numbers and compared earning and using frequent stay points at six different hotel chains.

The most generous hotel loyalty program? It was Wyndham.

For every $100 you spend there, you get back about $13.60 worth of stays on points.

Wyndham actually changed its program last year to prize every reward room the same at 15,000 points.

Even better? No capacity controls or blackout dates.

Who has the stingiest program? Starwood, which is now part of Marriott.

Ideaworks reported a payback with Starwood of only 5.6 percent in rewards.

But the bottom line here is the same as for airline miles.

The rules can change rapidly, and so can stability levels for points.

So don’t hoard them—use them.

For more information about rewards programs, check out:

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