Hotel Award Programs
Hotel chains are keen to ensure that they have loyal customers and as such the larger chains will almost always offer some incentive for repeat bookings. Always ask what incentives are available, particularly if you can’t choose between two different hotels. If one offers a good ongoing program, this may sway your decision. Some of the more popular offerings include a free upgrade if you stay for 10 days over the course of a year, free nights, free wine in your room.
Holiday Inn was the first hotel chain to begin to offer incentives and in the early days it was an impressive offer! After 75 days stay a traveler would get 2 airline tickets to Europe! Needless to say, this program was popular but soon had to be discontinued due to the amount it was costing the company. They do now have a very good awards program, just not quite as generous!
Combined Award Programs
Although some hotels and airlines offer frequent flyer points that encourage you to use their specific company, these sometimes will not offer you the best deal in combination. There are now plenty of companies that allow you to gather points whenever you use transport or goods that are affiliated to awards company.
Affiliates can be anything from hotels and flights to restaurants and clothing. Joining is normally easy and free, and with a bit of careful planning can yield huge rewards. What have you got to lose?
