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18-night Fast Track to Platinum for Accor Plus Members
Accor Plus – Accor’s special paid membership programme in Asia Pacific – is running a fast track promotion for its members.
You can access the offer page here.
- Register by April 15
- Book and stay by August 31
- Silver members get an additional 10 night credits after one stay
- Gold members get an additional 15 night credits after one stay
Upon purchasing Accor Plus membership you are granted Silver status right away. Note that only Silver and Gold members can register to this offer.
Remember that everyone earns double elite night credit throughout 2021. For a Silver member, with the 10 bonus credits you only need to stay 10 nights to gain Gold (10+10*2=30); and then this rewards you with an additional 15 credits, so a total of 18 nights stayed elevates you to Platinum (10+10*2+15+8*2=61).
If you are already Gold though, you only earn 15 bonus night credits which means it still requires 23 nights for you to become Platinum.
40% Bonus When You Buy Marriott Points
Marriott’s points sale is back, although not as good as the offers from last year.
You can access the offer here. Now through March 22, you can benefit from 40% bonus when you purchase at least 2,000 Marriott points, which is equivalent to 28% off. The purchase limit has also been doubled for 2021, which means you can buy up to 100,000 points (excluding bonus).
The unit price is the same no matter how many points you buy, and on the top end you can pay $1,250 for 140,000 points. This equates to $8.9 or £6.4 per 1,000 points.
The discount isn’t great, as we saw 50% and 60% bonus towards the end of the last year. It may still make sense to buy a few points though if you have immediate use of them, especially since the category change is taking place on March 3 soon.
IHG Luxury & Lifecycle 3-for-2 Offer with Free Breakfast, Room Upgrade, $100 Credit & More
Many hotel groups, including Marriott, Hilton and IHG, have one or more specialised booking schemes for high-end customers. Qualified travel agents can make such bookings on their behalf which come with extra benefits.
IHG’s program is called Luxury & Lifestyle, and participating brands include Regent, Intercontinental and Kimpton etc. You pay the Best Flexible Rate and enjoy 2pm late check-out, room upgrade, welcome amenity, plus:
Regent, Intercontinental & some Kimpton hotels:
- Free breakfast for two
- $100 hotel credit per stay
Other brands:
- $50 hotel credit per stay
Even better, IHG Luxury & Lifestyle is running a promotion now. For select hotels, you can book three nights and pay for only two, which is equivalent to 33% off compared to the Best Flexible Rate, plus you still enjoy all the benefits mentioned above.
Some of the participating UK and Europe hotels:
- Intercontinental London Park Lane
- Kimpton Fitzroy London
- Hotel Indigo London Kensington
- Intercontinental Edinburgh The George
- Intercontinental Paris Le Grand
- Regent Berlin
- Intercontinental Berlin
- Intercontinental Amsterdam Amstel
- Intercontinental Sofia
To check, you can simply search on IHG’s website using Corporate ID 786905371. For example, Intercontinental London Park Lane comes up at £226 per night, which is slightly higher than the Get a Night on Us offer. However remember it includes many additional benefits, and you can cancel free of charge one day before.
And Regent Berlin:
Beware though, that you can only use this method to check for availability and don’t book away. You must get a qualified travel agent to book for you, for example Virtuoso.
Marriott Releases 2021 Category Changes
Like previous years, Marriott has just released the planned category changes for 2021.
You can view more information here. Note that the changes will kick in on March 3rd.
The most affected countries appear to be United States and China. Only four properties in UK are on the list:
- Delta Hotels Milton Keynes 4 -> 3
- Moxy Edinburgh Airport 4 -> 3
- Moxy York 4 -> 3
- The Langley 6 -> 7
And the current Marriott redemption chart is as follows:
Note that the off-peak pricing includes 10% promotional discount valid until Feb 21st.
17,500 points for a hotel in central York during busy times is definitely a bargain, however I personally don’t quite like the extreme simplicity of Moxy’s hotel rooms. The Langley, on the other hand, sees a great hike from the initial Cat 5 to Cat 7, and redemption here no longer represents great value unfortunately.
If you have a plan to stay at any hotel on the list whose price is going to increase, lock in your reservation now as you can always cancel later.
Registration Open: Marriott Double Points & Night Credits Promotion
Firstly, a quick reminder that Marriott’s 2021 bonus elite nights have just landed onto our accounts:
Elite members receive certain night credits depending on the status that they have earned in 2021:
- Silver 5
- Gold 13
- Platinum 25
- Titanium 38
- Ambassador 50
Being Titanium and the Amex co-branded credit cardholder, I’m starting the year with 53 nights already!
More importantly, Marriott’s Q1 global promotion is now open to registration, and you can sign up here.
- Stay between 16 Feb and 27 April
- Two-night minimum stay required
- Earn double points and double night credits on all eligible stays
This is a very good offer, especially considering how un-generous Marriott usually is when it comes to global promotions.
On a separate note, a new influx of targeted offers has been making its round in the last week. If you haven’t checked your mailbox yet, you can visit Marriott’s Promotion Centre to see if there’s any offer awating.
The offer could be double points, stay X times earn Y bonus points etc. It’s stackable with the Q1 promotion above, however unfortunately I didn’t receive anything this time (again!)
Marriott 3-for-2 Offer in the Middle East and Africa
This is a very old offer that started in the SPG times long before the merger, and Marriott has been extending the offer since.
You can access the offer page here. It’s a partner offer with Mastercard, so in theory when you make the booking it has to be on a Mastercard.
There are three forms of rate type: 3-for-2 (Stay three nights and pay for 2), 4-for-3 and 6-for-4, which are equivalent to 33% off, 25% off and 33% off respectively.
To book, simply enter your stay details on the offer page, or search on Marriott’s homepage with promo code BOG. In the example below, the BOG rate is indeed the cheapest one across the board:
Note that however, this rate is non-changeable and non-refundable, which makes it very unattractive in the current climate. Still it’s worth knowing of though in case it becomes useful for your future trips.
Qatar Airways and Accor Plus Status Extension
With the pandemic’s threat still very strong, multiple airline and hotel corporations have published new status extension or qualification reduction policies for 2021 already.
Qatar Airways has just announced that, all elite memberships that are due to expire during 2021 will be valid through 2021, if you fail to meet the qualification criteria.
It is not hugely generous to be honest, as it only means a measly couple of months’ extension for those whose status is about to expire towards the end of this year. However, Qatar Airways ran a status match campaign in May 2020, and those who got their free status will also benefit.
It looks that Accor Plus, a paid Accor scheme in Asia Pacific, has also got a new policy. As you can read here:
Please Note: Due to the impact Covid all Accor Plus members will maintain their current status upon renewal in 2021.
You should be able to extend your status for another year when you pay to renew your status in 2021. It’s only mentioned in the AU site, but from the sound of it it should be a system-wide policy for all Accor Plus members.
Radisson Double Points Promotion
Radisson Rewards has just launched their new quarterly global promotion. You can sign up here.
You earn double points for all paid stays completed between 1 February and 30 April. Unfortunately reward stays won’t benefit from this promotion.
Double points means an additional 20 points for each dollar spent on your room. Radisson Rewards awards double points compare to the other programmes including Marriott, IHG and Hilton (10 per $), but its value is relatively low too.