Impressive Finnair promotion: 100% bonus on miles purchase & “free” Oneworld Sapphire status
Finnair is running a very interesting bonus promotion on miles purchase, and plus you can get free elite status with them (and Oneworld)!
You can view the offer here. Firstly, you get a bonus when making a purchase of at least 5,000 Finnair Plus points:
- 5,000 – 49,000 points: 60%
- 50,000 – 99,000 points: 80%
- 100,000 – 150,000 points: 100%
At 100%, you are buying Finnair Plus points at €64.375 per 10K points, which is roughly £58 at the current exchange rate.
The best use of Finnair points is on cabin upgrade:
- One-way intra-Europe upgrade from HEL costs 10K points (£58)
- One-way intercontinental upgrade from HEL costs 50K points (£290)
In terms of reward flights, a one-way flight from HEL to North America or Asia in business class costs 80K points (£464) plus taxes and surcharges, which is passable.
The second part of this offer is more fun though. During the promotion period, you will earn 25% of the total amount you buy as tier points. If you max out at 150,000 points, with 100% bonus on top it means you will get 75,000 tier points for free. It is more than enough to lift you to Finnair’s Silver status, which requires 30,000 tier points only.
Equivalent to BA’s Bronze, Finnair Silver comes with priority check-in and seat selection privilege. It doesn’t just stop here though – Finnair allows you to transfer award points into tier points at the ratio of 3:1, which means you could convert 15,000 of the purchased points into 5,000 tier points, and upgrade yourself to Finnair Gold (80,000 tier points).
In a word, if you are happy to pay £1740 to Finnair, you get free Oneworld Sapphire status that grants you business class lounge access (plus one guest), priority check-in and boarding, free seat selection and extra baggage allowance. In addition you are also left with an account balance of 285K Finnair points.
Similar to BA, Finnair’s status accrual is based on membership year rather than calendar year. I’m not totally sure but from the sound it if you open a new account now and take part, your Gold status is valid for the current and next membership year, which is almost two years.
Upon reaching Gold, you get to choose one of the following three elite gifts:
- Four one-way short-haul upgrade vouchers
- One one-way long-haul upgrade voucher
- One 2-4-1 award ticket voucher
Note that for Silver members, the cap on your converted tier points is 40,000, so you cannot just buy your way up to Platinum using this trick.
Royal Lancaster Hotel 40% off sale
Black Friday is coming in less than a month’s time – it’d be interesting to see how the hospitality sector responds this year, but I’m expecting to see some very strong offers.
And someone has decided to kick off early already. Royal Lancaster, a luxury five-star hotel near Paddington is running an early Black Friday deal in a couple of days:
- Opens 6th, 13th, 20th, and 27th – 30th November
- Starts 6am and closes midnight
- 40% off executive rooms and suites
- Valid for stays through March 2021
- Free cancellation until 2pm on the day of arrival
Worth mentioning that the Landmark hotel shares the same owner so look out for similar deals. the Landmark is also on the Amex LHW £100-off deal list.
5000 bonus points per Conrad / Waldorf Astoria stay
Yes, another (reincarnated) Hilton targeted promotion…
To sign up visit this page. You earn 5000 bonus points for each stay at Conrad or Waldorf Astoria hotels, as long as it meets the two-night minimum requirement.
I’ve successfully registered to it and also the other “5000 bonus points for two stays” offer. Stackable with the current double points promotion, it’s great news for those who can travel…
Another Hilton bonus points offer (25K points)
We wrote about three resurrected Hilton targeted bonus points offers a few days ago. A reader failed all three registrations but reported to have received a different version.
The landing page of the other offer is here. Stay at least four nights within 90 days and a bonus of 25,000 points will be deposited to your account. Again it’s a targeted offer and considering how rewarding it is, I don’t think many people will qualify.
It’s sad that UK and Europe are going into another lockdown, and I doubt many people will have a chance to use these offers at all.
Hilton targeted promotions: Up to 10K bonus points after two stays
Hilton ran a campaign of targeted promotions last year. There were different versions of it but anyhow you’d get a bonus after two stays. It looks like the offers are reincarnated into a new life form this year!
There are three different offers:
- Stay twice, get 10,000 bonus points
- Stay twice, get 7,500 bonus points
- Stay twice, get 5,000 bonus points
I’d recommend signing up from top to bottom, in case you can only register to one of them. I only qualify for the last one:
And I can see it under My Offers already on Hilton’s website:
Note that the fine print stills say December 31, 2019, but there are reports of successfully getting the bonus already so it should work. Good luck!
Subscribe to The Spectator and earn Avios
We know that The Economist runs continuous sign-up bonus deals with Avios and many other loyal schemes. And now there’s a chance to earn Avios by subscribing to The Spectator too.
To participate, visit this page. Note that the offer is not visible on BA’s website anymore but as it’s still up on The Spectator I assume it’s still valid.
The following options are provided:
- Digital only six months: £59.5 / 5,000 Avios (1.19p / Avios)
- Print + Digital six months: £79.5 / 6,250 Avios (1.27p / Avios)
- Digital only one year: £119 / 10,000 Avios (1.19p / Avios)
- Print + Digital one year: £159 / 12,500 Avios (1.27p / Avios)
From the buying-Avios point of view, you are paying more than 1p per Avios which obviously isn’t a bargain. However if you are keen to subscribe anyway it’s a good rebate on your money spent.
Avios are credited to your account within two weeks and you can cancel your subscription for a refund within 14 days – however if you opt to cancel the Avios will be recalled too.
Work Anywhere – Marriott’s new (great) day use rate
We wrote about Accor’s campaign for day use rooms a while ago, and now Marriott is ready for the market as well. The promotion is called Work Anywhere, which you can access here.
There are three promotional rates offered. The first one is called Day Pass, which very naturally represents the day use rate. As you can see on the page, what you get is:
- 6am check-in and 6pm check-out (12 hours)
- A proper work environment, including functional desk & chair and natural light
- Premium wi-fi
- Complimentary bottled water
Worth noting that the rate is eligible for Marriott points accrual, and also Platinum elite and above are granted lounge access where applicable. However, you won’t earn elite night credit as you are not staying overnight.
I don’t think Marriott’s default search engine supports same-day check-out yet, so you need to use this dedicated site to book. Here are the rates I find at some London hotels:
- Residence Inn by Marriott Tower Bridge £50
- Residence Inn by Marriott Kensington £60
- Marriott Canary Wharf Hotel & Executive Apartments £70
- Sheraton Grand London Park Lane £139
- Bankside Hotel, Autograph Collection £100
Unlike my observations with Accor, there are some serious discounts here. Of course the experience cannot be compared to an overnight stay, but it could be a budget way for some to try out otherwise expensive hotels.
The second rate plan is called Stay Pass, which is for the usual overnight stays, but with similar benefits as the ones included in the Day Pass, plus a $10 F&B voucher. You could search on Marriott’s website as usual with promo code 1X4. I didn’t find anything exciting.
The last rate plan is called Play Pass, designed for those with kids. What you get is:
- A Business Concierge
- Supervised kids’ activities
- Booking access to semi-private workspaces and meeting rooms
- Premium wi-fi
Sounds expensive already, and participating hotels are mostly luxury resorts, such as the JW Marriott Venice and the Westin La Quinta at Malaga.
IHG Ambassador 10% rebate renewal benefit terminated
I’ve written about the IHG Ambassador programme and highly recommend you to join even if you stay at InterContinental hotels just once. When it comes to renewal, you used to have two options:
- Pay 40,000 points
- Pay $200, get 15,000 points and 10% rebate on award stays for a year (max rebate 100k points)
It was a no-brainer to go for option 2. Back in February though, when I was going to renew I found the 10% rebate message missing:
You should be able to see your options here too if your membership is due to expire in the next two months. I wasn’t sure what’s happening so sent a request to the Ambassador service team. One representative confirmed that I was still eligible, and the missing message was simply a glitch. I was rest assured and went ahead with the renewal.
Eight months have passed, and all of sudden there are some discussions about the termination of this benefit again on Flyertalk. Also I noticed that none of my stays have had the rebate posted (it was very slow in previous years too) so made a claim using IHG’s contact form.
The response I got is as follows:
I’d like to share with you on the other hand that the 10% rebate for Reward Night stay benefit has already been discontinued for Ambassador renewals made on 13 Feb 2020. In this regard, I’m so sorry to inform that your below stay will no longer be eligible for this benefit.
Amusingly, it’s the same representative who confirmed my eligibility for the rebate in February. Without question I replied quoting the original response, as I believe I have enough reason to insist on the rebate.
Another representative (supposedly the manager) replied promptly, apologised again and offered 10,000 points as a one-time compensation. Given that my rebate due is already in this range, and I have award stays planned in the next few months, I asked for another 10,000 points which was granted – not a shabby result!
It’s absolutely a shame to see this benefit go – in fact I deem it one of the most important benefits offered by the Ambassador membership, as it doesn’t require staying at InterContinental hotels. And it’s a bit dodgy of IHG not to give proper notice or public announcement on its removal, although it was implied on the renewal page.
So if you are wondering when your Ambassador rebate will land in your IHG account, it wouldn’t. The scheme is still quite decent, and I’ll probably continue renewing in the future, but I’ll think twice before picking my payment option.