IHG Rewards is offering members of the program a discount of 15% on Points & Cash Award night bookings. Under the offer, you are able to redeem and award night if you have as few as 5,000 Points.
Valid for bookings made by 19 July 2023, the offer is valid for stays between 12 July and 31 August 2023.
Points & Cash Bookings
The Points & Cash option provides a way of redeeming an award night, even if you are a few points short. The offer works by using your cash to buy IHG One Rewards points, which you can then use to redeem an award night.
The Points & Cash option presents a range of options on how to pay for the Award night. Firstly, you can choose to pay in full with points. Otherwise, you can choose from various combinations of Points & Cash.
As an example, I searched on Award Night for the Intercontinental in Melbourne. The following tables show the options I was presented with. As the table shows, if I took this option, I would be buying points for just over1 cent each.
| Points Required | Points Purchased | Cost per point |
|---|---|---|
| 36,000 Points | ||
| 31,000 points + 54 AUD | 5,000 | 1.08 cents |
| 26,000 points + 109 AUD | 10,000 | 1.09 cents |
| 21,000 points + 160 AUD | 15,000 | 1.07 cents |
| 16,000 points + 208 AUD | 20,000 | 1.04 cents |
| 11,000 points + 251 AUD | 25,000 | 1.00 cents |
How Points & Cash Works
The Points & Cash option has had a lot of interest in the IHG Rewards community. This is because it has allowed members to purchase points at a reasonably cheap price.
When you opt o book through the Points & Cash option, you are booking an Award Night. The way it works if you take this option is that IHG will first deposit the number of points you are purchasing into your account. Then they will deduct the points from your account to complete the booking.
Using the Intercontinental Melbourne option as an example, say you had 30,000 Points, but you need 36,000 Points for the reward night. If you take the 26,000 Points + $109 AUD option, IHG will first deposit 10,000 points into your account, bringing your total to 40,000 Points. From this, 36,000 points will be used to secure the room, leaving you with 4,000 points in your account.
Later on, if you cancel the award night, you will have the 36,000 points deposited back into your account. You won’t get the $109 back – you will get the points you purchased.
Is it a good deal?
These offers can make for a cheap way of buying points. In the example provided, you are basically buying points for just over 1 cent each.
If you buy the points outright, you could be paying more for your points. For example, IHG sells 5,000 points for $US67.50 (almost $100 AUD). Once you have taken exchange rates into account, it is almost double the price to purchase points outright.
It is worth noting that some members have found the deals at some hotels are not as good as they were. That is, you need to pay with more cash than had been the case in the past. As a result, you should look at the options presented in your specific case to determine if it is good value.
Further information on this promotion may be found on the IHG site.
