As I was pulling up all the travel documents and plans for this week’s Hawaii stay, I was having trouble finding our SFO airport hotel stay. It turns out that despite doing some research on accommodations, I never ended up booking the stay (!!!) Thankfully I’ve got a range of points banked. Looking at hotels around the airport, I found a few options from IHG to Hilton to Best Western.
I’ve kept a small pile of Best Western points since our France visit last summer. I’ve never redeemed Best Western points, so I explored those options some. All the “free” redemption hotels were 20,000 points, and of course I was just shy, at 19,510. As it turns out, their program offers some flexibility. I managed a nice-enough room with free airport shuttle for $4.15 + 19,510 points. Score!
Best Western Rewards
10 points/dollar for paid stays. Depending on loyalty level, 10-50% bonus points. Wide range of redemption options, notably for rooms as low as 5,000 points. These points are even transferrable to various airline programs and redeemable for gift cards (although the value suffers greatly). The general value appears to be floored at 0.5 cents/point, as a result of Pay With Points redemption offers.
From initial experience, it looks like points redemptions are broadly available with limited restrictions. They even have a no-annual fee Visa card that offers 10,000 points annually (maybe I’ll consider this for a future card acquisition!)
Pay With Points experience
The award redemption for all SFO Airport hotels was 20,000 points. I was short. But not to fear, Best Western is here! They allow partial redemptions, with minimum of 5,000 points for $25 off, and each additional point worth 0.5 cents. 19,510 points scored me $97.55 off. That left a balance of $1.44 for the room rate, and another $2.71 in taxes and fees ($4.15 total cost).
There are some interesting parts of the experience here. On the negative side, the Pay with Points was not eligible for the lowest-rate room. That meant, all else equal, I’d be paying a few dollars more for the room pre-discount. On the positive side, the Pay with Points offset reduced the cost of the room, meaning the taxes & fees (14.75% of rate) were substantially lower. These two basically offset eachother.
The room math:
- Fully Paid rate: $104
- Pay With Points cost: $4.15 + 19,510 points
- Total Value: $104 – $4.15 = $99.85 value (+ free shuttle to/from airport, saving another $30+)
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