Hotels

Using Amex points for a Fine Hotels and Resorts booking vs transferring to the partner program.

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I’m a huge advocate of using credit card transfer partners, and while it USUALLY means a far better value, it shouldn’t be your default position. Case in point. I’m looking to travel through Doha in the beginning of April, and am considering a variety of hotels from Marriott, Hyatt, and IHG.  In checking my options I wanted to weight out the pros and cons of whether it would make more sense to pay outright and book with Virtuoso/Amex FHR benefits or transfer into one of the hotel loyalty programs.

Let’s look at Sharq Village, a Ritz Carlton hotel.

If I were to book via Marriott and use points…it would set me back 35k points. I could populate my Bonvoy account from either Chase or Amex.

a screenshot of a hotel

However, Sharq Village is also part of the Amex FHR program. Only 31,460

Not only does this hotel represent a savings in points needed to book the room, but I will also enjoy all of the benefits of FHR. In fact, the FHR benefits provide $150 worth of value per room.

  • Early Noon Check-in and 4pm late checkout
  • Room Upgrade when available
  • Daily Breakfast for two people ( I’m valuing at roughly $50 )
  • $100 food and beverage credit per room

a screenshot of a hotel

Will you get hotel loyalty points and elite nights as well? You should.

In the past FHR would earn you status nights and loyalty points in addition to Amex points for the stay. Then Amex introduced 5x points via FHR and a big question was raised. Would you still earn the hotel loyalty points and status nights? Correct me if I’m wrong, but the evidence I’ve seen and heard is that you do. If that’s the case, since using Amex points is buying the night, it serves us to believe that using points to pay for the room would also earn you hotel loyalty points and elite nights as well.

Analysis

Everyone values their points differently, and this certainly isn’t the best value for using Amex points by my standards. In fact, it’s only getting a penny a point, and it damn near kills me to get less than two cents. That said…if you’re sitting on an absolute grip of points, which a lot of small business owners are, and you’re looking to get the best value at specific properties, don’t overlook using your points to simply pay for the room instead of transferring into a partner program. In this scenario, it’ll not only save points, but provide incredible benefits during our stay.

 

Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.

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Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card


4.8
4.8/5
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® is a great starter card that earns Premium Ultimate Rewards that can be transferred into over a dozen partners many of which are US based including Hyatt, Southwest, United, IHG, and Marriott.

Welcome Offer

60k Points after $4k spend in 3 months

Annual Fee

$95

Points Earned

Transferrable Chase Ultimate Rewards

  • 3x on dining
    •  including eligible delivery services for takeout
  • 3x on select streaming services
  • 3x on online grocery purchases
    • (excluding Target, Walmart and wholesale clubs)
  • 5x on all travel purchased through Chase Travel Portal
  • 2x on all other travel
  • $50 Annual Credit on hotel stays purchased via Chase Travel
    • The begins immediately for new cardmembers and after your account anniversary for existing cardmembers
  • 10% Anniversary Bonus
    • Every year you keep the card, your total spend will yield a 10% points bonus. If you spend $10k in a year, you’ll get 1k bonus points
  • Chase Sapphire Preferred® continues to redeem at 1.25c in the Chase Travel Portal and the slew of other benefits remain in tact including primary rental car insurance, purchase protections, etc.
  • Points are transferrable to 13 Ultimate Rewards partners
  • Redeem in the Chase Travel center for 1.25 cents per point
  • No foreign transaction fees
  • Suite of Travel and Purchase Coverage
    • Primary rental car coverage is my favorite

We keep an up to date spreadsheet that lists the best ever offers: You can find that spreadsheet here.

Historically 80k is a very, very good offer and hit in both 2022 and 2023. In 2021, we saw the offer hit an all time high of 100k. Who knows if that will ever come back.

Main Cast: 

Cards that earn flexible points and should be used on the bulk of your purchases.

Supporting Cast:

Cards that earn fixed points in the currency of the airline/hotel and can not be transferred at attractive rates. These cards yield benefits that make it worth keeping, but not necessarily worth putting a lot of your everyday spend on. 

The Chase Sapphire Preferred® is exceptional starter card and offers transferrable Ultimate Rewards, and pairs well with other Chase cards.

If you carry this card alongside Chase’s cashback cards like the Chase Freedom Flex℠and Chase Freedom Unlimited® or the business versions: Ink Business Cash® , Ink Business Unlimited® you can combine the points into Preferred account and transfer into hotel and airline partners

Annual fee is quite low at $95 a year + you get a 10% anniversary bonus on points + $50 hotel credit in Chase travel.

The responses below are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved, or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.

6 Comments

  • […] Transferring Points To Hotels VS FHR:  In this hobby, we’ve learned that you get immense value by transferring your flexible points to hotel programs to book award nights.  However you should always check all of your options before pulling the trigger on transferring points. […]

  • Steve March 18, 2019

    Wouldn’t cash via the FHR be the best option? At a 1cpp, you would be better off transferring via the Schwab platinum at 1.25cpp, then paying cash, no?

    • Christian March 18, 2019

      +1. Unless you’re sitting on a giant pile of points, why not pay cash?

      • Christian March 18, 2019

        Sorry, pay by card but not using points?

      • Miles March 18, 2019

        Christian – yeah, as I mentioned, it pains me to get less than 2cpp, but if a lot of small businesses accrue miles in massive amounts, so this strategy optimizes use and benefits

    • Miles March 18, 2019

      Steve – for sure. this scenario came up when working with a client with a heap of points and no CS only vanilla plat + biz plat

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