Amex is offering a 25% bonus on transfers to Hilton Honors

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It’s the start of a new month so it’s time to look out for new deals, and the first one that we noticed when we opened up our American Express accounts was a new Hilton transfer bonus.

For the next 3 weeks, you’ll get 25% more points when you convert your Amex Membership Rewards points into Hilton Honors points, but is this a deal you should be considering?

Amex to Hilton transfer headline terms & conditions

• Get 20% to 30% more Hilton Honors Points when you convert Membership Rewards® points.
• Enrollment in Hilton Honors is required.
• American Express is not responsible for availability of accommodations, or any other rewards in the Hilton Honors program.
• Guest rooms are subject to availability. Check award accommodation availability before transferring points by visiting HiltonHonors.com or by calling 1-800-HHONORS.
• Once you have transferred Membership Rewards® points, they cannot be transferred back to your Membership Rewards account and become subject to the Terms and Conditions of the Hilton Honors program, found at HiltonHonors.com/Terms .
• Transfer enough points into your Hilton Honors account to redeem for your award accommodations or top up your Hilton Honors account
• Transfers are normally immediate, but please allow up to 24 hours for the transfer to be completed.
• Please note that no booking can be made until the Hilton Honors points are credited to your Hilton Honors account.
• Taxes, fees, charges and surcharges may apply.
• All redemption bookings are subject to the terms and conditions of the Hilton Honors program

Full terms and conditions can be found on the promotion page within your Amex online account.

Is this a good deal?

Sometimes, American Express offers different bonuses to different card holders, but as we’ve only seen and read about a 25% bonus being offered, I’m going to assume that that’s the best deal on the table.

Amex Membership Rewards points ordinarily transfer over to Hilton in the ratio of 1,000 : 2,000 so, under the terms of this transfer bonuses, the transfer ratio is now 1,000 : 2,500.

At TFM We value Hilton Honors points at 0.4 cents each while we value Amex Membership Rewards at 1.5 cents each and based on those valuations (yours may differ), this is what American Express is offering with its 25% bonus: 1,500 cents —> 1,000 cents

That doesn’t look promising, does it? And it’s not.

You will find it hard to find a example where transferring Amex points to Hilton is a good idea.

By doing my best to find a Hilton property at which a point redemption is very good value (i.e. this isn’t a randomly chosen night), I found that an entry-level room at the Trafalgar St. James London (Curio Collection) can be booked for $647 or 95,000 points.

By using points instead of cash, a Hilton Honors member could get at least ~0.68 cents of value out of each Hilton point on this stay (more if you would otherwise book a flexible rate) and as they’re only really worth around 0.4 cents each, that’s quite a good return (you may be able to buy Hilton Points for 0.5 cents each right now).

If you wanted to generate those 95,000 points from Amex Membership Rewards, you would need to employ 76,000 Amex points while the 25% bonus is on offer.

Based on our valuation of Amex points at 1.5 cents/point (which most people will find conservative), those points are worth $1,140.

Why would you effectively pay $1,140 for a room you could buy for $671?

Don’t forget, this isn’t a randomly chosen night.

I’ve tried hard to find an example where the cash rate is relatively high and the number of points needed for a booking is relatively low, and yet the numbers still don’t stack up.

There will be some outliers where you may be able to save a little money using this transfer bonus, but these outliers aren’t particularly easy to find and the savings aren’t particularly impressive.

Yes, if you find yourself a situation where you absolutely have to stay at a particular Hilton property when cash rates are high, when your Hilton account is empty and when you would prefer not to buy points in a sale, converting Amex points to Hilton points may make sense.

But outside of niche situations (like the one above) or on rare occasions when Hilton’s 5th night free benefit makes the numbers more attractive, converting Amex points to Hilton points when the transfer bonus is set at 25% doesn’t make much sense.

Bottom Line

While the transfer bonus is set at 25%, most people will find that converting Amex points to Hilton points will not unlock any significant savings, and while there will be exceptions to this, you’ll probably find that buying points (when they’re being sold for 0.5 cents each) will offer better value than an Amex conversion.

Check the latest price for Hilton points here.