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Hilton has joined in the points selling party that we’ve been seeing recently and has launched its latest campaign in which it’s offering Hilton Honors members a bonus of up to 80% when they purchase points.
Unlike some of the points sales we’ve been seeing recently this one runs though to the end of the year so, if you’re not sure what to do, you have time to make up your mind.
You can buy Hilton Honors Points via this link
The Headline Terms & Conditions
These are the main terms and conditions you’ll need to know in order to make an informed decision (the full terms can be found at the bottom of the offer page after you log in:
- The current promotion runs through 11:59pm ET on 29 December 2017
- Members may purchase a maximum of 80,000 points in this promotion
- Members may purchase a maximum of 80,000 points in a calendar year
- Bonus points do not count towards the maximum annual limit.
- Hilton’s points sales are processed by Points.com so there’s no scope to earn credit card category bonuses awarded for hotel/travel spend.
This latest promotion from Hilton is tiered:
- Buy 0 – 9,000 Hilton Honors Points and get a 0% bonus
- Buy 10,000 – 19,000 Hilton Honors Points and get a 60% bonus
- Buy 20,000 – 80,000 Hilton Honors Points and get an 80% bonus
The Math
Although the promotion is tiered, within each tier the cost per point remains the same so you can buy 20,000 or 80,000 Hilton Honors points and you’ll pay the same per point.
Here’s proof:
Buying 20,000 points will net you 36,000 points after the 80% bonus is applies and will set you back $200:
$200 for 36,000 points comes to ~0.56 cents/point.
If you were to purchase the full 80,000 annual allowance that would net you 144,000 Hilton Honors points at a total cost of $800:
$800 for 144,000 points comes to ~0.56 cents/point.
Note: If you decide to buy between 10,000 and 19,000 points they will cost you 0.625 cents/point…and that’s expensive.
Should You Buy Hilton Points In This Sale?
This isn’t the cheapest rate at which Hilton sells points – we had a sale at 0.5 cents/point back in September/October – so that’s definitely worth bearing in mind…but what if you need points now? Can this be a good deal?
I value Hilton points at around 0.4 cents each so I’m not inclined to stock up on points at this price but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t opportunities to make the most of this offer if you’re prepared to put a little bit of work in.
Take the Hampton Inn Chicago Downtown Michigan Avenue as an example:
Picking a random date in May the Hampton Inn Chicago Downtown Michigan Avenue can be booked for $331 + taxes or 50,000 Hilton points:
$331 + taxes works out to a total cost for the night of $389.24:
The 50,000 points needed to book this room can be purchased in the current promotion for $280 and Hilton award bookings are flexible.
Buying points in this promotion could save you over $100/night on a reservation like this one AND you would be getting a flexible reservation as opposed to the very inflexible reservation you get with the lowest cash rate.
And this doesn’t just work a the middle-of-the-road properties, it can work at premium properties too.
Take the Hilton Bentley Miami South Beach which, on a random date in April, will cost you $521 + taxes or 80,000 Hilton HHonors points:
$521 + taxes comes to $623.07 for the night….
…while the 80,000 points needed to book this room for exactly the same night (and which would give you a flexible reservation) will cost just $448 in this promotion.
In this example you would save over $175 for the night and you would be getting a better type of reservation (flexible).
Buy Hilton Points via this link
Bottom Line
Keep in mind that the maximum number of Hilton HHonors points you can purchase in a year is 80,000 (excluding bonuses) so you’re not going to be able to buy a lot of cheap nights with a “buy points promotion”.
The most important thing to do is to….
- Work out what you’d like to do with your points, where you’d like to visit and when
- Perform similar calculations to the ones I’ve shown above.
If the math works for you then buying points in this promotion could clearly save you some money but, if the math doesn’t look pretty, don’t try to persuade yourself otherwise. Math is impartial, you are not.
If you only need a few more thousand points (to add to your existing balance) to be able to redeem an award you’ve been thinking about, then paying a little more for the points than you would otherwise be happy to pay would also be ok….just don’t go overboard.
You can access the latest Hilton Points Promotion via this link.
