When it comes to how to get hotel rewards, you have a lot of options—and those options are growing.
Online travel agencies (OTAs), sometimes also called travel booking aggregators, offer you all the travel you need, bookable in one easy spot. They’re known for their great deals. They make business travel easy. Think the Hotwires, Expedia’s and Booking.coms of the world.
However, these OTAs come with one big problem for frequent Travelers. When you book with an OTA, you’re very likely not going to earn any booking-related rewards through your favorite hotel loyalty program. Likewise, you’re not going to be able to use any of your existing rewards points or miles on the booking (e.g., for a free room or room upgrade).
For many Travelers, this puts them in a bit of a bind. They want the best price, but they want their points and rewards, too. Enter, OTA rewards programs.
A Quick Overview of OTA Rewards Programs
More and more OTAs are beginning to launch their very own rewards programs.
Booking.com launched its Genius loyalty program, for example. While it doesn’t offer you points or miles, it does offer you discounts. Higher discounts are available to those in higher loyalty program tiers.
Here’s how it works. Genius Level 1 members enjoy 10% discounts on hotel or rental stays, and rental cars, as soon as they sign up for the loyalty program. After completing five bookings in two years, Travelers level up to Genius Level 2, after which they get up to 15% discounts on stays, 10% discounts on rental cars, free breakfast and free room upgrades on select stays. Finally, after completing 15 bookings in two years, Travelers get up to 20% discounts on stays, plus priority booking support.
Expedia, meanwhile, has its OneKey loyalty program. In addition to offering discounts, this loyalty program also allows you to earn OneKeyCash. A dollar in OneKeyCash equals $1 in the real world to spend on future travel. You also earn Trip Elements. These are basically points. The more Trip Elements you earn, the greater your loyalty program membership tier. The higher your tier, the more perks you receive.
You earn Trip Elements for each night you spend in a hotel, on a cruise, or with a rental car, as well as with each flight you book or travel experience you book (like a private tour). The highest tier, Platinum, is reachable via acquiring 30 trip elements. This tier gives you savings of 20% or more on hotel bookings, 6% OneKeyCash earnings on bookings (it’s otherwise normally 2%), welcome gifts, room upgrades and even refunds if you book a flight and then the price drops at a later date.
Which is Better: Hotel Rewards Programs or OTA Rewards Programs?
When considering how to get hotel rewards and deciding between booking direct and earning points through a hotel rewards program, or booking through a third-party and earning points through an OTA rewards program, there are several things to consider.
How loyal are you to a particular brand?
Hotel rewards programs really are built for those Travelers who are exceedingly loyal to one specific brand. If you hop from brand to brand, you may find that an OTA rewards program is overall more benficial than joining one or two hotel rewards programs.
Do hotel perks enhance your business travel?
Many hotel rewards programs specifically offer perks that you can enjoy during your stay. These might include free WiFi, free breakfast, etc. Do these perks enhance your Business Travel Experience and make your trip more enjoyable and convenient? If so, you might stick with a hotel rewards program versus trying out an OTA rewards program.
How can you redeem those points?
Beyond the ease of earning points, also consider the ease of redeeming points and how/where you’d like to redeem them. Many business Travelers accumulate points during their business travel. Then, they redeem their points for leisure or bleisure travel at a later date. An OTA rewards program may make this easier, as it will give you more booking options. For example, you can accumulate points during business travel hotel stays. Then, you can redeem those points for a leisure flight.
What’s your business travel policy?
Last and most certainly not least, business Travelers will need to consider their organization’s travel policy before booking business travel with the intention of earning hotel rewards or OTA rewards. Some organizations may prohibit the use of OTAs altogether, while others may require you to book through a TMC portal.
Earning Hotel Rewards Points Without Booking Direct: Other Options
Of course, if you just can’t choose how to get hotel rewards, whether through a hotel rewards program or an OTA, there are other options.
One is to book your travel through an OTA, but to do so using a hotel loyalty program credit card. While the credit card won’t give you as many points as you might have earned from booking direct with the hotel brand, it will still give you some loyalty program points for just spending on travel in general. For example, the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit card from Chase gives you up to 17x points for every $1 that you spend at a Marriott Bonvoy property, but it will also give you 2x points for every $1 spent at other properties, or on OTAs.
Then, of course, your other option, for business travel specifically, is to work with your Travel Manager or Travel Management Company (TMC) to ensure that any of your organization’s travel partnerships or booking platforms will allow for individual points-earning. This is just one area where a potential hotel partnership can provide value to Travelers, making for a more enjoyable and rewarding Business Travel Experience overall. Additionally, a TMC may be able to offer OTAs’ aggregated hotel content within their booking platforms. This allows Travelers to reap the benefits of booking with an OTA if they so choose, while avoiding the downsides of booking directly with an OTA, such as duty-of-care concerns and lack of data control.
Need More Help?
Talk to the JTB Business Travel team today and learn more about JTB’s new Spotnana-powered booking product. The new offering will equip Travelers to shop for airfare similarly to how they might book their own, private travel, taking advantage of their rewards points and convenient agent assistance.
