Hotel chains across the board are making points less valuable – and while Hyatt is the latest and most egregious example, Hilton has done it too … three times in the last year or so, in fact. While award rates as high as 250,000 points per night are tough to swallow, Hilton just made a minor update with big upside to its site that makes using points – and maybe more importantly, Hilton free night certificates – a bit easier.
The hotel chain quietly rolled out a new, color-coded award calendar, meaning you can more easily identify which nights are at the lowest “standard” award rate … and which nights are more costly (in some cases, much more costly) premium awards. This same color-coding mechanism also applies to cash rates when searching with Hilton's flexible price calendar, but the upside is much bigger on the award side.
Here's a look at the incredibly popular Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos Pedregal for the month of April, for reference. See what I mean?
Is this a groundbreaking improvement? Hardly. But it makes it much easier to see these lowest-priced rates with one quick glance. That's most valuable for Hilton free night certificates from cards like the *Hilton Aspire*: So long as there's standard award availability, you can put a certificate to use and book it.
Here's a look at the old calendar … granted, it's not the best point of comparison: When this screenshot was captured, every night of the month was showing at the standard price of 250,000 points per night.
Admittedly, this isn't a huge change – prices didn't go down – but it is a positive change, nonetheless. At a time when other loyalty programs are not only making their points less valuable but also harder to redeem by nuking their websites and award search engines, this is a genuinely customer-friendly enhancement that's sure to save travelers some unnecessary frustration of scrolling through months' worth of award availability to find a deal.
If you're looking to use cash instead of points, this new color-coded calendar is available there, too – with the cheapest night in each month highlighted in green.
The easiest way to find these lower rates – either in points or cash – is by going to the room selection page and clicking “Edit Stay.”
Click the date and then click “Shop by Price” next to “Flexible travel dates?” to view the calendar for the current month.
Here, you'll be able to scan the calendar to see the dates available at standard pricing or the lowest nightly rate. At the Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos Pedregal, the standard room reward rate is a whopping 250,000 points per night. As you can see (above), it's not uncommon to find some nights going for 500,000 points or more – hard pass.
Additionally, you can use Hilton's Points Explorer tool to search for award nights. Simply plug in your points “budget” and desired location to scope out properties you could afford with your current points balance.
Hilton is out with bigger bonuses on its entire suite of Amex cards – including a free night certificate!
Bottom Line
Hilton just rolled out a small but meaningful improvement to its website: A new color-coded calendar that clearly shows which nights price at standard award rates and which jump to pricier premium levels.
It doesn’t make award nights cheaper, but it makes finding the best redemption dates far easier – a welcome change for travelers with Hilton points and especially those with free night certificates from co-branded credit cards.
