In 2006 the top Hyatt redemption level was category 4. The Park Hyatts in Tokyo, Paris, and Sydney were only 15,000 points per night.
We got category 5 and 18,000 points per night for 2007. Then we got category 6 and 22000 points per night beginning June 2010.
Now, starting Tuesday we get a new category 7 at 30,000 points per night. Regency club and suite awards go up, confirmed upgrades get more expensive too.
Across the board, standard room nights go up just 4%. But as with the 2010 changes, the increased costs are more significant and concentrated at the very top-end of hotels.
So what should you do? Remember that most award nights are fully cancellable. So make any speculative bookings now. For those who like top-end hotels for their points, there’s no reason to have any points left in your account beginning January 7.
- Hyatt will let you book at the ‘old’ points rate up until January 7.
- You can make changes to those reservations — not just dates, but also adding or removing the number of nights in the reservation — through February 15.
So all you’re really locking in by making a reservation now is an option on a particular hotel. Make a booking at the Park Hyatt Paris, the Park Hyatt Sydney, the Park Hyatt Zurich just in case and then you’ve still got a bit more than a month to figure out when you want to stay there.
If you turn out not to want or use the reservation, you can cancel and get your points back.
If you turn out to need your points for something else, you can cancel and get your points back and make a different reservation later (at new points prices).
One reason you may want to spend points from January 7 onward is that we get cash and points awards starting tomorrow. These will not be searchable online. But these rates will count towards elite status and for promotional points-earning. They’re a good deal compared to booking award nights for category 2 through 6 hotels.
But there’s no reason to ‘save’ points for those, since you can cancel any booking you make today in order to fund the reservation you want to make tomorrow.
Let’s see whether we can all spend our point balances down as close to zero as possible, and lock in those great award night values!
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Got three nights in a suite @ the PHV in Paris for my birthday weekend! 4K left 🙂
Thinking about transferring 8k UR points (actually 9k as I need 8050 points) to top up my account for 2 nights at a Cat 6 PH. Would you do this if the booking is speculative? Will UR transfer automatically? thanks!
Done and done. Burned 220K points on 10 nights at the PH Maldives for later in the year. Less than 3K points left in my account.
I know that the PH Maldives is staying at category 6, but this still saves me 30K points versus booking it later in the year.
I dumped my 105K balance on 5 nights at the Grand Hyatt Tokyo. 3 night suite award, 2 night suite upgrade with points. Given the size of the suite and the exec lounge access for breakfast and evening nibbles, I’m thinking this was a good redemption for our family of four!
Gary, I know you’re just testing our blog reader perspicacity but… there’s a typo in the following line:
“Then we got category 6 and 212000 points per night beginning June 2010”.
It’s 22,000 points per night.
Hey View from the Wingers – In case anyone needs Park Hyatt Place Vendôme May 1-4, I just released those dates….
It’s more valuable to me to keep my points and pay a higher redemption price down the road when I find a destination that I actually want to go to, rather than forcing a booking now (even speculatively) for a trip I’m not even sure I want to take, all in the name of “value.”
@asw – thx!
@John UR transfer instantly. I have booked more than my balance actually allows without transferring to top off because Diamonds can book without points in their account 😉
I love the title of this post!
@Andrew – Agree 100%.
I burned quite a few Hyatt/UR points in the last month, and am happy I did. 4 nights at Park Hyatt Sydney and 3 nights at the Park Hyatt Melbourne. The Sydney nights had been anticipated for a while since I’ve had Australia booked for 9 months. Earned and burned.
Booked 7 nights at the Andaz Maui for our 10th anniversary in November. Wanted a suite so used 33000 pts/night or 231000 total (as opposed to 48000 pts/night after tomorrow!!). Does anyone know if we will automatically get club lounge access with a suite, or would we still need to be Diamond members for that?
@Jennifer
There is no club lounge at the Andaz, but there is complimentary spa water throughout the hotel as well as some snacks and non-alcoholic beverages in room.
Done! Just burned 88k points on the PH Sydney for October, plus another 75k at the PH in Melbourne. Got two round trip business class tickets on Delta/Virgin Australia from Seattle for 160K miles each, too, which is the best use of DL miles one can hope for. So it’s been a good day…
So we can add nights to a booking that we make now, can we add rooms? So if I book one room at the PHV, would I be able to add an additional room between Jan 7 and Feb 15 at the current rates? I have made 3 different speculative bookings at Paris hotels and will consolidate them once I figure out where the points and cash will be available, but I don’t have enough points to book 3 rooms (which is how many we will need) at each of the hotels.
I haven’t booked any award nights with Hyatt before. Do we need the full amount of points in our account before it will allow us to book? Any way to put one of these reservations on hold with the lower rate without points in the account? I have a bunch of UR points that I will transfer into Hyatt, but I am still finalizing the dates of my trip and don’t want to dump a bunch of points into Hyatt and then realize I won’t end up staying there.
No Holds, Diamonds don’t need points in their account to book but others do
You mentioned “You can make changes to those reservations — not just dates, but also adding or removing the number of nights in the reservation — through February 15.” I don’t think this is correct or at least not complete. I added another night at Hotel Du Louvre to my predevaluation booking and they bumped the rate for the entire reservation to post-devaluation levels. I added a night to my reservation at The Churchill in London and managed to keep the predevaluation rate for the existing night but had to pay the higher rate for the added night.
@far north trader – interesting experience, that’s contrary to how jeff zidell told me that it would work