Hyatt’s New SLH Properties – By Redemption Category. Are They a Good Deal?

Hyatt has launched its partnership with SLH hotels offering points and elite credit earning on paid stays, and points redemptions.

So far they have 54 hotels online, out of over 500 in the SLH portfolio. That’s disappointing but Hyatt says more are coming.

These hotels – 49 of which are in Europe — are incorporated into Hyatt’s award chart and they’ve added a new category 8. Since only SLH properties are in category 8 (so far) and do not offer premium room awards, category 8 shows only standard room awards.

More options for where to use your points are better. Full stop. And there are some lovely properties included in this portfolio. This gives members more nice places to use their points.

I had a look at what these SLH hotels cost for paid stays and how many points Hyatt is charging to redeem. Some of these redemptions appear to offer shockingly poor value — as though the hotels are just miscategorized. For instance,

  • The Palazzo Vecchietti is a category 8 hotel. It’s 40,000 points per night. And I’m seeing room rates across different seasons running $303 – $480 per night. The hotel ought to be category 5 not category 8.

  • San Antonio on Santorini appears to be pricing at under $500 per night during peak season. There’s no reason for it to be a category 8 property.

  • Centurion Palace in Venice appears to have rates running $248 – $476, yet it too is a category 8 property.

Hotel Le Strato, at least, has room rates that approach $1000 per night. It seems like category 7 adequately captures that value. But at least it’s not an awful redemption at 40,000 points per night. And The View Lugano in Switzerland does run in the high $800s during peak season.


Credit: On the Rocks, Santorini

I have to assume Hyatt is over-reimbursing properties in this relationship (compared to Hyatt hotels) and so has to price them more expensively to members.

As I look down the category list things don’t appear to get better. For instance Pangkor Laut Resort in Malaysia costs fewer points (category 5, 20,000 points per night) but has much lower rates too. Roughly speaking this appears to me to be a $200 per night hotel and you’re getting a penny a point in value.

Here’s the list of SLH hotels by redemption category:

SLH Property Name City Country WOH Award Category Points/Night
Hotel and Spa des Pecheurs Corsica France 8              40,000
Hotel Le Strato Courchevel 1850 France 8              40,000
San Antonio Santorini Greece 8              40,000
Santorini Secret Suites & Spa Santorini Greece 8              40,000
Palazzo Vecchietti Florence Italy 8              40,000
Hotel Vilon Rome Italy 8              40,000
Centurion Palace Venice Italy 8              40,000
The View Lugano Lugano Switzerland 8              40,000
Columbia Beach Resort Limassol Cyprus 7              30,000
Elounda Gulf Villas and Suites Crete Greece 7              30,000
Margutta 19 Rome Italy 7              30,000
Villa Spalletti Trivelli Rome Rome Italy 7              30,000
Sikelia Sicily Italy 7              30,000
Ca’Sagredo Hotel Venice Italy 7              30,000
Palazzo Sant’Angelo sul Canal Grande Venice Italy 7              30,000
Nobu Hotel Marbella Marbella Spain 7              30,000
El Lodge Ski and Spa Sierra Nevada Spain 7              30,000
The Margi Athens Greece 6              25,000
Liostasi Hotel & Suites Ios Greece 6              25,000
Archipelagos Mykonos Greece 6              25,000
Pietra e Mare Beach Hotel Mykonos Greece 6              25,000
Aressana Spa Hotel and Suites Santorini Greece 6              25,000
On the Rocks Santorini Greece 6              25,000
Relais San Lorenzo Bergamo Italy 6              25,000
Magna Pars Suites Milano Milan Italy 6              25,000
Byblos Art Hotel Villa Amista Verona Italy 6              25,000
Sant Francesc Hotel Singular Mallorca Spain 6              25,000
Dukes London London United Kingdom 6              25,000
Flemings Mayfair London London United Kingdom 6              25,000
St. James’s Hotel and Club London United Kingdom 6              25,000
The Capital Hotel & Apartments London United Kingdom 6              25,000
The Atlantic Hotel St Brelade United Kingdom 6              25,000
Alexander House Hotel & Utopia Spa Turners Hill United Kingdom 6              25,000
Hotel de Orangerie Bruges Belgium 5              20,000
The Sukhothai Shanghai Shanghai China 5              20,000
Les Etangs de Corot Versailles France 5              20,000
Ketschauer Hof Deidesheim Germany 5              20,000
Sesa Boutique Hotel Kanali Greece 5              20,000
Grand Hotel Parker’s Naples Italy 5              20,000
Hotel Lord Byron Rome Italy 5              20,000
Pangkor Laut Resort Pangkor Laut Malaysia 5              20,000
Nira Caledonia Edinburgh United Kingdom 5              20,000
Ashdown Park Hotel Forest Row United Kingdom 5              20,000
Hotel St. Petersbourg Tallinn Estonia 4              15,000
Park Hotel ai Cappuccini Gubbio Italy 4              15,000
Gaya Island Resort Borneo Malaysia 4              15,000
Luton Hoo Hotel Golf & Spa Luton United Kingdom 4              15,000
The Arden Hotel Stratford-upon-Avon United Kingdom 4              15,000
Theoxenia Palace & House Suites Athens Greece 3              12,000
The Excelsior Thessaloniki Greece 3              12,000
Hotel de La Ville – Monza Monza Italy 3              12,000
Lanson Place Bukit Ceylon Kuala Lumpur Malaysia 3              12,000
The Edison George Town Penang Malaysia 3              12,000
Tylney Hall Hotel and Gardens Hook United Kingdom 3              12,000

This is an analysis of redemption value and not whether it makes sense to book a paid stay through Hyatt channels.  For that it’s necessary to compare the pricing Hyatt is giving versus what you can get at SLH.com or by contacting the property directly.  Since points-earning and stay credit only applies to bookings through Hyatt channels it’s important that you aren’t getting a worse rate for the privilege.

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. I just stayed a couple of weeks ago at the lovely Park Hyayy in Sydney for 30,000 while the room rate was $A1493 or or well over USD$1000 a night. So these new ones seem ridiculous.

  2. They are definitely reimbursing at a higher rate considering that All members are getting elite property benefits on stays. Those extra costs would definitely factor into the reimbursement rate. These properties also probably have fewer discounts that they give for corporate rates, so there are fewer levers that can drive down their average daily room rate

  3. I’m sure you will get much better value (and service to boot) from the Malaysian properties at Category 3-5 than the European ones at 6-8.

  4. Do you think these redemption rates are so lousy because these hotels are small and thus more likely to be full, which would increase Hyatt’s reimbursement cost?

    At first blush this is making me much less excited about the addition of the Alila/Thompson hotels.

  5. I wouldn’t be shocked if the reimbursement rates Hyatt pays are settled at a flat rate that’s been bilaterally negotiated and at around 20-50% of the standard rate for entry level rooms during off-peak dates for the Hyatt loyalty program enrolled properties.

  6. So don’t ever redeem points to stay at these hotels but at least we can gain the same amount of points using your Hyatt Card (9 points) as you can at any other Hyatt Hotel.

  7. Take a look at London for good value. A number of 25,000 point per night options at some very nice and very expensive hotels. St. James, for example.

  8. Are these hotels also available for 6000 point Standard Suite or 9000 point Premium Suite upgrades?

Comments are closed.