Hyatt’s latest points devaluation means fewer outsized redemptions at top properties—here’s precisely how I’ll shift my strategy to keep getting the best possible value.
When Hyatt announced their devaluation with new award charts, they did not even attempt to spin it as good for customers. I appreciated that.
Their narrative was, basically, it’s been several years since we’ve hosed you, so there you go. But that makes staying at Hyatts and spending on their credit card less attractive since the rebates you earn are worth less. The same points just don’t go as far.
If I were them I would have paired it with positive changes on the earn side that encourage more of the kind of activity from guests that they’re after. They could have offered:
- bigger elite bonuses (globalist 30% is an industry worst) and
- more points for Hyatt spend on their card to make up some of the difference.
But while my reaction to this as a customer is quite negative, it should also be kept in a bit of perspective. The top award price will be 67% higher than before! But that is not at all the magnitude of the devaluation. ‘It could have been much worse’ and there are still reasons at least on a relative basis to trust Hyatt and their currency.
They didn’t eliminate award charts. They didn’t move to dynamic pricing. They gave us advance notice of changes. And it isn’t yet clear how many hotels and for how many nights will go into those higher priced buckets.
You might ask what an award chart even means when there will be 78 price points, not even counting Miraval or their hotels that do not price on the chart (points pricing based on room rate). In fact, in my post laying out the changes I made this point explicitly. However,
- There will be some hotels especially at the lower end that are sometimes cheaper than before. That does not make this change net good, but there will be a modest benefit to some members redeeming those hotels.
- There is still an award chart and that means when Hyatt changes price ranges they need to update the chart – unlike other hotel chains they will actually tell us they’ve made changes. So they are more honest with customers than their peers.
- Hyatt picks a category for each hotel and a price level for each room night at the hotel a year out – and sticks with it. The level and price of a given night at a specific hotel will not change its redemption cost, even as room rates fluctuate. This is far more fixed and still affords possibility of outsized value compared to other chains like Marriott.
- We don’t know how many nights will actually price at the top end of these categories. Hyatt says the effect will be fairly minimal this year. Probably 2027 is worse but that depends on how the overall economy in different markets does, affecting occupancy and room rates and thus Hyatt’s cost to reimburse hotels for redemptions.
Of course Hyatt needs to offer a more compelling value proposition than Marriott, IHG, or Hilton.
- It has a much smaller footprint. Guests have to work to stay loyal. No effort required with a chain 4 – 6 times as large.
- They skew premium. That’s a higher margin business and one where the returns to loyalty are greater.
And they still offer a compelling reason: unquestionably their status program is stronger at least for top tier (Globalist).
- Updates: no other major program offers such widespread access to ‘confirmed at time of booking’ upgrades to suites.
- Breakfast: they spell out club lounge access, or if that isn’t offered then the benefit is either the full buffet if there is one or it’s explicitly coffee or tea and juice and an entree from the menu (not limited to a subset of items) and this includes tax and gratuity.
- Late check-out: 4 p.m. is confirmed and only subject to availability at resorts. I find it is usually proactively offered.
- Dedicated concierge: quality of concierges vary (as with Marriott Ambassadors) but this feature opens up at 60 nights vs. 100 and $23,000 spend with Marriott.
So as I think about this devaluation, it’s a bummer to see the best redemptions cost much more. I probably won’t just shrug and say of course I’m going to stay at the best Hyatt in any given city! I probably won’t stay as often at the Park Hyatts in Sydney, Tokyo, and Kyoto as I might have in the past.
But in terms of my actual behavior aside from avoiding a few very expensive redemptions, here’s what will and won’t change.
- Actual stay behavior won’t change. I stay with Hyatt largely for the benefits. I earn those on work stays, and on redemptions, and I prefer to redeem at Hyatt so I can book a standard room and confirm a suite at booking without spending extra points so that I’ll have the room I want for my family.
As a Globalist redeeming suite upgrades for family stays, I’m getting significantly more value for my redemptions (a suite for the points cost of a regular room) and I’m going to keep doing that. I want to guarantee the suite at booking, not hope one is leftover at check-in. The points I’m earning on my paid stays will be worth less, but I’ll accept that because I (1) value the status benefits more, and (2) am not earning most of my points from paid Hyatt stays anyway.
- I’m already using the Hyatt credit card less. Their points are worth less but that’s not going to change my Hyatt card spend a lot. It’s my intention to mostly move off that card anyway. Chase Sapphire Reserve gets me 4x on hotel stays. Those points were mostly transferring to Hyatt, so 4x for Hyatt stays were still going on the Hyatt card. Maybe I move Hyatt stays off the Hyatt card, preferring to earn Chase points – because how I redeem Chase points likely changes.
- What really changes for me is how I use Chase points. Hyatt and Chase announced that as part of their extended credit card agreement, more Hyatt properties will be joining The Edit. We should see those offered with Points Boost. When I can redeem Hyatt properties through The Edit at 2 cents apiece, it’s likely that’ll be fewer points than why Hyatt wants, plus I’ll get value add from Chase (like a $100 property credit) and will earn points for the room rate.
In other words, I’ll be more likely to redeem Chase points through Chase Travel for Hyatt stays than I will be to transfer points to Hyatt. I’ll still confirm those bookings into suites with suite upgrade certificates.
At the end of the day what this devaluation means for me is a higher bar (rather than just not thinking about it) booking the best, most expensive properties in Hyatt’s portfolio and a shift away from transferring Chase points to Hyatt.
“they did not even attempt to spin it as good for customers. I appreciated that.”
See, Gary, you’re starting to get it. Reject the faux-charm of the passive-aggressive South. Embrace the front-stabbing directness of the North. ‘The North remembers…’
Chase Sapphire was my primary route for earning Hyatt points, and Chase is the big loser in this. You’re right that Points Boost is now the best way to redeem Chase points, but that is watered down by prices in Chase’s travel portal being inflated.
Long story short, I can no longer justify the $795 annual fee for Chase Sapphire Reserve.
@Pat — Say what you just said, but to a Chase rep. when you call-in to cancel the card; you never know, maybe you’ll get a retention offer than makes up for that extra cost for a year. Rinse, repeat.
“When I can redeem Hyatt properties through The Edit at 2 cents apiece…”
“When” is the key word here.
No more Hyatt cc spend, no more mattress runs, no more staying at crappy Hyatts just to earn elite nights when there are better options available, no more effort of any kind to get status. I’m sure I’m not alone. You’re not gonna treat me like an Epstein girl, Mr. Pritzker. I’m out.
The whole Hyatt “skew[s] premium” thing is a myth. The average Hyatt Place in North America is at best a Courtyard, but often more like a Fairfield Inn. Similarly, the average Hyatt Regency is at best a Marriott or Sheraton. Is that really premium?
Wouldn’t count on 2 cents per point with The Edit. Nearly all of the Marriott properties I’ve looked at recently have been at the 1.66 level. The fact that Hyatt was the only Chase partner to not jump in from the beginning leads me to believe you’re not likely to ever see 2 cents per point redemptions. Hope I’m wrong, as I’d love to redeem this way as well.
I feel like all the loyalty points programs are being devalued at this point to where I’ll have one credit card like the CSP or Bilt that I can transfer points from and won’t be loyal to any particular program. Currently I have CSR and am a Globalist but the juice isn’t worth the squeeze at this point IMHO.
@Mantis — That’s rich coming from you, Dr. Toboggan. Aren’t you the Passport Bro here (having abandoned the US, now living in Asia)?
Mr one note retard strikes again. Try again with something relevant, or, if you have nothing coherent to say, feel free to sit a play or two out.
@Mantis — Ahh, fine, I should compliment you for actually saying something on-topic, like above, instead of merely just whining about ‘the left,’ like usual. *slow clap*
Gary,
Why do you keep showing pictures of that hotel in your Hyatt article? It gives me HIGH ANXIETY!
Hello kettle, this is pot, you’re black. Yeah, we get it, workers should be paid more by those evil greedy corporations.
We need to see how 2h of ’26 and summer season 2027 shakes out before we judge the redemption changes. Stay the course thru the cy and reevaluate with more data in Jan.
Having said that, 2007 earn needs improvement and the lack of guardrails for top redemptions is a concern. It’s not the end of days…
Gary, is the Edit worth paying destination fees that would otherwise be waived? Your article on a person getting that corrected was a real outlier , Reddit and FT document tons of headaches.
Standard award prices (now termed “moderate”) are increasing in every category and by a range of 17-37%. Gary and other bloggers seem purely focused on 67% Cat 8 increase, but it seems clear that this is a broad scale devaluation that will significantly hit almost ever redemption.
I really want to thank Hyatt for the upcoming changes, and in no way am I being sarcastic. I feel like I’m free, and that the self-imposed shackles are released, and that I can remove from my trip destination and planning decision matrices the heavily-weighted variable of, “is there a Hyatt where I can leverage points or elite status re-qualification?”
I’ve been Globalist (nee, Diamond) since the Jeff Zidell years, when the amazing Star MegaDo 3 HY Diamond offer was made to participants. It’s long in the rearview mirror now, but while Hyatt has been the darling of hotel loyalty programs for the past decade (IMHO), I remember when it was the upstart, fighting for business and loyalty relevance against the 800-pound gorilla, SPG.
For several years, I have felt that it has become increasingly difficult to justify the increases in prices *at the Hyatt properties where I want to redeem my points*, when the earn rate was not keeping pace. Surely, transfers from CSR and Bilt were the primary function for filling up the HY account coffers (versus spend at actual hotels), but it still took effort to make sure I hit the 60-night threshold. But I did make the effort, because the opportunity cost was still high vis-a-vis the consistency and value (to me) of the benefits associated with Globalist status.
And so I feel that even if Hyatt were to pivot in the future and start to improve its earn rates (or even roll back some of the point increases – HAH!), for me the psychological bond and emotional attachment is broken, and I know longer hold as much or the irrational passion to the brand, because even though they still have “award charts,” it is (and perhaps has been for longer than I care to admit) a shell game with ever-moving goalposts.
I don’t begrudge Hyatt for doing what it thinks is a better and more profitable decision (whether that is short-term or long-term positive remains to be seen). And I’m happy for folks like Gary for whom the program will still work. To be sure, the times in the post-Feb. 2027 future when I may check into a Hyatt as a non-Globalist may be less than stellar. But Hyatt’s upcoming changes have made my travel planning life simpler because they will no longer be top of mind, and for that, I am grateful.
This is the business model of the big hotel chains. They work hard to build loyalty and get as many people signed up for their credit card as possible. Once they hit a certain critical mass, they start devaluing the points. I feel sorry for customers that were amassing a large number of points to save for a vacation at a top tier Hyatt property. It should be criminal.
I remember when I was a really little kid in the late 60s, my mother would drag us to the “Blue Chip Stamp” or “S&H Green Stamp” showroom where she would cash in her 12 million stamps for a toaster or something. She was such a loyal shopper.
This is exactly what these loyalty programs are. They will keep devaluing you and ultimately only the very very top 0.5% of passengers will be treated respectfully like a “Vegas high roller.” You don’t get into that club with a credit card.
Now that I don’t travel for work anymore, I am so happy to be off the mileage and loyalty hamster wheel.
“Hyatt picks a price level for each room night at the hotel a year out”
They hinted this may no longer be true. If not, my guess is the point level is tied to the cash rate in some $/point way until it tops or bottoms out of it’s category. Meaning it can update as frequently as the hotel updates their cash rates
Gary, where is my thinking wrong. I thought if we booked any hotel via any portal(other then that Hotels program) that we dont get any status benefits or earn points or any stay/night credit? Thusly if a person isnt interested in maintaining status with a hotel program then its OK to book via a CCs portal otherwise its a big no no
@isaac – there are some portal bookings where the hotel is merchant of record.
let’s put it this way – corporate booking tools have long been eligible bookings, even though they are agency bookings. amex fine hotels and resorts has been eligible. rove and bilt now have eligible bookings in their portals, too.
chase the edit bookings are supposed to be eligible.
@Vin – “They hinted this may no longer be true. ” where did they hint this? Laurie Blair was 100% explicit that this is an advantage they offer the customer vs other chains
@Gary
As I understood, Hyatt sets the category, that’s fixed until the next systemwide deval I mean recategorization, while the property sets the season, with no restrictions on how many days in each season. As such, I don’t see that the properties are constrained in the same way as Hyatt setting all the property categories, and could change to peak or super peak (or whatever nonsense word they are using) on a whim. If they haven’t explicitly said they can’t do that then I’d count on it happening.
@ Gary — Screw Hyatt. Theft.
Hyatt points are worth 3-4 times the competition. Several of my favorite hotels have not changed redemption price for 3-4 years, while cash prices continued to rise. So my Chicago stay went from 1.9 cents to 2.0 to 2.2 over the past 4 years. Now it may drop to 1.7 or 1.8. What are my alternatives?
Bonvoy? NO! I’m lifetime Titanium but the pricing goes up and service continues to drop.
Hilton? Points worth .5 cents apiece if I’m lucky?
IHG? Points worth .5 cents apiece for Holiday Inn Express?
Hyatt is still the best deal around. I knew this couldn’t last forever. This was inevitable. It is NOT a crime, just good business. Deal with it.
@ Ray — Hyatt has been devaluing slowly for years via category shifts. Those were justified by inflation. This latest devaluation is not. It is simply flat out theft. The fact that other programs have done the same does not justify it.