Hotels.com - Shops away

Hi all,

I'm close to booking a hotel room via Hotels.com and currently I believe they offer 6 miles/£1 spent via shops away.

Before I book I thought I'd check if anyone else has used this offer before? I'm slightly concerned there will be some small print hidden somewhere and they find a reason not to credit the Virgin miles to my account.

I'm also considering booking now buy paying when I arrive at the hotel but will only do this if I still receive the air miles.

Any feedback would be appreciated.

Thanks.

You should be fine doing this, I've never had a problem with Hotels.com and miles tracking. Miles won't usually credit until after your stay if I recall correctly, and it makes no difference if you pay now or pay at hotel on check out if that option exists. If you cancel the booking the miles will usually still credit and then at some point be cancelled and removed from your FC account.

Agree totally. Lost count of the number of times I've "shops awayed" hotels.com and never had any problems. Your nights booked this way also count towards hotels.com rewards (10% rebate effectively) so don't forget to log in once you've clicked through or join beforehand if not already a member.

HP

The only issue with this is you won't always get the benefits of any hotel scheme you are a member of. But have never had any issue with hotels.com mikes posting

The other alternative is using Rocketmiles. I've us d them a few times and they often have great bonus miles on offer. I'm looking at a 4 night stay in Boston for this s summer and will get 60,000 miles if I book

Hi you do need to pay for the hotel before you travel to earn miles -

From the shops away site:
You will earn a lower reward if you chose to receive Hotels.com Reward Points. If you use a voucher code (including codes by Hotels.com) you will not be eligible for a reward. You must make payments online prior to the booked dates in order to earn rewards. All rewards are applied to the hotel cost, minus taxes and fees.

We have always received the miles before our stay AND when paying at the hotel. Unsure what would happen if you then spent said miles, cancelled the hotel and ended up with negative miles. I'm too scared to try!

6 to £1 is not a great rate for hotels.com. I have somehow ended up receiving an email from ShopsAway everytime they increase their rate. I think that happens automatically if you add hotels.com to your favourites within ShopsAway. It often varies so if you're in no rush, hold off a few weeks and it could be back to 8 miles a £1 or even more. The best I've seen is 12 miles per £1.

Even though it limits any loyalty with hotel groups, they fast became my favourite for booking hotel rooms. Often the cheapest according to Trivago (if you ignore booking.com*) and a decent loyalty scheme which has scored us quite a few free nights.

* - booking.com don't include the taxes so they often appear cheapest on most comparison sites.

Those purchase conditions Kazzypen refers to above seem new since last time I did it but they are indeed there so double dipping will not be quite what it was. Thank you Kazzypen! Its been a while as Mr HP has been living in a Holiday Inn 2 nights a week for the last year so we've been reaping the rewards from IHG. Now got to do a hotels.com earning or burning stay in the next few weeks to not lose both £150 of reward credit and more than a few nights towards the next reward. As long as you do one night a year it stays alive. Hopefully will get to find out what the lower earning rate is and decide where we go from there.