Our series Award Success makes a stop in Tokyo this week where I just managed to book a 4 night stay at the Intercontinental using IHG Rewards Points and getting the 4th night for free through my IHG Premier Mastercard.
This property costs 55,000 points per night and is located in the Akasaka area of Tokyo and in walking distance to Roppongi Hills as well.
I rarely have use for 4 nights in one stretch especially on an award reservation but with the new IHG Premier Card which I recently got when they had the juicy 125k signup bonus I now get the 4th night free each time and that’s a hard to ignore benefit.
The Intercontinental Tokyo isn’t my favorite property though. I prefer the Intercontinental Strings at Shinagawa if I have a choice but unfortunately the hotel isn’t available on points despite their standard rooms being on sale. That’s one of my main issues with IHG that they don’t have to open their standard rooms for reward booking as long as their quota if fulfilled. Maybe It’ll open up, I’ll keep checking.
In any case I searched and found availability at the IC Tokyo Akasaka instead and decided to book it tentatively:
The 4th night will be deducted immediately from the price which is nice. As a bonus I’ll also get another 20% of this redemption refunded at a later point. 10% for being IHG Mastercard basic member (you can hold both cards and stack the benefits) and another 10% for having chosen the Ambassador option that gives a 10% rebate on award redemptions.
All in all I will be paying 132,000 IHG points for 4 nights at a rather expensive Intercontinental in Tokyo. That’s a 40% off value which is pretty hard to beat especially within the IHG Rewards structure.
Conclusion
I really like that you can stack all these benefits and profit from a great discount overall. It very much plays into the consideration if staying at an IHG property or not makes any sense since even as Spire Ambassador the upgrades are scarce and there won’t be club access or even breakfast given by the hotel. The on property benefits are the weakest part of IHG overall for Elite members but going more into this is like beating a dead horse as it’s a well known issue.
Should this 4th night free be of interest to you and you’re able to get a Chase card in the U.S. then I suggest to wait until a good offer comes around again (usually once a year) and then apply through the IHG website at the end of a hotel booking process. That way you can get a $50 statement credit, there is no need to apply through affiliate links on blogs and leave that money on the table.
