IHG Rewards Club has now finally started to send out emails to select members about the award night change that has been gradually implemented over the past few months.
IHG first instituted variable award night pricing at properties in Greater China that was then rolled to Europe and finally to Americas (read more here, here and here), and already devalued it once (read more here).
You can access the IHG Rewards Club here.
READ MORE: IHG Rewards Club Rate & Bonus Points Promotions
You can see the email above and below is the text (in text format):
Discover thousands of hotels for fewer points
We know that flexibility is what you are looking for right now, so we’ve made some updates to the way you redeem Reward Nights around the world. When hotels are less busy, Reward Nights may require fewer points, while busier times they may require more.
So go ahead and book your next stay – for fewer points!
Conclusion
Astonishingly, IHG Rewards Club has not sent out communication about this award night pricing change to all program members.
The change is beneficial for most of us right now when the paid rates and occupancy rates are abysmal. It remains to be seen what the award pricing will look like during the regular times where we eventually get back to, however horrible the situation is right now.
![Airfare of the Day [Business Class] SWISS London to Hong Kong from £1,360](https://cdn5.loyaltylobby.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/xcity-g0cd29ff20_1280-hong-kong-120x86.jpg.pagespeed.ic.Dl1ujXuAbk.jpg)
It feels nasty
One of the great advantages that IHG Rewards had was that the redemptions had a fixed table … that is, you could plan for a future redemption, considering that a certain hotel had a known redemption value throughout the year. Your only job was to be able to redeem for the period you had in mind.
Now, this has changed …
With the pivot tables, hotels are free to charge whatever amount they find convenient for them.
If they are in low occupancy, as they are now in these COVID-19 times, they will certainly have lower rates.
But, when the situation returns to normal, we will have the current low and high season regime.
Now, if the person is willing to pay according to the hotel’s occupancy rate, that is, to pay more when there is more demand, why would he IMMOBILIZE his points in a loyalty program, having paid in advance for those points, and not being able to use them with advantages for high season periods ???
If the person is now being forced to submit to the regime of variation of quotations for accommodation, it is MUCH BETTER to be able to have other chains and / or other hotels to stay in the high season, because that way they have more options to find a hotel that fits your financial availability, that is, it is much better to accumulate cash, not points that will be stuck and can only be used at IHG.
It is a tradition in these loyalty programs, when they change the rules for the “flexibility” regime, to start with more attractive rates, to break the argument that the changes are harmful to customers …
We have dozens of examples in company loyalty programs. airlines, who did this … and then, over time, the “dynamic table” (*) got worse for the associate.
(*) Pivot table is utiopia … table, being dynamic, is not a table, because, the tables imply that you put a value in the input and have only one value in the output. But, if you put a value at the entrance and, DYNAMICALLY, the exit can return any value, it is no longer a table, but a mess …
Indeed. We already sold our private information to them for a pittance, why should they pay again? Heck, they don’t even have a postage cost!
Well said. It is for this reason, and the high depreciation rate, that I decided I don’t value SPG/Bonvoy anymore.
Actually, I’ve been taking advantage of this for a month or so. I rebooked a number of stays at a lower points’ cost. I’ve yet to see a hotel where the points required went up, they all went down.
Good on the front end means you know this is going to hurt on the back end… Good time to dump as many points as possible as the remaining balance will be diluted late 2021 and 2022 as the pandemic subsides and things improve… Those cash back cards are looking a lot better than this Monopoly money where the rules change from day to day and week to week… IHG points will probably depreciate faster than the US$ the next 3 years which is quite a feat…