Periodically American Express Membership Rewards (MR) offers increased transfer rates to many of its travel partners. One of these partners is Hilton hotels. The standard transfer rate from MR to Hilton is 1:2 so 1,000 MR points equals 2,000 Hilton points. With Hilton points being worth about 0.5 cents each, this isn’t a great redemption value and I wouldn’t normally use my points this way unless I need to top off my balance for a redemption.
Bonus
About once per year, Amex offers up to a 50% transfer bonus to Hilton. Coincidentally I’m planning a trip where Hilton points would come in handy and I was hoping for such an opportunity to present itself. So you can believe my delight when I opened my account this morning and saw this offer:
The 50% offer is back and valid for transfers until April 14! This brings the redemption value of MR a bit more in line with a decent redemption value.
Planned Redemption
One particular redemption I am eyeing up for a family trip later this year is San Diego’s Hotel del Coronado.
Standard rates are 95k per night. Best cash price for the room plus the resort fee is $472 per night. That yields a 0.5 cent per point redemption rate.
When you factor in the transfer bonus that means it would value at 1.5 cents per MR point, the bare minimum I set for myself to redeem any transferable point currency at.
Conclusion
While the deflated value of Hilton points don’t always offer the best value for MR points redemption the additional 50% bonus does help to make the option more attractive. It’s still always wise to compare the cash value of a room to what the ultimate point cost will be but in some cases it might be a worthwhile transfer at this time. Also never speculatively transfer points unless a specific redemption is planned. However, if all conditions are met and you can take immediate advantage of this offer, act quickly because it expires on April 14 and might not return for at least another year.
In Points We Trust 