points hound: earning bonus miles while still getting stay credits for hotel bookings

the problem with booking with third party sites (e.g., expedia, orbitz, priceline) for hotel bookings is that for the most part, you won't get any stay credits with the hotel chain that you've booked. despite paying probably the same price, there are no points earned or stays/nights earned for hotel status.

expedia and friends do have an advantage to them, however. usually, they have higher rebates on sites like bigcrumbs.com. if shopping through bigcrumbs, expedia gives a rebate of 5.6% back on hotel purchases, whereas for starwood properties, they give a 2.1% rebate on hotel purchases (if it credits at all). this is in addition to a 1-2% rebate via expedia's own points program. hotels.com offers a 4.55% rebate on bigcrumbs.com, in addition to an effective 10% return via their hotelrewards program.

what is pointshound?
points hound is an online, third party hotel booking service that provided an interesting proposition. you earn various amounts of points on your hotel bookings based on how many nights you've booked with them in the past.

it's not completely clear if it's 0-5 nights per year or based on some other time frame. and when they say 3-8x, they really mean 3-8 points earned per dollar spent. they have several partners you can credit your miles to: united, virgin america, american, delta, aeromexico, hawaiian, baltic, etihad, and us airways.

at a conservative 7 miles per dollar spent after 20+ nights, and assuming 2c value per mile, that's like getting a 14% return. if you had booked the same property on hotels.com (using canadian currency, thereby removing the forex fee of 2.5%), you would get 10% back via welcomerewards and 4.55% back via a rebates from bigcrumbs, or 14.55% total return. guaranteed cash. airline miles are never guaranteed.

pointshound and double dipping
but recently, points hound started to do something that was quite innovative. they've teamed up with the various hotel chains to allow users to earn hotel chain points and stay credits in addition to a reduced amount of airline miles. fantastic!

i'm planning on going to seattle for a weekend trip (as i usually do), and am interested in staying at a particular starwood hotel.

normally, you can earn 400 mileage plus points for a $159 hotel night, or slightly less than 3 miles/$ spent. this would not earn you any points with starwood. i would value 400 miles as being worth $8 to $16 (2-4 cents/mile). if i book through hotels.com, i would expect to get back $7.23 from bigcrumbs and $15.90 back from hotelrewards. so pointshound would not be that great. neither website would give you starwood points or stay credits.

but see that "double dip" icon in the bottom? that means that if you agree to earning a lower number of mileage plus points via pointshound, you can get rates that are eligible for starwood points and stay credits.

in this example, you can still get 350 mileage plus credits (just over 2 miles/$ spent), the hotel rate is different (AAA rate, which i'm a member of, and refundable), and you get the stay credit and starwood points. if i were were to have solely booked through bigcrumbs to get a 2.1% rebate for purchases made at spg.com, i would get $3.38 in rebates. i value 350 mileage plus points at $7-$14 (2-4 cents/mile). not bad. and as i haven't booked on bigcrumbs before, the number of miles could potentially increase as i climb that ladder.

i'll bite. i'll make a booking and see how it goes. hopefully the stay credit will come through!

(note: if you sign up with points hound using my link above, you get 250 sign up miles, and i'll get 250 referral miles after your first purchase).