Citi ThankYou Rewards has added a new transfer partner to its program: Preferred Hotels iPrefer is now a transfer partner at a ratio of 1,000 ThankYou points to 4,000 iPrefer points. That’s an exciting development that gives Citi exclusive access to yet another boutique hotel booking platform at what could be solid value for ThankYou points, though you’ll probably have to be willing to fork out a decent chunk of change for a cash & points stay to use these points.
The Deal
- Citi Thank You Rewards has added Preferred Hotels iPrefer as a new transfer partner at a ratio of 1,000 Thank You points : 4,000 iPrefer points
Quick Thoughts
We’ve written about Preferred Hotels many times before, but most of that has been about booking Preferred Hotels through Choice Privileges. Thus far, our posts about iPrefer have mostly been in the context of joining the iPrefer program and getting program benefits (though we did write about a status match opportunity that turned out to be targeted to Air Canada Aeroplan cardmembers). It’s awesome to see that rather than just booking Preferred Hotels through Choice, we now have another opportunity to potentially get good value for points thanks to this new transfer partnership.
That said, an early glance into the program indicates that the most widely-available use of iPrefer points is for cash + points redemptions. As you would expect given the 1:4 transfer ratio, points aren’t highly valuable (and in fact sometimes have negative value, which is to say that some points + cash redemptions were more expensive than a cash booking), but in at least some of our test cases so far, points have yielded from 0.415c per point. to 0.91c per point. Given the 1:4 transfer ratio from Citi, that’s 1.66 to 3.64c per Citi point, which would represent a great use of Citi points (so long as you don’t mind laying out the majority of the cost of your hotel in cash).
If you’re able to find availability to cover a stay entirely with points, the value can be even better, but our early research indicates that finding pure rewards stay availability (as opposed to cash and points) can be quite a challenge. At this point, it seems like iPrefer may not be a great program for those looking to spend $0 out of pocket given that most of the award availability is going to require a decent chunk of cash outlay whereby points will reduce your cost rather than eliminate it. In fact, the cash & points redemptions we’ve seen require paying the majority of the cost of the stay in cash — so it’s best to look at iPrefer points as providing a discount over the full cash rate.
Still, it’s great to see Citi add yet another unique hotel program to its stable as it broadens the potential use case for Thank You points.
H/T: Doctor of Credit
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after some effort and long phone calls, i was able to find and make a one night test booking at boston harbor hotel nov 4th over the phone. the preferred representative confirmed multiple times it was points only with $54 in taxes. when i received the confirmation email it was for $384 in cash + 150k points which is a terrible redemption. I called the hotel directly and they confirmed the cash portion as well as the points. The whole experience was a disaster. Additionally, i spent 2+ hours on the phone trying to find an available night at 11 different hotels in switzerland and couldnt find one. Some had a 2 night requirement but the rep could see this and was checking for it as we went. Hopefully something will change with this partnership as they have alot of great hotels!!
From this video https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8RIqwvhFXQQ apparently to find the points-only bookings you need to go to iprefer.com
Has anyone found a property that is points only, and that is actually bookable?
A fraction of the total network but there are. Depends where you want to and whether the property is suitable. iPrefer is probably best for the one-off type of stay.
i will ask a better question. has anyone found a night that is actually bookable (all the way through the checkout process) for ANY preferred hotel on ANY night using preferred points? it seems everyone is talking about it but they ignore the elephant in the room, plus, do we really think citi/preferred are gonna just let us walk in and get 3++ cents of value per citi point? if this were actually available, it would blow up instantly. I would be thrilled if someone could put me in check here!
Maybe the best use is to top off an account if you already have some in iPreferred.
Better off using Choice points to book, assuming a room is bookable.
Rather than generalize, maybe better off assessing which program offers the best cents per Citi point for the specific booking. Sometimes it might be Choice and other times it might be iPrefer.
Certain iPrefer properties cannot be booked with iPrefer points . . . ever. For those properties, a person can convert points to a Reward Certificate (fixed 0.2cpp value) and present it to the property to offset charges. Not advised.