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The Portal
I had someone tell me their Chase points were worthless. And although it hurt my heart, I realized that they were trying to book in the bank portal and didn’t realize the immense value of their points when transferred out to transfer partners. While there are definite reasons to book in the portal, more often than not, the value of your points will dramatically increase when transferred out to other partners.
When should I book in the portal?
Better Points Prices
Sometimes the portal will have better points prices for the hotel you are looking to book. In this case, book in the portal! I always tell people to double check and verify before purchasing or transferring. We want the best deal!
Using a Credit
If you have a credit card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred or the Capital One Venture X, then you get a certain amount of money towards travel expenses each year. You obviously want to book in the portal if you are taking advantage of these offers.
Specialty Hotel
If you are looking to book a specific hotel that does not have points transfer options, sometimes you may find it in one of the bank’s travel portals. I have even seen Great Wolf Lodge in there a couple times. GASP!
Convenience
If you have zero time for this and you just want to earn the points and easily throw them at a trip without care for the extreme savings, this option is for you. I would view it as a coupon instead of the extreme couponing version of points and miles that I participate in.
When should I NOT book in the bank portal?
Booking a Hyatt
When booking a Hyatt hotel you will 99 percent of the time find a better deal on the Hyatt website.
Most points bookings
Realistically most points bookings will give you better pricing outside the bank’s portal. However, as I said above, always check. You never know when you will strike a surprise deal. I would also advise learning about Alliances because this will make the transferring process so much easier to navigate.
Possibility of Complications
If your trip has a possibility of complications, and lets face it, these days, there’s a lot of those, then booking through the portal is not your best bet. Booking through a third party adds a layer of people to go through if you need to cancel or rebook or deal with a flight cancellation. Booking directly with the hotel or airline gives you direct access to their booking services should a complication arise.
Example
For an example I chose a Disneyland trip, since those hotels are widely sought after. For choice #1 we will look at the Hyatt. In the bank portal, the Hyatt House is 29,203 points per night.
However, When we go to the Hyatt app, we can see that it is only 12,000 points per night. This is more than half the price on the Chase website.
Now for the same Disneyland example, I will show you the Fairfield by Marriott. In the Chase portal, this hotel is 19,929 points per night.
However, our discrepancy here is backwards, with the Marriott app pricing much higher at 41,000.
This example is why I emphasize double checking. Many in the travel community will tell you to disregard the bank’s portals completely, but this example shows that there is always an advantage to doing your research. Doing our research yields crazy results sometimes, and can be well worth it.
Conclusion
These examples will hopefully illustrate why we do our homework, and never count the portal out. Have more questions about this? Send them my way! I always love to talk with you!
