IHG Rewards Club is the loyalty scheme for InterContinental Hotels Group, a group that has more than 5,000 hotels worldwide.
It’s my favorite loyalty scheme because of how easy it is to earn free hotel nights with them. To help you learn more about it, here’s our guide to IHG Rewards Club containing the 15 most important things to know.
This guide will help you earn the most points and be able to maximize the number of free stays you can get – something we’re doing on our 5 year, 50 state road trip.
1) They have four status levels. Or six. Or ten.
IHG Rewards Club has four status levels:
The InterContinental brand has its own additional loyalty scheme which has two levels:
To confuse things even further, IHG bought Kimpton Hotels a few years ago. At the time of writing this, it’s still being run as its own entity with its own separate loyalty scheme called Karma Rewards. The Karma Rewards status levels are:
- Tier 1
- Tier 2
- Tier 3
- Inner Circle
For most people though, you only need to focus on the Club, Gold, Platinum and Spire status levels.
2) You earn points at 11 different brands
Check out our guide to all their brands to learn more about what you can expect at each one. You earn IHG Rewards Club points at all the brands below other than Kimpton (at present).
3) You earn ten points per dollar. Or five.
You earn ten points for every dollar spent at most IHG hotels. The exceptions are Staybridge Suites and Candlewood Suites where you earn five points per dollar and Kimpton which has its own loyalty scheme.
4) There are 11 category levels. Or 12.
Every IHG hotel has been assigned a category which specifies how many points you need for a free night’s stay there. They range from category 1 hotels that require 10,000 points to category 11 hotels that require 60,000 points. Each category between 1 and 11 goes up in increments of 5,000 points.
There is a (sort of) 12th category level though, which leads us on to our fifth point…
5) PointBreaks hotels are freakin’ awesome
Every three months, IHG publishes a list of PointBreaks hotels. These are hotels that are normally category 1-11, but for a three month period only require 5,000 points to stay there.
That means you can get immense value out of these discounted hotels. This is primarily how we’ll be using our IHG points on our 50 state road trip. Even before that though, we’ve used them for random weekend getaways, overnight stops on longer road trips and even a week-long stay in Tampa over Thanksgiving.
The IHG credit card gives you a 10% points rebate, so PointBreaks actually end up only costing 4,500 points if you have that card.
6) They have freakin’ awesome promos too
Every couple of months or so, IHG run promotions that reward you for staying at their hotels. Arguably the most lucrative of these promos is called Accelerate. This is where they give you various challenges and award bonus points if you meet them.
As a result, we earned enough points for seven free nights just by paying for a one night stay that cost less than $60.
They’ve had even crazier promos though, such as the one where you could hand-write 94 postcards and earn enough points for ten free nights. Shae and I both did this (well, I hand-wrote postcards on her behalf), so we earned ~90,000 points without even having to stay in one of their hotels. Frequent Miler had a great explanation back when that promo was going on.
7) It has a great credit card
IHG has one of my favorite hotel chain credit cards – Shae and I each have one. It comes with a great signup bonus, it gives automatic Platinum Elite status, provides a 10% rebate when using points, you get a free night at any IHG hotel every year after your first year, you earn bonus points on stays and more.
8) They’re a transfer partner of Chase Ultimate Rewards
There are many Chase credit cards that earn Ultimate Rewards (UR), several of which allow you to transfer your points 1:1 to some hotel and airline loyalty schemes.
One of those transfer partners is IHG Rewards Club, so it’s a way to top up your balance if you need some points for a specific redemption.
Transferring your UR to IHG doesn’t tend to provide good value, although it might be worth it if you’re wanting to book a hotel on the PointBreaks list.
9) Pay discounted rates
As an IHG Rewards Club member, you receive a member discount when booking directly with IHG. Although it’s not a huge discount, the savings will add up the more you stay.
10) Perks and loyalty recognition aren’t great
I love IHG Rewards Club because of how many free nights you can earn by maximizing their promos, credit card and PointBreaks hotels.
Having said that, their status levels don’t provide you with many of the perks that other hotel chains provide (e.g. free breakfast, Executive Lounge access, etc).
11) You can pay with Points & Cash
If you want to reduce the cost of a stay, you can take advantage of their Points & Cash option. By increasing or decreasing the number of points you use, you decrease or increase the amount of cash you have to pay.
I’m not a huge fan of this option as I prefer to use our points on PointBreaks hotels. As you can see from the screenshot below, using 5,000 points saves ~$30; those same 5,000 points can get you a free night at a PointBreaks hotel instead.
12) You can redeem your points for other stuff. But please don’t.
IHG Rewards Club has an online catalog where you can redeem your points for products, gift cards, etc. Please don’t do this though as they don’t provide great value.
For example, a $10 Starbucks gift card costs 5,000 points; you could instead use those points for a free night at a PointBreaks hotel.
13) You can earn miles instead of points
Instead of earning IHG Rewards Club points that can be used for free hotel stays, you can earn airline miles instead. This isn’t a terrible option, especially if your priority is free flights rather than free hotel stays, although I personally prefer earning IHG points.
14) Earn points when eating out
Register your credit and debit cards with IHG Rewards Club dining. You’ll then earn between 1 and 8 points per dollar spent at participating restaurants.
If you eat out frequently at participating restaurants anyway, this is a great way to earn free hotel stays without having to do anything different.
15) Save money at Shell
IHG Rewards Club has teamed up with Fuel Rewards to save you at least 5 cents per gallon every time you fill up at a Shell gas station.
You can get much greater discounts through wholesale clubs or other fuel reward schemes run by grocery stores, but it’s still a good discount if you find yourself needing to fill up at Shell.
Question
That’s our own guide to IHG Rewards Club, but what else would you add? Do you have any hints, tips or tricks to share? Let us know in the comments below.
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