The Q3 IHG Accelerate promotion has just been launched, so it’s time to check out your offer for stays between September 1 and December 31, 2017.
In case you’re not familiar with Accelerate, it’s a promotion run by IHG several times a year that awards bonus points for completing several different challenges. It can be such a generous promotion that we earned enough points for seven free nights by spending just $54.
And in case you don’t recognize the name IHG, they’re the parent company of some of the world’s best-known hotel brands such as Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express, Crowne Plaza and Intercontinental.
Everyone’s offer is different, so register for the promotion to find out your challenges. Here are both my and Shae’s offers and how we’ll be maximizing them.
My Q3 IHG Accelerate Offer
If I was to complete all of these challenges, I’d earn a total of 46,000 IHG Rewards Club points. That’s unlikely to happen though, if for no other reason than we’re not planning on staying two nights in NYC.
The great thing about my challenges though is that I don’t have to complete them all. I only have to complete three of the challenges shaded in gray in order to earn the 24,100 point achievement bonus.
That can be done in as few as two nights – here’s how.
First of all, I’d book a one night stay and pay using my IHG credit card which would take care of the first and fourth challenges. I’d most likely book it for September to take advantage of the additional 3,000 point bonus listed at the end.
I’d then book a one night Points & Cash stay somewhere cheap which would take care of the third challenge.
That would earn me the following bonuses:
- 2,000 – Stay once, get 2,000 bonus points
- 2,400 – Stay for less and earn
- 1,500 – Spend on your IHG Rewards Club credit card
- 24,100 – Your achievement bonus
- 3,000 – September bonus offer
- Total = 33,000 bonus points
Having said that, I might not work my challenges in this way. That’s because I already have a three night stay booked in October at a Holiday Inn. That means I’d only need to book a Points & Cash stay in order to earn my achievement bonus.
Depending on what our travel plans are looking like over the coming months, I might book two of those nights at an IHG brand in order to complete the second challenge and earn the extra 10,000 bonus points.
Shae’s Q3 IHG Accelerate Offer
Shae’s offer is fairly similar to mine. She too can earn up to 46,000 bonus points, although one of her tasks is different. We can maximize her offer in as few as two nights as well – here’s how.
The first step would be pretty much the same as I suggested for my own offer. We’d book a one night stay at a Holiday Inn Express in September and pay with her IHG credit card. That’d take care of the first and fourth tasks, half of the third task and also the final ‘Stay in September’ bonus challenge.
We’d then book a one night stay at a different Holiday Inn Express hotel to finish off the third task.
That’d earn Shae the following bonuses:
- 2,000 – Stay once, get 2,000 bonus points
- 5,600 – Be the readiest
- 1,500 – Spend on your IHG Rewards Club credit card
- 20,900 – Your achievement bonus
- 3,000 – September bonus offer
- Total = 33,000 bonus points
In Shae’s case, we might just go ahead and book two separate nights as a mattress run. Even though we don’t need the stays, we can get a lot of value out of 33,000 bonus points – far more value than we’d spend paying for two nights upfront.
How We’ll Use Our IHG Accelerate Bonus Points
During our 50 state road trip, we’re planning on mainly using our IHG Rewards Club points to stay at PointBreaks hotels.
This is a list of hotels that changes every three months and which only require 5,000 points per night to stay at them. Even better, IHG Rewards Club credit card holders (like Shae and I) also get a 10% rebate when using our points. That means PointBreaks stays cost a net 4,500 points.
That means if both of us unlock our achievement bonuses, we’ll earn enough for just over seven free nights each. Even if we did a few of the nights as mattress runs, we should be able to do that for less than $250. That’s a worthwhile investment seeing as it’d earn us enough points for up to 14 nights total.
Question
What kind of Q3 IHG Accelerate offer did you get? We’d love to hear in the comments below.
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