🧅 My 7-layer hotel stack

Estimated read time: 4 minutes and 47 seconds

Hey there, amigos. Welcome back to another week of Daily Drop!

I’m currently in the Seychelles doing what I always do when I’m relaxing at a beach resort: Planning my next trip.

And I found some fun points and miles deals that I’m using that you might be interested in:

• ✌️ Earn double IHG elite nights (and more)

• 🏨 Earn 500 points per night at these hotels

• ✈️ New: Book Philippine Airlines flights with points

✌️ Earn double IHG elite nights (and more)

I got a fun email from IHG the other day.

On top of the current global “choose your own adventure” promotion, they also just sent out some targeted emails to earn double elite nights.

As I said, this is targeted… so you’ll have to be logged in to your IHG account to see your offer (a clickable banner will appear).

Anyway, I was targeted with up to 5 bonus elite nights for stays through the end of July.

Some key terms:

• You need to register for the offer (if eligible - log in to see your offer)

• Your checkout date must be on or before July 31

• Only paid stays are eligible

This is pretty sweet, especially when you stack it with the other global promotion I referenced earlier, where you can earn 8,000 points for every four paid nights.

If you want to kick things up a notch, you can also use an IHG co-branded card like this one (which also has a nice elevated offer right now) to pay for the stay.

The card earns 10x points at IHG and includes Platinum status, which earns you another 6x points.

Now that we’ve got our stack components, let me tell you how I’m using this:

Example: New Zealand

Next month, my friend and I will be heading to Queenstown, New Zealand, and we’ll be staying at an IHG property for four nights.

We’re sharing a room and splitting the cost, so we’re spending about $84 per night each, but I’ll be putting the spend on my IHG card and account. 😈

In total, we’ll spend $672 but walk away with the following haul:

• 6,720 points for being an IHG member

• 6,720 points for spending on this credit card

• 4,032 points for having Platinum status

• 8,000 bonus points from the global promotion

• 8 elite night credits

Those 8 elite nights will also put me over the 20-night milestone reward, earning me another 5,000 points. 👇

In total, I’ll end up with 30,472 IHG points from this 4-night stay in New Zealand. 😎

That’s enough points to book TWO nights at the Crowne Plaza in Auckland later on the same trip, saving me hundreds of dollars thanks to this single stay.

Anyway, here is the total stack count:

• 1️⃣ IHG Membership points

• 2️⃣ IHG credit card spend

• 3️⃣ IHG Elite bonus (a perk of that same credit card)

• 4️⃣ IHG’s global promotion

• 5️⃣ IHG’s targeted bonus nights promotion

• 6️⃣ 20-night Milestone Reward bonus points

Actually, screw it… let’s add a seventh layer.

You can often book IHG hotels through a portal like Rakuten, which is currently offering 10% cash back or up to 10x MR points back for IHG bookings:

Honestly… I can even think of two additional stacking layers that I didn’t touch on, but they’re a little niche… Let me know if you figure them out. 😉

Okay, now I’m done… Promise. 🫶

🏨 Earn 500 points per night at these hotels

Hyatt fans, here’s an easy win for ya – whenever a property joins the World of Hyatt portfolio, you can earn 500 bonus points for each qualifying cash or award night during the hotel’s introductory window.

Hyatt has just updated the list of eligible properties, so it’s a good time for a quick refresher.

Here’s how to take advantage:

• Stay at one (or more) of Hyatt’s new properties during the eligible timeframe

• That’s literally it. No registration required 🙃

I often skim through Hyatt’s running list of new properties to see what’s available and if I can maximize any of my upcoming stays.

500 bonus points per night is insane... Six nights spent in beautiful, new hotels would yield 3,000 points, which is enough for a free night at a Category 1 property.

So, what’s on the radar right now?

The current list includes properties in Virginia, Washington, Tennessee, and many, many more places. 👇

You’ll see each property’s eligible timeframe (usually a few months from its opening date), and right now, many on the list are eligible for stays through the end of September.

Remember, this is a running list that is constantly being updated, so it’s always worth a glance. 👀

Two fine-print reminders:

• Your checkout date must fall within the property’s bonus window.

• Only one room earns the extra points, even if you’re paying for multiple rooms.

Happy hotel hunting!

✈️ New: Book Philippine Airlines flights with points

It’s always great when we see new opportunities pop up to book different airlines with points… especially when those airlines don’t belong to a traditional airline alliance.

And that’s what just happened with the new partnership between Qatar Airways and Philippine Airlines.

Basically, you can now earn and redeem Qatar Airways Avios on Philippine Airlines (PAL), which means a new way to fly to/from/around Asia with easy-to-access points.

And the deals are actually pretty good.

But before we get into it, it’s worth noting that you can transfer Avios around between a bunch of different airlines. 

As a result, Qatar Avios are EXTREMELY easy to get.

Anyway, flying from West Coast cities like San Francisco to Manila on PAL will cost you 110,000 Avios in business class.

That’s a lot of Avios… but it’s also a 14-hour lie-flat seat across the Pacific. So not too bad.

Plus, when there’s a transfer bonus (like the current 30% one from ThankYou points), that cost could be as low as 85,000 points.

United operates two daily flights on the same route and charges a whopping 250,000 United miles… so yeah.

Anyway, this is also a great option for hopping around Asia on PAL flights.

For example, last year I flew from Papua New Guinea to Manila on Philippine Airlines, as it was the only flight going anywhere that day… But it was expensive, even in economy. 

Now, however, you could book that same flight for just 27,000 Avios, which would’ve been much more preferable.

If you’ve never flown with PAL before, it’s a solid airline. They have nice wide-body planes with lie-flat business class, which are pretty comfortable.

But even on regional routes like the one I flew last year, they still have nice lie-flat seats on many smaller planes, too. 👇

Anyway, here’s the bottom line:

This is an exciting new airline partner that we all now have access to thanks to points and miles. And more options are always better.

That’s it for today, my friends!

Have a great day, and I’ll see you in the next newsletter. 😉

4.6827° S, 55.4804° E

With contributions by Sam Anthony.