16
Jun
Priority Club’s new cash and points option allows you to, in effect, purchase points when making an award booking at a discounted three-fifths of a cent per point.
Normally point purchases cost 1.15 to 1.35 cents apiece.
Cash and points award nights are cancellable, and when you do cancel you get your full points refunded to your account (provide you cancel by the cancellation deadline). You don’t get your points and cash refunded. As a result, the cash and points award option is a backdoor way to discounted points purchase even when you aren’t looking to book an award night.
Why might you want to do this? Well, one reason would be Priority Club offers “PointBreaks” awards, room nights at select hotels for only 5000 points. Using the cash and points backdoor for points purchases, you can acquire 5000 points for $30.
Darren said,
Hmmm… wonder if this “return” of points would increase your earning towards Platinum Status for the year
Ed said,
Sorry, I must be dense but I cant understand the trick here. Can you lay it out for me in steps?
Nathan said,
Yep, the return of points counts towards Platinum Status – so you can go from zero to Platinum for US$360 a year now
Todd said,
I was recently short 4900 miles to platinum so I decided to do a remards booking for 20,000 + $30. The 5000 points are showing as an other transaction but did not increase my total points earned (and it didn’t update when I cancelled and the 25,000 points went back to my account). So, I guess IC has closed the loop-hole on this one!
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