Rocking Hyatt’s overlapping promos. Top tier status is easier than ever.

Hyatt’s Bonus Journeys 4th quarter promotion is really good.  It offers triple or quadruple point earnings and bonus tier qualifying nights.  On top of that, Hyatt has extended their previous awesome promotion for Free Nights on Sale (up to 25% back and free parking on award stays).  Both promotions run until January 4th 2021.  Both promotions additionally overlap with the Miraval Buy One Get One (BOGO) offer, Hyatt’s Work from Hyatt (WFH) offer, and the targeted offer to earn 3X American Airlines miles on paid Hyatt stays.

Promo overlap

Let’s look at how these promotions overlap…

Stays in October, November, or December completely overlap all of these promotions.  That said, some of these offers primarily reward paid stays whereas others reward point stays.  The primary piece that overlaps all promotions is the Bonus Journeys’ bonus tier qualifying nights.

What are tier qualifying nights?

Tier qualifying nights are often referred to as “elite nights”.  With many hotel chains, you can earn elite status by acquiring a number of tier qualifying elite nights each year.  For example, Hyatt requires earning 30 elite nights per year to achieve mid-tier Explorist status, or 60 elite nights for top-tier Globalist status.  Additionally, Hyatt offers “Milestone Rewards” which are perks like free lounge access, free nights, bonus points, etc.  Milestone Rewards are earned within a calendar year when you achieve 20 elite nights, and every 10 elite nights after that up to 100.  Read more about Hyatt elite status and Milestone Rewards in our World of Hyatt Complete Guide.

Bonus elite nights

This is the part of the Bonus Journeys promo that is most relevant to all of the overlapping promotions.  With each elite night (tier qualifying night) earned during the promotion period (Oct 1 – Jan 4), you’ll be given a bonus elite night in 2021.  Here’s how Hyatt describes the deal:

For every Tier-Qualifying Night on stays completed during the Promotion Period, members will earn one Tier-Qualifying Night credit toward elite status the year in which they earn it, and one bonus Tier-Qualifying Night credit toward elite status in 2021.

I reached out to Hyatt to get more details.  Here’s what I learned:

Bonus Elite Night Q&A

  • Do award stays count? Yes
  • Do free night certificate stays count? Yes
  • Do Points + Cash award stays count? Yes
  • Do bonus elite nights count towards Milestone Rewards? Yes
  • Do elite nights from World of Hyatt credit card spend count? No
  • Are bonus credits awarded for a stay that is entirely in 2021? e.g If I were to stay Jan 1-4 (3 nights), would I earn a total of 6 tier qualifying nights for 2021? Yes. Nights completed between January 1 and January 4, 2021 will count twice in 2021.
  • What happens with stays that span December and January? For example, if I stay Dec 28 – Jan 4 (7 nights), how many tier qualifying nights would be awarded for 2020 and how many for 2021?  Elite nights are earned based on the checkout date. So, in this example, the 7 night stay would earn a total of 14 elite nights in 2021 and zero nights for 2020.

Didn’t you say otherwise on Ask Us Anything?

On a recent Ask Us Anything episode, I told the audience that Hyatt was going to award elite nights differently for this promotion. They had told me that elite nights would be earned on the dates they happened rather than the checkout date.  I was surprised by that, so I kept asking followup questions until the Hyatt rep finally went to the operations team to get the facts.  The operations team answered as follows:

Nights are always awarded based on checkout date. In the chance a member checks-in in 2020 and checks-out in 2021 – the member will earn Tier-Qualifying Night credits based on the checkout date.

For instance, if a member has a stay that spans December 28, 2020 – January 4, 2021 (7 nights total), they would earn based on the checkout date = 7 Tier-Qualifying Nights would be awarded in 2021 and 7 bonus nights would be awarded in 2021.

Milestone rewards

One cool aspect of Hyatt’s loyalty program is that they offer rewards each time your reach a number of milestones.  This chart shows the details:

Completely separate from elite status, Milestone Rewards are available to everyone and are based on the number of nights you stay in a calendar year. Club Lounge Access Awards and Suite Upgrade Awards are valid for the rest of the current…

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