When Hyatt announced their purchase of Mr & Mrs Smith, I was very excited. After all, Mr & Mrs Smith’s collection of independent hotels includes incredible properties and brands like the Post Ranch Inn in Big Sur California; Virgin Limited Edition properties including the luxury safari properties Mahali Mzuri and Ulusaba; Six Senses Resorts; Aman Hotels & Resorts; Belmond Hotels; Rosewood Hotels; and many more. We hoped and expected Hyatt to cram these hotels into its existing award chart and that would have given us the opportunity to get incredible value with our points. Alas, it was not to be. Hyatt is dynamically pricing Mr & Mrs Smith award stays instead of relying on an award chart. Worse, it appears that most awards will get only around 1 to 1.4 cents per point value. That’s terrible compared to getting over 2 cents per point value on average Hyatt hotel stays. Taken together, this means that the highest priced hotels will cost absurd numbers of points.
Details
- Roll out
- Over 700 Mr & Mrs Smith properties expected to be available now (or very soon)
- On May 15th, more than 60 SLH hotels that were previously bookable with Hyatt points will rejoin Hyatt through Mr & Mrs Smith. If you had previously booked one of these hotels through Hyatt for a stay taking place on May 15th or later, Hyatt has confirmed that you will earn elite qualifying nights for your stay.
- Some Mr & Mrs Smith hotels may never become bookable through Hyatt due to brand conflicts. For example, since IHG owns Six Senses, I don’t expect to see those properties available through Hyatt
- Booking with points
- All rooms & room types are expected to be available to book with points (at the time of this writing, though, we only see base rooms available)
- Point price: Varies. Hyatt is dynamically pricing these awards instead of relying on an award chart. We have seen per point values ranging from 0.96 to 1.4 cents per point. That’s awful for Hyatt points which are usually worth much more towards Hyatt stays.
- Waived resort fees when booking with points
- Hyatt members who book Mr & Mrs Smith properties through Hyatt will qualify for the following benefits:
- Earn 5 base points per dollar on paid stays (same as regular Hyatt stays)
- Earn elite bonus points (same as regular Hyatt stays)
- Earn elite qualifying nights
- Mr & Mrs Smith counts as a brand towards Hyatt’s Brand Explorer
- World of Hyatt credit card members will not earn 4 points per dollar on Mr & Mrs Smith paid stays.
- Other stay benefits: None. When Hyatt previously partnered with Small Luxury Hotels of the World (SLH), every Hyatt member who booked through Hyatt qualified for free breakfast, a complementary room upgrade (if available), and more. Similar benefits are not promised with Mr & Mrs Smith bookings.
- Elite benefits
- Earn bonus points on paid stays (same as with regular Hyatt stays)
- Room upgrades for Globalists upon check-in (based on availability)
- More info from Hyatt here:
- Hyatt’s Mr & Mrs Smith announcement: newsroom.hyatt.com/mmshotels
- Mr & Mrs Smith landing page: www.hyatt.com/mr-and-mrs-smith
- Map showing Hyatt participating Mr & Mrs Smith properties: www.hyatt.com/explore-hotels/map?brands=Mr+%26+Mrs+Smith
Dynamic award pricing: 0.96 to 1.4 cents per point
Unlike the rest of Hyatt’s properties, Mr & Mrs Smith awards are not priced according to an award chart. We looked at a number of properties to see the point price vs. the cash rate and we were careful to compare point rates to after-tax refundable cash rates whenever point rates were refundable (which was usually the case, but not always). Through this process we found a range of 0.96 to 1.4 cents per point value. Fortunately, 1.4 cents per point was the most common result.
For the properties where we explored further, we found that cash rates when booking through Hyatt matched the rates when booking through Mr & Mrs Smith. In some cases, but not all, we found that its possible to get a lower rate by booking direct or through member rates with sites like Expedia.
Does this mean that Hyatt will ditch award charts for all of their hotels in the future?
One of my top fears with Hyatt’s Mr & Mrs Smith solution is that they’ll deem it a success and spread dynamic pricing to all of their properties. Hyatt assures me that this is not the case. They say “This is not a move towards dynamic pricing and hotels in the Hyatt portfolio will continue to fall in either the standard or all-inclusive award charts.” Let’s hope that’s true!
Hyatt further told us “we think about the redemption values of newer Hyatt offerings like Mr & Mr Smith, the FIND Experiences Platform and Homes & Hideaways by World of Hyatt differently from the 1300+ hotels in the Hyatt Timeless, Boundless, Independent and Inclusive Collections.” That’s a good point. They already moved Homes & Hideaways to a similarly poor dynamic pricing model (as we reported here). And FIND Experiences are pegged at 1.4 cents per point.
Don’t book with points, unless…
Unless you find much better point value opportunities than we have found so far, we recommend against using your Hyatt points to book Mr & Mrs Smith hotels. When Hyatt points are used for Hyatt stays at properties that fit within Hyatt’s award charts, we’ve previously found that it’s easy to get 2.1 cents per point value or better. Similarly, AwardWallet has found that its users have averaged 2.19 cents per point value.
One possible exception to this advice: Some resorts have incredibly high resort fees. Since Mr & Mrs Smith properties booked with points do not incur resort fees, it’s possible that booking with points will actually be a good deal in those cases. I recommend calculating the full cash rate after resort fees and comparing to the point rate in order to figure out the exact value you’ll get for a particular stay.
Consider booking through Hyatt for paid stays
If you’re planning to pay for a stay at a Mr & Mrs Smith property anyway, and if you highly value earning Hyatt points and elite qualifying nights, it may make sense to book through Hyatt. It’s very important, though, to compare Hyatt’s rates vs those found elsewhere. It doesn’t make sense to pay significantly more just to earn Hyatt points and stay credits. I think it especially makes sense to check out the hotel’s own website where you may find deals like 3rd night free (or whatever) that aren’t available elsewhere.
What about Mr & Mrs Smith gift cards?
Regular readers may remember that for a few months it was possible to earn Hyatt points and elite qualifying nights by buying Mr & Mrs Smith gift cards. We had hoped that once integration was complete it would be possible to double-dip and redeem gift cards for stays booked through Hyatt so that we’d earn elite credits twice. Unfortunately, that won’t be the case. As was the case before, these gift cards can only be used to pay for a room reservation at the time of booking with Mr and Mrs Smith through https://www.mrandmrssmith.com. Since we won’t be able to go through Hyatt’s own website to use these, it won’t be possible to double-dip.
Other options for booking luxury independent hotels with points
If you’re as discouraged by Hyatt’s approach to Mr & Mrs Smith as I am, you can at least take solace in a number of other options in which its possible to get good value with your points when booking high end independent hotels:
- Independent hotel brands within major chains: Most major hotel chains, including Hyatt, now offer independent hotels within their portfolio. With Hyatt, this includes The Unbound Collection, Destination by Hyatt, and JdV by Hyatt. These properties are bound by Hyatt’s award chart and therefore often deliver great value with points.
- Small Luxury Hotels of the World (SLH): Book with Hilton points (coming soon). Fortunately, with these hotels, award prices will be capped and we will be able to use Hilton’s 5th Night Free awards and free night certificates. Details here.
- Preferred Hotels & Resorts: Many of these hotels are bookable with Choice Privileges points. Details can be found here: How to book Preferred Hotels online with Choice points. Also see: Great value Preferred Hotels bookable with Choice points.
- Leading Hotels of the World (LHW): Many of these properties are bookable with Leaders Club points which you can get by transferring 1,000 to 200 from Citi (as long as you have the Citi Premier or Prestige card). Read about my experience with this option here: Sampling Leading Hotels of the World (LHW) thanks to Citi ThankYou Rewards.
- Fine Hotels & Resorts & The Hotel Collection: While these hotel collections don’t offer good value when booking with Amex Membership Rewards points, I included them here because those with consumer Amex Platinum cards can get a $200 rebate each year.
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