January 10 Update: IHG changes Best Rate Guarantee, Lufthansa A350 to fly YVR-MUC route, Air France seat sale to Asia

IHG has changed their best rate guarantee from offering the first night free on a succesful claim to now offering up to 40,000 points. Over the years most hotel chain's BRGs have been tightened and harder to take advantage of. (HT YHBU)

1. Under the Program (as further described below), if you book a hotel room at an IHG branded hotel using any IHG direct channel (such as a branded website, call center or the mobile app), and within 24 hours of making your reservation you find a lower rate online for the same hotel room, number of guests, and reservation dates, and submit a qualified guarantee claim form, we’ll match the lower rate and give you 5X the IHG® Rewards Club points, up to a 40,000-point maximum,  for the room rate for that hotel stay. 

If you have a $150 stay and make a claim, instead of earning the base 1,500 points you would end up getting 7,500 points. As you can see the 6,000 points extra isn't worth the same amount as getting the first night free! It gets even worse if the stay is at a Staybridge or Candlewood Suites since those locations only have 5 points per dollar earn rate.

Good news for those of you who like to travel to Poland or use Poland as your jumping off point for Eastern Europe, the Baltic's or Russia - Air Canada is upgrading their Toronto-Warsaw route to mainline service from Air Canada Rouge. That means the flights will now be flown with an International configuration 767 with Executive Class Pods. Even Economy Class on these planes is better than Rouge so overall a good upgrade for everyone. The flights run from early June to early September. (Source Routesonline)

Lufthansa is upgrading the aircraft they use on their summer seasonal Vancouver-Munich route come this May! Gone is the A330-300 and in comes the new A350-900XWB! Lufthansa starting taking delivery of the new planes early in 2017 and is a welcome change for the Vancouver route! Let us know if you plan on flying this route when the new plane comes on board - we'd love to have you review it for Rewards Canada! (Source Routesonline)

Image Source: Lufthansa

Posts since our last update:

• List of major hotel promotions that are live or going live soon
  The New Year is upon us and many of the first quarter major hotel promotions that were announced before Christmas…
• Earn Quadruple Aeroplan Miles for Choice Hotels stays Worldwide until March 31
  It has only been a month since the last 4x miles offer ended and now its back! Once again you…
• Save up to 50% on Economy and Business Class award tickets from Toronto & Montreal to Europe
  As we do each month we bring you the latest set Miles & More "Meilenschnaeppchen" discounted mileage awards!  This…

Travel Deals

Air France is offering some great rates on flights to Asia from Canada. Fares start at $919. Book by January 15. Find out more here.

• Montréal - Delhi from $ 919
  
• Montréal - Bangkok from $ 939
  
• Montréal - Beijing from $ 969
  
• Montréal - Mumbai from $ 1 085
  
• Toronto - Bangkok from $ 915
  
• Toronto - Beijing from $ 939
  
• Toronto - Delhi from $ 1 315
  
• Toronto - Mumbai from $ 1 640
  
• Vancouver - Bangkok from $ 1 015
  
• Vancouver - Beijing from $ 1 039
  
• Vancouver - Delhi from $ 1 529
  
• Vancouver - Mumbai from $ 1 640

Qatar Airways is offering up to 35% off their flights out of Montreal! Book by January 16 for travel until December 10. Find out more here.

Remember to visit Rewards Canada's Travel Booking siteto book travel directly with many of your favourite airlines, hotels and more!

Canadian Bonus Offers
Air Canada / Aeroplan
- Quadruple Aeroplan Miles on all stays at over 6,500 Choice Hotels worldwide. More... Until Mar 31, 18

Other Bonus Offers
Carlson Hotels Club Carlson
- 3,000 Bonus Gold Points when you book the VIP Privilege Package at a participating Radisson Blu®, Radisson®, Park Plaza® or Park Inn® by Radisson hotel in China. More... Until Feb 28, 18
- OFFER EXTENDED 3,000 Bonus Gold Points when you complete a stay booked via the Club Carlson mobile app. More... Ongoing

EVA Air Infinity MileageLands
- 2,000 Bonus Infinity MileageLands Miles on your first hotel stay booked via Rocketmiles. More... Book by Mar 31, 18

Iberia Plus
- 25% Avios Discount when you redeem for all award travel on Iberia, Iberia Express or Air Nostrum. More... Book by Jan 31, 17

Marriott Rewards
- Earn up to 2,000 Bonus Rewards Points for Sunday - Thursday stays at Gaylord Hotels in the U.S.. More... Until Mar 31, 18
- 10,000 Bonus Rewards Points when you book Vacations by Marriott with airfare and a minimum four nights at participating Autograph Collections Worldwide. More... Book by Jan 31 for travel until Apr 30, 18

SAS EuroBonus
- Double EuroBonus Points for stays at any participating Radisson Blu, Quorvus Collection, Park Inn by Radisson or Radisson RED hotels. More... Until Jan 31, 18'

United MileagePlus
- OFFER EXTENDED 1,500 Bonus MileagePlus Miles when you book a mid-size or larger car with Hertz . More... Until Mar 31, 18

Follow Rewards Canada:

List of major hotel promotions that are live or going live soon

The New Year is upon us and many of the first quarter major hotel promotions that were announced before Christmas are now live or will be soon. Always remember to register for them all even if you don't have plans at the moment for staying with that hotel chain - you never know when your plans may change and by that time you may have forgot about the promotion or registration may have closed.

Hotel Promotions that are live:
Best Western Rewards
Receive a $10 Best Western Gift Card with every stay at Best Western Hotels Worldwide. Full details, online registration & booking (Registration is required) Until Jan 31, 18

Hilton Honors
Earn 2,000 Bonus Honor Points per stay at Hilton Hotels Worldwide. Earn an additional 10,000 bonus points for every 5 stays completed during the promotional period. Full details, online registration and booking (Registration is required) Until Apr 30, 18

IHG Rewards Club
IHG Rewards Club Accelerate: Earn 500 to 30,000 or more Bonus IHG Rewards Club Points when you complete stays at IHG Hotels Worldwide. Bonus varies by member  Full details, online registration and booking (Registration is required) Until Apr 30, 18

Voila Hotel Rewards
5,000 Bonus VHR Points per stays at participating VOILÀ network hotels Worldwide. Register Online (Registration is required) Until Apr 30, 18


Hotel Promotions that will be going live soon (you can register and book already however):
Marriott Rewards
Earn up to 3,000 Bonus Rewards Points for stays at participating Marriott Hotels Worldwide starting with your second stay.  Earn 2,000 points per stay and an additional 1,000 bonus points for stays that include a weekend night (Fri/Sat or Thu/Fri in the Middle East) starting with your second stay. Full details, online registration and booking (Registration is required) Register by Mar 31 for stays Jan 16 - Apr 15, 18

Starwood Preferred Guest
Earn Double Starpoints on stays at participating Starwood Hotels Worldwide starting with your second stay. Earn an additional 500 bonus Starpoints for stays that include a weekend night (Fri/Sat or Thu/Fri in the Middle East) starting with your second stay. Full details, online registration and booking (Registration is required) Register by Mar 31 for stays Jan 16 - Apr 15, 18

Earn Quadruple Aeroplan Miles for Choice Hotels stays Worldwide until March 31

It has only been a month since the last 4x miles offer ended and now its back! Once again you can earn 4x the Aeroplan miles for Choice Hotels stays until the end of March. Remember there is no such place a Choice Hotel, that's just the parent company name for hotels like Quality Inn, Comfort Inn, Econolodge, Clarion and more.

Offer details:
Earn Quadruple Aeroplan Miles for stays at over 6,500 Choice Hotels Worldwide. Full details and online booking. Until Mar 31, 18

Find many more Aeroplan bonus offers here.

Save up to 50% on Economy and Business Class award tickets from Toronto & Montreal to Europe

As we do each month we bring you the latest set Miles & More "Meilenschnaeppchen" discounted mileage awards!  This month we see the return of economy class offers on LOT in addition to economy and business class options on Lufthansa.

These are good for travel on LOT until April 1 with bookings allowed until March 31 while Lufthansa is between May 1 and June 15 and must be booked by Jan 31.

You can redeem Miles & More miles for round trip economy class tickets on LOT from Toronto to Poland for only 30,000 miles. This is a 50% discount off the normal Economy Class award ticket price of 60,000 miles and LOT does not charge a lot for additional taxes and fees so this is an ideal redemption to look at! 

Here are six of the ten cities you can redeem for on LOT:

You can also choose to redeem 30,000 miles for round-trip flights out of Montreal or Toronto to 94 destinations in Europe on Lufthansa. These will incur higher fees and taxes than the LOT flights but there are a lot more options. Here is an example of some of them:

And for business class this month the options between Montreal and Europe on Lufthansa, the discount is a bit below 50% as you need to redeem 55,000 miles for round trip flights that normally cost 105,000 miles.

Example of the business class options:

As we mention every time they have the 50% off economy offer is that you could in theory get close to amount required to redeem for the tickets with grabbing a single credit card that has a $120 annual fee! How so? As we usually mention in this post you can boost your Miles & More account with the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express. Currently the card comes with a 20,000 Starpoints sign up bonus and when you convert those 20,000 Starpoints to Miles & More SPG will award you an additional 5,000 miles. Which gives you 25,000 miles. Of course if you spend $5,000 on the card that will easily boost you to the 30,000 miles required. That's enough miles to redeem for one of the economy class tickets in this offer. Of course timing of getting the card now, spending and getting the points will likely not happen for Lufthansa but could easily be done for the LOT flights.  Need to grab two tickets? You could choose to get one SPG card for yourself and you for your partner or spouse. If that's not your situation and want two tickets for yourself you could also grab The Starwood Preferred Guest Business Credit Card from American Express as it also has 20,000 point sign up bonus and then you would ultimately be able to have 50,000 Miles & More miles not including spending.

Full details on this Miles & More offer can be found here

January 9 Update: World of Hyatt free award nights to count towards status and Amex statement credits for booking hotels

More hotel program changes. Hyatt's World of Hyatt announced that free award nights will count towards tier status. They are following in the footsteps of many other major chains who offer this benefit. Hyatt is also extending the validity dates for the following free night awards.

Starting with awards issued January 1, 2018, you can use them up to 180 days from issuance.

• Free night in a Category 1-4 Hyatt hotel or resort when you stay 30 qualifying nights or earn 50,000 Base Points in a calendar year
• Free night in a Category 1-7 Hyatt hotel or resort when you stay 60 qualifying nights or earn 100,000 Base Points in a calendar year

Check your emails from American Express for their statement credit offers for booking hotels via American Express travel. I received two different offers for two different cards:

Posts since our last update:

• Air France KLM Flying Blue Promo Awards - Save 25% on Business Class award tickets between Calgary or Edmonton and Europe
  The newest set of Air France KLM's Promo Awards were released at the end of December and this time…
• Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for January
  Here are the Rewards Canada Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for the month of January! This is not…

Travel Deals
Save up to 50% on hotel bookings made via American Express Travel and tie in your credit offers as listed above! Simply book online by February 28, 2018 for stays between April 1 and June 30, 2018. Find out more here.

Remember to visit Rewards Canada's Travel Booking siteto book travel directly with many of your favourite airlines, hotels and more!

Canadian Bonus Offers
Air France / KLM Flying Blue
- January Promo Awards - Save 20% to 50% on the Award Miles usually required for an award ticket. This month you can fly in Business Class from Calgary or Edmonton to Europe with a 25% discount. More... Book by Jan 31 for travel Mar 1 - Apr 30, 18


Other Bonus Offers
American AAdvantage
- 1,000 Bonus AAdvantage Miles for stays of 2 or more nights at Starwood Hotels Worldwide. More... Until Dec 31, 18
- Earn up to 50,000 Bonus AAdvantage Miles when you buy or gift 5,000 or more miles. More... Until Jan 30, 17

Delta SkyMiles
- 5x SkyMiles per $1 on 1st stay and a $25 coupon for you 1st booking with airbnb. More... Book by Feb 28, 18 for stays until Feb 28, 19

Le Club AccorHotels
- Earn up to Triple Le Club Accorhotels Points when you stay in any participating hotel in Sweden, Germany and Austria. More... Register and book by Jan 15 for stays until Feb 28, 18

Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
- Earn 3x KrisFlyer Miles when you rent with Avis in the USA, Canada, Europe, Latin America, Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific. More... Book by Jan 31 for rentals until Feb 28, 18
- Earn up to 4x KrisFlyer Miles when you rent with Hertz Worldwide for two or more days. More... Book by Jan 31 for rentals until Feb 28, 18

Starwood Preferred Guest
- 3,000 Bonus Starpoints for stays in a Suite at pariticipating Starwood hotels in North & Latin America. More... Until Dec 31, 18

United MileagePlus
- 1,000 Bonus MileagePlus Miles for stays of 2 or more nights at participating Starwood Hotels Worldwide. More... Until Dec 31, 18
- Earn up to 60% Bonus MileagePlus Miles when you buy miles online. More... Until Jan 22, 18

Follow Rewards Canada:

Air France KLM Flying Blue Promo Awards - Save 25% on Business Class award tickets between Calgary or Edmonton and Europe

The newest set of Air France KLM's Promo Awards were released at the end of December and this time we only see two Canadian cities in the promotion. With promo awards the discount ranges from 25 to 50% off the regular amount of miles required to redeem for these flights. As you can see just by the discount this can be a very good offer if you get 50% off for Business Class! However for us here in Canada the 50% offers are few and far between but we do get 25% off which can definitely be utilized by some! While 25% isn't as good as 50% of course, it still is something to look at if you were planning travel to Europe for February.

The offers are for January are:
Calgary, Edmonton, to Europe: 25% off Business Class

Offer Details:
January Promo Awards - Save 20% to 50% on the Award Miles usually required for an award ticket. Destinations vary by each promotional period. Full Details Book by Jan 31 for travel Mar 1 - Apr 30, 18 (

Here are all the details on the  Canadian offers available for booking this month:

Don't have all the miles? Hopefully you took advantage of the Flying Blue 100% bonus on buying miles earlier in fall of 2017 so that you could use them for this month's offer.  They do however have a 50% bonus going on right now until Dec 31! You can buy enough miles for the round trip business class flight for around C$2700.00 then you would have to add in the taxes and fees for the flights which can run upwards of $600. So ideally you'd only want to buy miles if the value of the ticket is more than $3,300 which many times it can be in the high $4,000 or $5,000 range unless they have one of their business class sales going on where the price of the ticket could be under $3,000.

You could always consider transferring Starpoints earned via the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express to Flying Blue. The card has a 20,000 Starpoint bonus right now which translates to 25,000 Flying Blue miles and a nice way to top off your account for one of these awards.

Another option to pad your Flying Blue account to get these award flights would be to take advantage of Marriott's Travel Packages where you can get 7 nights and miles as follows (although these packages are less valuable than Package #1 options):

If you are interested availability seems to be plentiful on the routes:
Calgary to Amsterdam and v.v.

Edmonton to Amsterdam and v.v.

Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for January

Here are the Rewards Canada Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for the month of January! This is not a 'best' credit card list like our Top Travel Rewards Credit Card rankings but instead a look at cards that have very good acquisition (sign up) offers. As always when choosing a card you should always take other factors into account other than the sign up bonus, but when most or all of these cards are first year free, they can and do pay off even when you grab them strictly for sign up rewards. In fact all of the cards on this list for September are first year free so you can try them out at no cost and decide later on if the card is right for you. All the while earning the sign up bonus which can be used to subsidize your travels!

Same list of cards we saw in October, November and December. We did notice that CIBC updated the terminology for the Aventura offer to new CIBC customers only - if you have a had or have a CIBC card already you may not get the annual fee rebate. You may also ask with the upcoming devaluation of the two BMO cards why are they still on the list? For the BMO Rewards World Elite, you're getting the Priority Pass benefits for no cost, however the  20,000 points may no longer be worth $200 but more like ~$142 unless they change the sign up bonus com the 15th. After you use up the points and use up your Priority Pass then you can reconsider keeping the card. Same with the AIR MILES card - the devaluation is the 25% discount for flights in North America dropping to 15% as of January 15th but no matter what 3,000 miles for $0 is an awesome deal.

Here are our top 5 credit card sign up offers for January (in alphabetical order)

BMO AIR MILES World Elite Mastercard - 3,000 Miles  (Apply here)
The best ever sign up bonus for an AIR MILES co-branded card makes it into our Top 5 sign up list thanks to its 3,000 miles sign up bonus (worth ~$300 or more) and no annual fee in the first year! Even if you aren't a fan of AIR MILES the fact you can get 3,000 miles and them use them as cash rewards for no cost to you should be enough to go out and get this card.

BMO Rewards World Elite Mastercard- 20,000 Points  (Apply here)

It's been awhile since this card has graced the top 5 credit card sign up offers! 20,000 points is your sign up bonus that is worth $200 in travel and since the card is first year free right now (they bill you $150 and then rebate after several months) that means your $200 in travel is free and yes you even get the Priority Pass access and 4 lounge passes included in that first year free. 

CIBC Aventura Visa Infinite (Apply Here)
The CIBC Aventura Visa Infinite card offers a 15,000 Aventura Points sign up bonus worth anywhere from $150 to $300 depending on what type of flight you redeem for and since the annual fee of $120 (and supplementary cards are waived as well) those 15,000 points come at no cost to you.

Scotiabank Gold American Express Card - 25,000 Points  (Apply here)

A very strong card in the earn category for Gas, Grocery and Dining/Entertainment purchases, the current sign up bonus for the Scotiabank Gold American Express Card is 25,000 points when you reach $1,000 in spending in the first three months. That 25,000 points is equal to a $250 travel credit and since this card is a book anywhere card you can book the travel how you want when you want and when the charge shows up on your account you can redeem the points against the charge. The card normally has a $99 annual fee but of course that is waived in the first year during this promotion.

TD First Class Visa Infinite Card - 50,000 Points (Apply here)
Its been awhile since this card has had a good sign up offer and now it has what we can recall as one of its highest bonuses of 50,000 points but that's not all it also has the first year fee waived! You get the standard sign up bonus of 20,000 upon approval and another 30,000 when you spend $1,000 in the first 90 days of having the card. Those 50,000 points translate to $200 worth of travel credits for any travel booking or $250 worth of travel for bookings made via Expedia For TD

If you went for all these cards you ultimately could end up with $1,300 or so in travel credits but even if you only take on one or two you are helping your travel budget significantly at no cost other than regular credit card spend

January 8 Update: BMO Perks offers for January, Great Amex Cobalt offer for Toronto Duty Free, new Aeroplan Rocketmiles bonus

If you hold a BMO MasterCard check your email for this month's BMO Perks offer - they are targeted so they may differ for each cardholder. The one I received is a C$30 statement credit if I spend C$200 or more for a Days Inn stay. Don't think that will happen but good to know that option is there. What offers did you get?

Amex is keeping the offers going for their Cobalt card! First it was H&M, then it was the 10x points and now this Duty Free offer. Simply spend C$50 in a single transaction at any participating Toronto Duty Free store at Toronto Pearson International Airport and you'll get a $50 (CAD) statement credit. This is such an easy offer and if you keep your purchase to $50 it is essentially free! The offer runs until February 15. Find out more about it on the Cobalt perks page.

And speaking of the Cobalt card we updated the American Express Cobalt Card Confirmed Multiplier Locations page with more merchants today!

In the bonus offers section check out the Aeroplan Rocketmiles bonus - this bonus award 50% more Aeroplan miles on your first booking made with Rocketmiles.

Posts since our last update:

• Hilton Honors 2018 Program Changes - becomes stronger for elite members, eliminates Points+Miles, lower earn for base & Silver members
  IHG Rewards Club is not the only hotel program with changes for 2018, Hilton announced a bunch of changes…
• IHG Rewards Club 2018 Point Changes - New higher redemption amounts and nearly 700 hotels changing categories
  Happy New Year everyone! We are now officially back at it and unfortunately start the New Year offer with…
• Today Only: Earn 100% Bonus Aeroplan Miles on select Air Canada bookings within Canada or between Canada and the U.S.
  Checking my email just now and I see this offer that has a little over 3 hours left! If…
• Kaligo: 70% Bonus Miles/Points in the program of your choice on all hotel stays booked by December 31!
  A great way to boost your balances for stays at non-chain hotels or even at chains that aren't your…

Travel Deals

Remember to visit Rewards Canada's Travel Booking siteto book travel directly with many of your favourite airlines, hotels and more!

Canadian Bonus Offers
Air Canada / Aeroplan
- Earn up to 3,000 Aeroplan status bonus miles per eligible trip when you fly with Air Canada® and Air Canada Rouge® to any of the over 80+ destinations available by season in 2018. More... Until Dec 31, 18
- 50% Bonus Aeroplan Miles on your next hotel stay booked via Rocketmiles. More... For new first time Rocketmiles members only .Book by Mar 31, 18
- 1,000 Bonus Aeroplan Miles for stays of 2 or more nights at participating Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide. More... Until Dec 31, 18

Other Bonus Offers
Iberia Plus
- Earn up to Truple Avios for stays at Derby Hotels in Barcelona, Madrid, London and Paris. More... Until Feb 28, 18

La Quinta Returns
- Earn up to Triple Returns Points for stays at participating La Quinta locations in the U.S.. More... Until Feb 1, 18
- 2,000 Bonus Returns Points on your first local purchase with Groupon. More... Ongoing

Marriott Rewards
- Earn up to 2,000 Bonus Rewards Points for stays at 24 hotels across the U.S. in 12 cities. More... Mar 1 - Apr 8, 18

Qatar Airways Privilege Club
- Earn up to 14,000 Bonus QMiles when you fly between Penang and Doha. More... Feb 6 - Apr 30, 18

Follow Rewards Canada: