Over the years we’ve seen some pretty major changes to hotel loyalty programs, particularly when it comes to the execution of elite perks, and also when it comes to the value of points. While I do think the World of Hyatt program has seen some negative changes in recent times, Globalist status in the program is still my favorite top tier hotel status, and I’d like to share why. But first let me talk about my current overall hotel strategy.
In this post:
My current hotel loyalty program strategy
There are four hotel loyalty programs I’m pretty actively engaged in, so let me share my overall thoughts on them, roughly in order:
- World of Hyatt is my all around favorite hotel loyalty program; I have lifetime Globalist status, so technically I don’t have to worry about requalifying, if I don’t want to (though there’s still an incentive to do so)
- Marriott Bonvoy is my backup program, even though I’ve earned Ambassador status with the program; beyond that, I have lifetime Platinum status, and I always earn at least 50 elite nights per year in the program in order to get access to the Choice Benefits program, and that’s easy enough to do since I have both the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant® American Express® Card (learn more) and Marriott Bonvoy Business® American Express® Card (learn more), earning me 40 elite nights per year
- I love Hilton Honors thanks to the incredible Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card (learn more), which earns me Diamond status for as long as I have the card; Hilton’s luxury portfolio has also been growing nicely in recent years
- IHG One Rewards is my very last backup chain; the IHG One Rewards Premier Credit Card (learn more) earns me Platinum status for as long as I have the card; I stay at IHG properties when I have a certificate to redeem, or when the location is the best
World of Hyatt Globalist benefits
With the above out of the way, Hyatt has some things working for and against it. In particular, Hyatt’s footprint isn’t nearly as large as that of Hilton, IHG, or Marriott (it has been growing impressively, though I wish that weren’t so focused on all-inclusives). However, Hyatt has a very compelling loyalty program, to the point that I think it’s worth pursuing top tier status with the program.
What I appreciate about Hyatt is the emphasis placed on consistently delivering benefits. While no loyalty program is perfect (especially when you consider that hotels are mostly individually owned), Hyatt does the best job in this regard, in my opinion.
So, why do I like World of Hyatt Globalist status so much?
Unlimited complimentary suite upgrades
World of Hyatt offers Globalist members unlimited suite upgrades subject to availability. At this point, World of Hyatt is the only hotel loyalty program that offers top tier elite members suite upgrades subject to availability, rather than simply at the discretion of the hotel.
While execution isn’t perfect, I’ve found that Hyatt is the most consistent of any hotel group when it comes to delivering suite upgrades for members. That’s to say that most Hyatt properties make an effort to proactively upgrade Globalist members as much as possible.
Of course it’s important to be realistic. Some hotels don’t have many suites, some hotels get a lot of Globalist members, and some hotels have a lot of paid demand for suites. Don’t expect that you’ll receive a complimentary suite upgrade at the Andaz Maui or Park Hyatt Kyoto, for example. Meanwhile at some other properties, suite upgrades for Globalist members are a near sure bet.
The ability to earn suite upgrade awards
The area where Hyatt’s upgrade policy really shines is with the suite upgrade awards that are offered as part of the Milestone Rewards program. With Milestone Rewards, you can select different perks in 10 night increments. A Globalist member earning 60 elite nights per year could select five suite upgrade awards.
Each suite upgrade award can be used to confirm a suite upgrade at the time of booking for a stay of up to seven consecutive nights.
The reason I love this benefit so much is because it allows me to upgrade those stays that matter the most to me, where I really value a suite. There’s not another major hotel loyalty program that offers suite upgrades at the time of booking with so few limitations.
The ability to earn Guest of Honor awards
Also as part of the Milestone Rewards program, World of Hyatt offers members Guest of Honor awards. With this benefit, eligible members can gift Globalist perks to others. Each Guest of Honor award is valid for a stay of up to seven nights, and can be used on a cash or award stay.
Best of all, for each Guest of Honor stay that you gift to someone else, you’ll automatically receive one extra elite night toward status, which is an awesome benefit.
Anyone who spends a lot of time on the road wants their family to travel comfortably as well, which is why I love this perk so much. I use this all the time when traveling with family and friends, and when I’m looking to book multiple rooms.
Best of all, Guest of Honor awards aren’t even the only rewards that you can gift others. You can also earn club access awards, which can be used to grant lounge access to friends and family, regardless of whether or not they’re traveling with you.
The best status breakfast benefit
As far as I’m concerned, Hyatt offers the best top tier elite breakfast benefit of any hotel group, given that full breakfast is offered at all hotels, including gratuity. To compare that to my two backup hotel groups, Marriott has excluded brands, while Hilton offers continental breakfast or a food & beverage credit.
With Hyatt you get access to the club lounge when there is one. For those hotels without a club lounge you get a full, hot breakfast in the restaurant. The way this is executed varies by hotel. At some hotels you have access to the buffet, at other hotels you can get room service, and at other hotels you can order anything off the menu.
Guaranteed 4PM check-out
Globalist members receive guaranteed 4PM check-out. This benefit is subject to availability at resorts, but it’s guaranteed at other hotels. A benefit is most valuable when guaranteed, so being able to stay four to five hours beyond the typical check-out time is great. Marriott offers this as well, while Hilton only offers it for its uber top tier Diamond Reserve status, and IHG doesn’t guarantee it at all.
Waived resort fees on all stays
Resort fees (or destination fees, or facility fees) are one of the most annoying trends in the hotel industry. We’ve seen these added at so many hotels. The good thing is that as a Hyatt Globalist member you never have to worry about these, as you’re exempt from them, regardless of whether on a cash or points booking. World of Hyatt is the only loyalty program to waive these fees for elites on all stays.
Waived parking fees on award stays
For those cases where you do redeem points, Globalist members don’t have to pay for on-property parking. This even applies if you’re parking in New York or San Francisco, where it might otherwise cost $50+. While I don’t use this benefit much, when I do, it saves me a lot of money.
Sometimes this is also the deciding factor for me when trying to choose between paying cash or redeeming points for a stay. World of Hyatt is the only program offering a perk like this.
Two free night awards annually
For earning 60 elite nights in a year (which is ordinarily required for Globalist status) you receive two free night awards annually:
- You get a Category 1-4 free night award when you pass 30 elite nights
- You get a Category 1-7 free night award when you pass 60 elite nights
Stays at those hotels could cost up to 25,000 and 55,000 points, respectively, so that’s potentially a value of up to 80,000 points per year.
The ability to transfer points from Bilt & Chase
Globalist status comes with so many great perks, but one of the issues is often that you wish you had more points you could redeem so you could enjoy these perks.
The good news is that World of Hyatt is a Bilt Rewards and Chase Ultimate Rewards transfer partner, so you have several additional ways of earning points. For example, you can transfer points from:
- The Chase Sapphire Reserve® Card (learn more), which offers 4x points on air and hotel booked directly, and 3x points on dining
- The Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card (learn more), which offers 3x points on the first $150,000 spent annually on travel, shipping purchases, internet, cable and phone services, and advertising purchases made with social media sites and search engines
- The Bilt Palladium Card (learn more) (Rates & Fees), which offers 2x points on everyday spending
- The Bilt Obsidian Card (learn more) (Rates & Fees), which offers 3x points on the choice of dining or groceries (dining is uncapped, groceries is capped at $25K of spending per year), and 2x points on travel
The way I see it, World of Hyatt is the only hotel program that allows efficient transfers from major transferable points currencies (where you don’t lose a lot of value in the process). There’s something to be said for that, because the same isn’t true for Hilton Honors, Marriott Bonvoy, etc.
The one caveat I should note is that transfers from Chase are only 1:1 (rather than 4:3) if you have a Chase Sapphire Reserve card, whether personal or business.
Combine points between Hyatt accounts
While this isn’t specifically a Globalist benefit, one other great thing about World of Hyatt is how easily you can combine points between accounts.
Sometimes you don’t have enough points for a redemption, and in those cases you have the opportunity to transfer an unlimited number of points to another member at no cost. There are two restrictions to be aware of, though:
- You can only transfer points to another member “in order to have a sufficient number of points to redeem a particular award”
- You can only combine points (regardless of whether you’re sending or receiving) once every 30 days
The Hyatt Privé program
While not limited to Globalist members, this is something that adds significant value to my Hyatt stays, and which makes me choose Hyatt over competitors. With the Hyatt Privé program you can receive extra perks when booking select Hyatt properties through an eligible travel agent.
In many cases this gets me a confirmed upgrade at booking, a $100 credit, and more.
What I don’t love about World of Hyatt
The above are the biggest reasons I love World of Hyatt Globalist status, though let me also share a few of the things I don’t love about the program:
- Actual points earning rates for hotels are ordinarily pretty weak — as a Globalist member you earn 6.5x points per dollar spent, which isn’t that great (I value Hyatt points at ~1.5 cents each, so that’s like a return of just under 10%); the recent award chart devaluation also didn’t help with the value of points
- While Hyatt has made huge strides when it comes to its global footprint, especially with luxury properties, Hyatt still can’t compete with the sheer number of properties belonging to Hilton, IHG, and Marriott, and Hyatt’s focus lately overwhelmingly seems to be on all-inclusive resorts, which don’t appeal to me as much
- As Hyatt has grown, I think the loyalty program isn’t quite as good as it used to be with preventing hotels from playing games with award availability, upgrades, etc.
World of Hyatt’s credit cards
There are lots of great hotel credit cards out there, and Hyatt has two of those — specifically, the World of Hyatt Credit Card (learn more) and World of Hyatt Business Credit Card (learn more).
While there are some great aspects to the business card, personally I think it’s the personal card that shines, given that it has a lower annual fee, offers an anniversary free night certificate, offers elite nights just for being a cardmember (without spending), and more. The good news is that both cards make it easier to earn Globalist status. You could even earn Globalist status entirely through credit card spending, if you wanted to (though that’s not what I’d recommend doing).
Personally, I think the ideal strategy is to earn Globalist status through a combination of credit card spending and actual stays. After all, if you’re not actually staying at Hyatts much, what’s the point of earning status?
Earning Globalist status with Hyatt’s credit cards
World of Hyatt requires 60 elite nights to earn Globalist status. Even award stays count toward status, so it’s awesome that redeeming points will get you closer to Globalist status.
Fortunately Hyatt’s credit cards can help you earn elite nights:
- With the World of Hyatt Credit Card you receive five elite nights toward status annually just for having the card, plus an additional two elite nights for every $5,000 you spend on the card
- With the World of Hyatt Business Credit Card you receive five elite nights toward status for every $10,000 spent on the card in a calendar year
This means that if you wanted to, you could spend your way all the way to Globalist status, through a combination of the elite nights earned on both cards. In reality I don’t recommend completely doing that. Rather I think some combination of credit card spending and actual stays is the best strategy.
Bottom line
I find World of Hyatt Globalist status to be the most compelling top tier hotel status out there. To me that comes down to the program offering strong perks to begin with, and on top of that, doing a better job than competitors with delivering on what’s promised.
I appreciate that Globalist members get a full breakfast (including tip), guaranteed late check-out, waived resort fees, waived parking fees on award stays, etc. Personally I don’t count on complimentary suite upgrades (even though Hyatt has the best policy in that regard), but that’s the beauty of confirmed suite upgrades, which let you lock in a suite upgrade for the stays that matter most to you.
Of course, I understand for a lot of people it’s just not practical to be loyal to Hyatt, given the group’s relatively small global footprint, though a lot of progress has been made there in recent years.
What do you consider to be the most valuable top tier hotel status?
This is my first and probably last year as a Globalist. It seems to me that each hotel varies greatly as to what they are willing to do. I'm currently at the Hyatt Regency Vancouver, horrible hotel and really they basically said: Thanks for being a globalist after I paid them. Otherwise have done next to nothing. I would have been better offer making a Privé reservation. The singular perk I received was a continental...
This is my first and probably last year as a Globalist. It seems to me that each hotel varies greatly as to what they are willing to do. I'm currently at the Hyatt Regency Vancouver, horrible hotel and really they basically said: Thanks for being a globalist after I paid them. Otherwise have done next to nothing. I would have been better offer making a Privé reservation. The singular perk I received was a continental breakfast in the lounge (which feels like being a the gate at an airport that has a to-go cafe next to it) . Personally I don't value lounge access and asked if I could forgo it and inside just have breakfast in the restaurant, they made a big deal of what I thought was a straight forward ask. No was the answer, but Mr Mehta the Assistant front office Manager offered 20% off if I paid seeing my displeasure he finally said with the glee of a used car salesman having made a great deal on a clunker, that he would make a special exception and we could eat in the restaurant once during our stay - so we could have the "experience". I declined and am avoiding the hotel F+B altogether. It strikes me as really cheap petty and tone deaf. In general this behavior represents how Hyatt has changed in the decade I've been loyal to them. Everything is just about money and hospitality is in short supply. For someone who travels for leisure I don't think there is much value in being loyal to a corporate hotel chain any more, the perks are less and less just as the points are devalued to make even a points night harder to attain.
Hyatt's globalist program is a consolution prize for their awful footprint.
I hate to say it but I'd rather stay at a marriott with mediocre recognition in the center or close to whatever event I'm in town for than a hyatt 40 miles away
There are more planets in the solar system than Hyatts in Central Europe.
If the questions from the survey Hyatt sent earlier this year come true, we'll all be off to other schemes.
@Ben
‘A benefit is most valuable when guaranteed, so being able to stay four to five hours beyond the typical check-out time is great. Marriott offers this as well, while Hilton and IHG don’t guarantee this.’
Isn’t it a guarantee 4 pm late checkout for Hilton Diamond Reserve members, the new top tier above DFL?
@ Stanley C -- Whoops, good point about Diamond Reserve. Updated the post to reflect that... thanks!
Footprint is by far the biggest problem with Hyatt. Just not enough properties in enough locations in Europe and Asia. Marriott wins hands down in this regard. For example, leaving MrandMrsSmith aside for the moment, not a single hotel outside Lisbon in Portugal or outside Vienna in Austria. Or take Osaka, yes there is now finally one property, a Caption, yet when I tried in early Dec it was impossible to book on points for...
Footprint is by far the biggest problem with Hyatt. Just not enough properties in enough locations in Europe and Asia. Marriott wins hands down in this regard. For example, leaving MrandMrsSmith aside for the moment, not a single hotel outside Lisbon in Portugal or outside Vienna in Austria. Or take Osaka, yes there is now finally one property, a Caption, yet when I tried in early Dec it was impossible to book on points for some reason. Denmark? Not a single property!?! Which gets me to MrandMrsSmith. The loss of SLH was a real setback for Hyatt, and the way M&MS has been executed does not make up for it. Yes there are three M&MS properties in Copenhagen but you only get 1.1c per Hyatt point if you want to use points for these hotels. This would mean 80-100k points per night at the "Darling" for example, twice what you'd pay for the Park Hyatt Paris. And you get basically no Globalist perks at any of these hotels. Moreover, when I stayed in an M&MS hotel in Southern Italy last October the hotel send me a PDF invoice via email and wanted me to pay them directly - it took multiple phone calls with the Globalist line to sort this out. A quick online search reveals I am not the only one this happened to at M&MS hotels. It's a mess. At the very least they should have an award chart like they did for SLH, to make these properties at least somewhat compelling. There also still appear to be numerous M&MS properties not participating in WOH at all. Seems like this should have been sorted by now.
There's a certain type of person who is perhaps best labelled as a "cheap screw." They are obsessed with CPP. Convenience and quality have no meaning. Almost uniformly, they love Hyatt. While they rationalize the compromises they make for the almighty CPP -- oh, it's not that big of a deal -- for me, life's too short. This isn't to say Hyatt has no great properties. They do. Just not enough or in the right...
There's a certain type of person who is perhaps best labelled as a "cheap screw." They are obsessed with CPP. Convenience and quality have no meaning. Almost uniformly, they love Hyatt. While they rationalize the compromises they make for the almighty CPP -- oh, it's not that big of a deal -- for me, life's too short. This isn't to say Hyatt has no great properties. They do. Just not enough or in the right places. (This doesn't mean that all people who like Hyatt are cheap screws.)
The problem with Hyatt cpp is that their hotels are so overpriced for what they are. You can slap a $400 price tag on a mediocre Hyatt, and yes your cpp or value will calculate higher.
Hyatt is stronger than IHG overall but IHG’s breakfast benefit is superior to Hyatt’s - you get full free breakfast for 2 even when the property has a club lounge. Since most Diamond members have the annual lounge pass, you can eat breakfast at either the lounge or the restaurant, or have free breakfast for 4 by splitting up among the restaurant and the lounge. Or sometimes I go to both the same morning at...
Hyatt is stronger than IHG overall but IHG’s breakfast benefit is superior to Hyatt’s - you get full free breakfast for 2 even when the property has a club lounge. Since most Diamond members have the annual lounge pass, you can eat breakfast at either the lounge or the restaurant, or have free breakfast for 4 by splitting up among the restaurant and the lounge. Or sometimes I go to both the same morning at Intercons, such as when the lounge has free champagne but the restaurant doesn’t.
Agreed on IHG Diamond breakfast benefits. I’d also argue IHG Diamond may be generally easier to obtain than Hyatt Globalist; have been Diamond via CSR spend alone, while there isn’t as much of an ‘easy-route’ to the top-tier status with Hyatt (like you gotta stay/spend a lot with them directly). Also, IHG has like 4x more properties worldwide. Eh.
Geographic footprint and award availability antics are my "don't love" as well. While Hyatt is an excellent fit for some, these two issues were always problematic and I never gravitated towards Hyatt. This is in spite of having complimentary Globalist status for years as an AA Concierge Key. And, given the state of the other major hotel loyalty programs, I'm predominantly a free agent. Hotels at which I'm a regular afford perks in spite of...
Geographic footprint and award availability antics are my "don't love" as well. While Hyatt is an excellent fit for some, these two issues were always problematic and I never gravitated towards Hyatt. This is in spite of having complimentary Globalist status for years as an AA Concierge Key. And, given the state of the other major hotel loyalty programs, I'm predominantly a free agent. Hotels at which I'm a regular afford perks in spite of no official loyalty program.