If we’re looking to book a hotel without using points or if it isn’t at one of the major brands, we tend to lean towards using Hotels.com.

We’ve found Hotels.com to offer good prices and they have an interesting rewards program where you earn 1 free night for every 10 you stay.

The way Hotels com Rewards program works is that when you stay (collect) 10 nights, you get one free. The value of the free night is the average price you paid for your 10 stays. You’re basically getting 10% back.

One thing I recently noticed about the program is that if you use a coupon code, you can not collect or redeem a free night.

This brings me to a recent booking.

Kim and I were looking for a hotel for an upcoming trip. We couldn’t find any decent options using points, Airbnb didn’t seem like a good option nor did hostels. We searched on Orbitz, Travelocity and other similar sites, finding the prices at Hotels.com to be the same or better.

Just as I was about to pay for the room, I remembered that I had a 10% off coupon in my e-mail. Using it would instantly save us around $41 or I could forget the coupon and collect 4 nights towards a free night.

I debated what to do for a few moments before deciding to take the savings upfront.

I figured that if we averaged around $100 per night for 10 nights booked at Hotels.com we’d get a free night worth $100. This makes each night credit worth around $10.

With a value like that, why wouldn’t I just take the savings right away! What would you do?

Do you book your hotel stays at Hotels.com ever? If so, how do you feel about their rewards program?