When we’re not booking hotels directly through the property’s site, I try to use Hotels.com for my bookings due to their loyalty program.

With their loyalty program, “after collecting 10 nights, you’ll get 1 reward night to redeem at any eligible property.” The reward night is worth the average value of the 10 nights you had booked.

This essentially gives you a 10% rebate on your bookings made on the site.

I recently received an e-mail from Hotels.com Rewards about “changes to our loyalty program.”

Before opening the e-mail I figured that this wouldn’t be good…

The e-mail stated that, starting on November 27, 2019, each reward night redeemed would now have a $5 redemption fee. However, as long as you book through the Hotels.com app, no fee would apply!

So basically, if you use the Hotels.com app to book your reward night, nothing changes. If you choose to book the reward night at the Hotels.com website, you’re gonna pay.

Overall, this isn’t really a big deal.

I thought Hotels.com might require additional stays to earn the free night, luckily they didn’t!

Going forward (or at least after 11/27), I’ll be sure to use the Hotels.com app. This will mean that no real changes were made to their loyalty program when it comes to reward bookings.