Shops Away - Am I being thick?

Quick question - I think I know what the answer will be, but someone may be able to suggest a solution! My OH spends at least 2 nights a week at a Hilton Hotel, but these are booked by a 3rd party, although he pays for the stays on his black Amex. Is there any way at all he could be credited with shopsaway miles in this situation?

The only way he could get them is by booking himself. It's not like points where you can claim for a stay/purchase, it's from the cookies when you book through the site.

In my experience,if any kind of corporate / discount is plugged in at booking time, the miles will get reversed at some point in the future...

Yup - same as discount codes, etc. They do not like stacking offers.
I use a few different shopping portals & check the offer with each one.
For example, I got £15 cashback through one place for travel insurance, compared to only being offered 500 miles with shops away. That £15 got converted to clubcard points - so now waiting for a miles bonus that will hopefully bag me at least 750 miles per 250 points. Thats an extra 4000 miles.

Quick question - I think I know what the answer will be, but someone may be able to suggest a solution! My OH spends at least 2 nights a week at a Hilton Hotel, but these are booked by a 3rd party, although he pays for the stays on his black Amex. Is there any way at all he could be credited with shopsaway miles in this situation?

The only way he could get them is by booking himself. It's not like points where you can claim for a stay/purchase, it's from the cookies when you book through the site.

Indeed, you have to make the booking yourself. It is the act of booking via their website which gets the credit.

Also, it doesn't affect your booking either, but also you get miles or nights credit if you book using your membership. Ie: Hilton via the hilton website will get you stays towards qualification to hilton gold and platinum (room upgrades, free breakfast and wifi), points for hilton, plus extra points for your chosen airline (used to be a lot, just a few now). Also 5 points per pound.

Do it via hotel.com and you can log in, and you get one free night in 10 bookings too, of a value of the average of the 10 nights. Gets 6 points per pound.

Hotel.com via topcashback gives about 8% of your cost in pounds, which can be converted via tesco at 240 points per pound until 50 quid, and 100 (or 105) after that. 6% via hilton on topcashback. It tends to have more offers too (and others via lastminute and expedia too).

So doing the math, 200 quid via shops away gives you

* 1200 VS points via hotel.com and shopsaway.
* 1000 VS points via hilton and shopsaway.
* 4000 VS points (to 50 pounds) then 1600 via hotel.com on topcashback.
* 3000 VS points (to 50 pounds) then 1200 via hilton on topcashback.

Takes longer to get points on topcashback though.

Love this. Can't believe I haven't done this before!

I have a couple of bookings that should equate to a fair few miles doing this. Hotel.com is currently at 7mpps.

How does it work through topcashback? Would I go to shopsaway->hotels.com->topcashback?

I just want to make sure it would link back to my VS account?

Bit confused.

Many thanks in advance.

G-VROY.

Topcashback and ShopsAway and Quidco are all essentially doing the same thing.
Rewarding you for purchases clicked on their links.
Topcashback and Quidco reward in cash; ShopsAway (and BA's Gate 365) reward you in miles.

Therefore you need to make a decision on what is more important - cash or miles.

If you click on ShopsAway > Hotels.com, then Hotels.com will track your booking from Shops Away. You won't be able to then click on TopCashBack to get cash from Hotels.com

Got you!

Fantastic.

Thank you for your help.

Now to start planning!

Ive never done the hotels route. Always found hotwire & priceline cheaper if you know how to manipulate the name your own price.

Ive never done the hotels route. Always found hotwire & priceline cheaper if you know how to manipulate the name your own price.

They're great if your plans are set in stone but not if you require any degree of flexibility. The majority of hotels.com bookings are fully refundable which means you can cancel and rebook if your plans change or - as often happens with rooms booked far in advance - the price drops.

you should also check to see what the cheapest price you can get the hotel room / car hire for to see if the shopsaway price (with flying miles) is a good deal.

For example I booked 16 days IDAR intermediate car hire with Ebookers using Alamo in Miami Airport for end September 2016

Alamo UK price £330
ebookers discount £44
Quidco (ebookers) cashback £17

total discounts £61 so I paid £269 for 16 days car hire

what would 16 days Alamo rental have cost with shopsaway and how many miles would you have earned ?

Something else to bear in mind with Shops Away is that a some merchants give a lower miles reward than the headline advertised reward depending what you buy or if you're a returning customer. I've bought from Secret Sales a few weeks ago and got 6 miles per £, and this week spent £260 (on shoes can you believe) and once tracked I've earned a paltry 330 miles. Not what I expected! Further investigation revealed that the 6 miles per £ is for new customers and first purchase, then you get a lower reward but it doesn't state what.