While hotel loyalty points that customers accumulate are seen as a nice perk to be cashed in for travel down the line, in the aggregate, they’re a massive piece of the balance sheet of major hotel chains. The companies have to literally account for the fact that they technically owe their customers money. This adds up: seven large hotel groups collectively own $11.6 billion to their guests, squirreled away across millions of loyalty accounts, redeemable at some point down the line. Marriott owes its 271 million Bonvoy guests $3.99 billion in the aggregate, Hilton owes its 243 million members $2.91 billion, IHG $1.73 billion and Hyatt $1.53 billion — all in perks redeemable at some point down the line. The problem is that customers rack up points faster than they can burn them. The gap at Marriott between points earned and points cashed in was $473 million last year. Given the sheer size of the programs, it’s expected that hotels are eventually going to pull off the same fiscal maneuvers that the airlines did, like when Delta raised $9 billion in financing during the pandemic that was backed up by the health of the SkyMiles program.
How many points do you have?
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