Buy 5000 or more SPG Starpoints at 30% discount - till 1 July 2016

Hot off the press, SPG has announced a 30% discount on the purchase of Starpoints for all members with accounts that have been active for a minimum of 14 days. This appears to be SPG's biggest discount on sale of Starpoints. (HT to reader Pranay)

Starwood normally sells 500 Starpoints at US$17.50, which works out roughly to Rs 2.35 a point (3.5 US$ Cents), but under this offer, you can get them at Rs 1.64 (approx 2.45 US$ Cents) if you buy 5,000 or more Starpoints by 1 July 2016. You can purchase up to 30,000 Starpoints in a calendar year. But the question is, should you.

I value Starpoints at Rs 1.43 apiece. The price under this offer is about Rs 1.64 per Starpoint, if you buy 5000 Starpoints or more. You can access this offer here, and the related FAQs here.

Room night awards

Now let's take a look at how much a paid night costs at various SPG hotels in India, and the number of Starpoints required at each of those hotels for an award night. I've calculated the value per Starpoint at each of those hotels, and come up with two lists - the first, where the effective rate per Starpoint is equal to or more than the purchase price of Rs 1.64 under this offer, and the others which yield a value lower than that. Mind you, I'm looking rates in October, and being holiday season, the paid rates are quite high in many of the hotels.

Basically, for the above hotels, you can actually buy Starpoints under this 30% discount promotion, and come out saving a bit. For instance, 2 paid nights at the Sheraton Hyderabad will require 6,000 Starpoints, which you can buy for $147 (or about Rs 9,849). Against this, you'll be paying Rs 13,168 if you're booking a paid rate. That's a discount of over Rs 3,300 (or 25%), which is super!

Westin Mumbai

Two nights at the Le Meridien Jaipur will cost you Rs 9,849 (6,000 points after the 30% discount) as against a cash value of Rs 24,796, or a saving of over 60%! Isn't that fabulous?

On the contrary, you should avoid using Starpoints bought at this rate, at the following hotels:

Note: The above prices were taken about a week ago, for a weekend night (8-9 October 2016). Because prices keep changing dynamically, you should check out the current prices. I've also considered 1US$ = Rs 67.

Pro tip: For any hotel that you decide, determine the value per point by dividing the paid rate (from the SPG website) by the number of Starpoints required. If that value per point is greater than 1.64, you should consider buying Starpoints under this offer.

There are also the usual aspirational properties, but I won't get into those, considering how much value you can get even at the routine properties, as I've demonstrated above.

Airline miles

Starpoints are considered a very valuable currency mainly because of the ability to convert them into airline miles at a 1:1 ratio (in most cases). What's more, if you convert 20,000 Starpoints (or multiples thereof), Starwood automatically gives you a 25% bonus upon conversion to airline miles. So you can convert 30,000 Starpoints into 35,000 airline miles, if you think that's worth the price of $735 (about Rs 49,245). From an Indian standpoint, I wouldn't convert Starpoints into JP miles, but there are more opportunities in the US, to get a good value from such a conversion.

Conclusion

I always recommend not buying points / miles speculatively. However, if you have a stay coming up, you should seriously consider this promotion. I've got 3 nights coming up overseas, and I'm wondering if it would be really useful to consider buying points under this promotion, for that stay.

Readers, what do you think of this promotion? Are you inclined to buy Starpoints at this price?