Cost of Using Points

[rjcraig]

Hi everyone,

I'm a new member even though I've been eavesdropping for years. I am using points to travel round trip in a roomette from Osceola, Ia. to Martinez, Ca. next month. It's costing me 100726 points. By comparison, round trip coach points would only be 12376. I called the Guest Rewards 800 number and asked about it. The person I got gave me a sales pitch about coach compared to sleeper which I already knew. She didn't seem to understand my point. That's over 8 times as much! I could see it being 2 or 3 times the points of coach, but over 8 times as much? I'm I missing something?

Thanks,

Bob

Ankney, Iowa

 

[PaTrainFan]

Hi everyone,

I'm a new member even though I've been eavesdropping for years. I am using points to travel round trip in a roomette from Osceola, Ia. to Martinez, Ca. next month. It's costing me 100726 points. By comparison, round trip coach points would only be 12376. I called the Guest Rewards 800 number and asked about it. The person I got gave me a sales pitch about coach compared to sleeper which I already knew. She didn't seem to understand my point. That's over 8 times as much! I could see it being 2 or 3 times the points of coach, but over 8 times as much? I'm I missing something?

Thanks,

Bob

Ankney, Iowa

Hi, are you certain it's a roomette and not a bedroom? Because we don't know your travel time, for grins I picked several random dates in April and found roomettes to be 54,300 points, for each date I selected. It is true that bedrooms are very expensive, over 100K points. If you have any flexibility, might suggest looking at a different date.

 

[rjcraig]

I leave April 6th and return April 14th It's a roomette. 532-4 westbound and 632-13 eastbound. Not really any flexibility on this trip. Going out there to spend time with friends and we have specific plans.

I just double checked on the Guest Rewards website. It is 100726 points for round trip.

I found 54300 points for roomettes also, but that's one way. FYI the one way cost of a bedroom is 119588. It is what it is, I was just curious.

Bob

 

[trimetbusfan]

Hi everyone,

I'm a new member even though I've been eavesdropping for years. I am using points to travel round trip in a roomette from Osceola, Ia. to Martinez, Ca. next month. It's costing me 100726 points. By comparison, round trip coach points would only be 12376. I called the Guest Rewards 800 number and asked about it. The person I got gave me a sales pitch about coach compared to sleeper which I already knew. She didn't seem to understand my point. That's over 8 times as much! I could see it being 2 or 3 times the points of coach, but over 8 times as much? I'm I missing something?

Thanks,

Bob

Ankney, Iowa

I leave April 6th and return April 14th It's a roomette. 532-4 westbound and 632-13 eastbound. Not really any flexibility on this trip. Going out there to spend time with friends and we have specific plans.

That sounds about right. The point rates are a direct correlation to the coach fares. The coach fare for a roomette is over 8 times as much as a coach ticket, so for a points redemption it would be the same "difference".

The "cost" of a ticket in points is 37.5 times the cash fare. For coach, (165 * 37.5 =) 6188 pts, and for a roomette it would be (1448 * 37.5) 54,300 pts.

Btw, 1448 is the highest possible cash fare for a roomette on this segment. The CZ has some of the highest sleeper fares of any route.

 

[rjcraig]

I appreciate this information. I just wanted some opinions on whether this sounded right.

Thanks everyone!

Bob