You Can Now Earn Virgin Points for Stays at Virgin Hotels, And The Earning Rate is Brilliant

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Virgin Red announced you can now earn points for stays at participating Virgin Hotels in the U.S. and the U.K. For stays in the U.S., you will earn 5 points per dollar spent, while stays in the U.K. earn 7 points per pound spent. You must link your “The Know” account to your Virgin Hotels account to earn points.

What Is “The Know”?

“The Know” is Virgin Hotels' loyalty program — just like Virgin Atlantic Flying Club is the Virgin Atlantic loyalty program. Meanwhile, the Virgin Red program is an umbrella program instituted by the Virgin Group to enable it to link all its various loyalty programs together.

Overview of Earning Virgin Points at Virgin Hotels

• Earn Virgin Red Points for stays at Virgin Hotels at the following rates:
  • 5 points per dollar on U.S. bookings.
  • 7 points per pound sterling on U.K. bookings.
• The offer only applies to participating Virgin Hotels.
• You must be a member of The Know and Virgin Red to earn points.
• You must link your accounts to earn points for eligible stays at Virgin Hotels.
• Points are only awarded on nightly room rates, excluding taxes, fees, and other charges like food and drink.
• The offer is only valid when booked directly with Virgin Hotels or through a travel advisor. Bookings through third parties and online travel aggregators aren't eligible.
• Allow up to 30 days for the points to post to your account.

Participating Virgin Hotels

Not all Virgin Hotels participate in Virgin Red. Instead, you can only earn points for stays at Virgin Hotel properties in the following locations:

• Chicago
• Dallas
• Nashville
• New Orleans
• Las Vegas
• New York City
• Glasgow

At this point, you cannot earn points for stays at the Virgin Hotel in Edinburgh.

While the number of properties may seem underwhelming, remember that this is the beginning for Virgin Hotels. The company is planning properties in Denver and Miami in 2025. In addition, Virgin is looking at development in Los Angeles, Boston, Philadelphia, London, and other locations. Therefore, it is safe to assume that Virgin Hotels' footprint will grow with time.

Crunching the Numbers on Virgin Hotels Earnings

This deal is outstanding if you transfer your Virgin Red points to Virgin Atlantic points at a ratio of 1:1 and then use them to book award flights. On average, AwardWallet members have been able to leverage Virgin points for 4.96¢ worth of value. That's a massive value buoyed by the many Virgin Atlantic sweet spots.

Even if you value Virgin points at a much lower 2 cents per point, you're getting a solid return. At a rate of 5 points per dollar for stays at U.S. properties, you're earning 10 cents worth of value for every dollar spent. If you stay at a Virgin Hotel in the U.K., the return is even better: around 11 U.S. cents in value per dollar spent (at a valuation of 2 US cents per Virgin point). And the potential value is much higher if you're able to leverage these Virgin points at a higher redemption rate.

Boosting Your Virgin Atlantic Points Balance

Your best option to maximize your Virgin Red points is transferring them to the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club and using them to book award travel. Fortunately, if you are a few points short of an award, you have other options to boost your Virgin Atlantic balance. You can transfer points from six major flexible currencies to Virgin Atlantic. All the following currencies transfer to the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club:

While most flexible point currencies transfer directly to Virgin Atlantic, one needs a minor workaround. Capital One miles are transferred to Virgin Red first, then onto Virgin Atlantic. However, you must link your Virgin Red account to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club to book award flights.

Our Take

This new development is excellent news if you are a Virgin Atlantic fan. The earning rates are outstanding, meaning you can leverage your hotel stays for far more value than you previously could. Arguably, the development is so lucrative that you may want to reconsider where you stay when visiting cities with participating Virgin Hotels.

Will you be taking advantage of this new points opportunity at Virgin Hotels? Let us know in the comments below.

AwardWallet Tip of The Day

Curious about which of your loyalty program balances have recently changed? AwardWallet shows an indicator (to the left of the account) for accounts that have changed in the last 24 hours. Look for this indicator to easily spot any accounts that have been recently updated.
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