Tesco Clubcard spend or swap?

X_romft

I recently exchanged £19 worth of Tesco Clubcard vouchers for £37 in Best Western hotel partner vouchers. I used them to book a one-night stay in Maidenhead, getting a king room with breakfast for £37 in vouchers plus £75 cash.

The hotel was lovely and the staff were really friendly. However, while checking in, there was a small issue with the booking—and that’s when I learned two surprising things:

1. The hotel only receives £19 (the original Clubcard value).

2. Booking the same room with breakfast directly through the hotel that night would’ve cost just £79.

So now I’m wondering:

Did I lose £15 by using the vouchers (£37 + £75 = £112 vs. £79 direct)?

Or did I technically save £4 (£19 Clubcard vouchers = £79 room cost)?

Would love to hear if anyone else has experienced something similar!

flaneurs_lobster

When you say that the hotel room would have cost £79 if booked "that night" do you mean if booked on the same day as your stay, or if booked at the same time as your booking with the voucher? 

Not sure if the details of the Clubcard/Best Western voucher business arrangement is relevant to the customer, Best Western is a franchise-like business of independent hotels (at least in the UK) so presumably the individual properties can choose to participate in the promotion (attracting customers) or not (charge more money). 

This bit of the Best Western/Clubcard website is relevant

*The ‘Tesco Clubcard Rate’ mirrors the hotel’s ‘Flexible Bed & Breakfast Rate’ for price and, like all hotel rates, the price may fluctuate over time.  Please note, the Tesco Clubcard Rate does have terms and conditions which are different from the hotel’s Flexible rates. 

Hotel room prices are the very definition of "dynamic pricing", although the major budget chains like Premier Inn, Travelodge which are competing hard on price are less so. 

Don't think it's healthy in these cases to "what if...", buyer's regret can be downright depressing. If you were happy with the price paid for the room and service you received then that's a win.

Definitely worth checking a price directly with a hotel, especially if you've found them via one of the aggregator sites like booking.com or if you are contemplating a promotion deal like the Tesco one. 

Exodi

I'd say it's good practice when booking hotels to shop around first.

I use Google for hotels (it has it's own hotel function) and it checks the majority of sites (e.g. booking.com, hotels.com, direct, trivago, etc):

https://www.google.com/travel/search

It's not uncommon that the price for something using Tesco vouchers is higher than booking it through a different method, as you have found out, especially as you can't combine with other discounts. To that end, we are very selective with how we use our Tesco vouchers.

It's not surprising that the hotel only receives the original Clubcard value, it seems a reasonable arrangement for the hotels to sign up to in exchange for increased business. If they didn't like it, they're free to remove themselves from the partner program of course.

It's not a fair comparison to compare £112 vs £79 because this was done at two different times and prices constantly fluctuate. Turning up on the day where they have lots of empty rooms causes many hotels to charge less. The time to compare prices would have been at the point of booking.

A relatively cheap lesson at least.