IdeaWorksCompany.com has released a report entitled, “Points, Pillows and Porsches: Hotel and Car Rewards at the Top 30 Airlines” and finds that car and hotel awards are now offered by every major frequent flyer program in North America and Europe with the exception of Turkish Airlines and US Airways. Twenty of the 30 programs studied offer hotel awards and 17 offer car rental awards.

The study found:
– Six airlines (American, British Airways, Delta, Lufthansa, Southwest and United) offer easy online booking of hotel awards (“online travel agent style”).
– Car rental award booking queries showed an average retail value of $0.012 (1.2 cents) per mile. On the higher end, an Aeroplan award for a two-day car rental at Orlando for Feb. 1-3, 2013 priced at $204 at Hertz.com required 8,500 miles–a value of 2.4 cents per mile.
– Hotel award booking queries showed an average value of $0.007 (0.7 cents) per mile redeemed. On the lower end, an Air France/KLM Flying Blue award for a two-day stay at the Hilton London Heathrow for Feb. 1-3, 2013, priced at $280 at Hilton.com, required 135,000 miles–a value of 0.2 cents per mile.
– Car and hotel awards usually represent between 5 and 10 percent of a frequent travel program’s miles/points redemption activity.

You can read the full report at http://insideflyerus.wpengine.com/link/?8005