Luxury Hotel Hacking In Bali

Bali… it’s Australia’s favourite playground and although some might think it’s ‘ruined’, there’s plenty of places to stay if you want to avoid the typical bogan crowd. Having lived in Sanur for 2 months as a dive-master, I’m quite fond of the place, and although there’s an established expat community in Sanur, it’s much more relaxed compared to Kuta/Seminyak etc.

Ok, get to the point… literally.

The #1 luxury hotel in Sanur has always been the Hyatt Regency. It’s been closed now for a few years while they did some extensive renovations and it looks absolutely amazing.

What’s more amazing is the fact it’s a category 1 hotel in the Hyatt rewards program. What the hell does that mean? It means you can book a room for only 5000 points per night.

Ok, that’s cool, 5000 points a night is nothing. Base rooms at this hotel are already huge and great but can we do better? The answer is yes! For only 3000 points more, you can score a suite. Now suites are retailing for around US$494 a night *ouch*, but since we can book them for 8000 Hyatt points, we can get the price down to US$137; that’s less than the cost of a base room which goes for around US$149. Oh, and the suite comes with club access, so food and drinks are pretty much sorted.

How did you get to this price?

Well as it turns out, Hyatt or better World Of Hyatt (the rewards program) is once again running a bonus points promotion of 40% when you buy more than 5000 points.

If you don’t have a World of Hyatt account yet, sign up now and buy your Hyatt points here until November 27.

How to book it?

As for now, the suite redemptions aren’t showing as an option online, but you can call up the World Of Hyatt helpdesk on 1300 553 133 and book/check availability over the phone. Since it’s not showing online, chances of actually booking a suite are pretty good. The harder it is to book…the better the reward.

Here are the steps:

1. Create a World Of Hyatt account here.
2. Research your dates (check my guide here).
3. Buy the points required here.
4. Call the booking desk to redeem a suite at Hyatt Regency Bali; standard rooms can be redeemed online as well.

I’ve written a very comprehensive guide to World Of Hyatt, and how to book and research so if you’re new to this I’d recommend you check that out here.

What do you think, is this hotel ‘hack’ worth a trip to Bali?

Update. Always practise what you preach.

So here’s a quick update, since this deal is to good now to take advantage I booked a suite myself. The total process took 5 minutes.

I tried calling the Australian Hyatt number which went dead, so instead, I dialled the US number +1 888 344 9288 which seems to be the most efficient way to make a redemption.

The automated phone system will set up your itinerary before connecting you to an agent. After providing my World of Hyatt number they booking was completed. I booked a total of 4 nights in the Regency Club Suite for a grand total of 32,000 World Of Hyatt points, which cost me US$548. To put that in comparison to the retail rate; here’s what the actual price of this room goes for on the exact same date.