Hotels.com gift card: stay for less, or sell it for cash

A Hotels.com gift card pays on hotels.com at checkout for a stay under any guest name — hotels care who checks in, not who paid. The seller books the property, room type and dates you priced with you as the guest, puts your email and phone on the reservation, and pays with the card. Hotels.com emails the confirmation and itinerary number to the guest contact, which is you.

Verifying a Hotels.com booking made for you

Open the confirmation email, or sign in to hotels.com and look under Trips — the itinerary number, the property, your dates and your name as the guest should all be there. You can also call the property a day later and ask for the reservation under your name; it will have arrived from Hotels.com by then. At check-in you show ID in the guest name; the room is prepaid, though the desk may ask for a card of your own for incidentals.

Cancellation, and why the payout waits for the trip

Most Hotels.com rates are "free cancellation" until a day or two before check-in, and a cancellation refunds whoever paid — the seller's card. Non-refundable rates cannot be cancelled at all. Because a refundable stay can be undone right up to the eve of arrival, the seller's payout is held until the day after your check-in.

What a Hotels.com gift card is worth here

Hotels.com gift cards list here at roughly 8–15% off. On a $600 four-night stay that is $50–90 off the price the site shows you. Typical bookings: a weekend in a city hotel, four nights near a conference, a family room over a holiday. Fares and rooms reprice by the hour: up to 5% over the total you saw is the seller's to absorb, more comes back to you to approve. The fee mechanics — 2.5% platform fee, how the discount is matched — are on the travel hub.

Booking Hotels.com for less

Find the property, room and dates on Hotels.com and post them on the booking form with the guest name as on ID and the total shown. A seller with the card accepts within the hour of opening it and books within two, with you as the guest and your email as the contact; you pay from your FlipGift balance when they accept, check the itinerary, and the seller is paid the day after you check in.

Selling a Hotels.com gift card

Hotels.com cards do not expire. Instead of selling the code, list the balance: a buyer's hotels.com stay becomes your way to spend it — booked in their name — and you are paid the day after they check in. A paid request gives you an hour from opening it to accept and two to book; the payout waits until the day after the guest checks in, and cancelling a stay you booked for a buyer ends an account here. List it →

Other hotel stays here: Expedia. Book Hotels.com for less now →