"Grooming" Award Bookings

This is a reminder that the fun of travel planning doesn't end when you've made all your award bookings.  You still need to check up on them from time to time, and sometimes it can pay off.  For an upcoming trip, I booked a single night at the Hilton Paddington in London.  A single nights stay there runs 70,000 Hilton Honors points.  But, I wanted to try out the Tower Rooms, which are in a relatively new wing of that hotel and feature access to their own lounge. So I booked a Hilton "Premium Room Reward" at a higher rate:

On a cash basis, Tower rooms run around £75 more per night than the base level (Double Hilton Guest Room, bookable for 70,000 points), so for an extra 37,000 points I was getting approx. $112 in value.  That's a .3CPP, or pretty much exactly what I think Hilton points are worth.  So, not a bad deal, but not a great one.  Today I was checking up on my reservations and comparing them to the rates currently available.  For the same night, I saw this:

Same room, same night, 34,000 points less!  You can be sure I made a new booking and cancelled my old one.  Now, for a 3,441 point premium, I'm getting the same £75 of value.  That means I'm now getting a fantastic 3.25 CPP return on those additional points!

FWIW, the Paddington seems to be having a bit of a sale on some premium rooms.  The Double Executive Room (two categories up from the base room) currently costs fewer points than a base level room:

And that's for a room that also includes lounge access.  Not a bad deal at all!