Hotelbeds, the world’s leading bedbank, has today confirmed a first-of-a-kind strategic partnership with Credit Union Travel (CU Travel), the official travel partner of the credit union industry in the United States.
CU Travel offers exclusive travel discounts to credit unions – a form of financial cooperatives popular in the United States that are owned by members and offer traditional banking services – who in turn offer the deals to their consumer members.
As part of the agreement the 180,000 hotel properties available from Hotelbeds globally, many of which are directly contracted at the best price and under exclusive terms & conditions, now gain access to CU Travel’s 12 million users across the United States.
This news follows a strategic push from Hotelbeds to work with more closed-user groups – such as points redemption schemes, employee benefits programs and loyalty cards – as part of the company’s commitment to provide hotel partners with high-value and incremental bookings.
Many reservations from this channel come from long-haul markets and on average book further in advance, pay higher rates, cancel less, stay longer, spend more in destination, and return more often.
Already the company can confirm over 50 existing closed-user group clients, many of them in the North American market.
Jason Soss, Global Head of Strategic Partnerships, Bedbank at Hotelbeds states: “I just know that our 180,000 hotel partners around the world will be hugely excited to hear that we will be working with CU Travel.
“Hoteliers everywhere are always looking for new ways to access incremental, high-value bookings from channels that they couldn´t access easily themselves. What better way to do that than through accessing the 120 million members of credit unions across the United States?
“We’ve been working hard over the last few years to offer our hotel partners access to more and more closed-user groups, such as CU Travel, and I´m pleased to confirm that we now have over 50 such partners, including loyalty cards, points redemption programs, and employee benefit schemes.”
Mike Neill, CU Travel Board Member and founder of ServiStar Consulting, comments “Credit Unions are known for providing tremendous value to their loyal members through great products, as well as personalized customer service. Our strategy is to help credit unions expand their reach by offering a great product – over 180,000 hotel properties worldwide, many sourced under exclusive terms at the best prices – for their members whilst generating both interest and non-interest income. It’s the ultimate win-win!”
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