Five Reasons Why You Should Book Your Hotel Room with Agoda

I've been a loyal client of Agoda for several years now, but I've never thought of listing down the reasons EXACTLY why that was so. But after my most recent booking experience with them (all good, promise) and considering that summer vacation's just around the corner, I figured that sharing with you my experience with them might be a way for me to pay it forward. 

If it's your first time to consider booking your hotel online, then I can't recommend Agoda enough. Although I've tried other similar websites and gave direct hotel bookings a try as well, nothing beats Agoda really. And here's why ---

Agoda Reward Points Agoda Cash is real!

They used to call it reward points, but they call it Agoda Cash now. Either way, it works the same: for every hotel booking you complete, you earn an equivalent number of points. And according to their FAQ:

• No minimum number of points required to redeem
• You can use it immediately or save it for a special occasion

In all the years I've been booking through their site, I've been able to redeem my points for eighteen transactions or for a total amount of P18,847.37! (O/T if you're curious about how much you have redeemed, just log in to their website on your PC / laptop and click on their Agoda Cash page.) 

P.S. There are certain hotels or hotel rooms that you cannot pay using Agoda Cash. At times, redemption may also be time-sensitive. For instance, there was this one time I reserved a standard room at Hotel X and was also able to redeem my AgodaCash for it. Several weeks later (and with only a few days left until our we had to travel), I tried booking an additional room (same type and hotel) and there was no longer any option for redeeming AgodaCash. 

Link your Agoda account to another reward card or Miles account for more points.

With the Agoda PointsMAX program, you can choose to link your Miles account (e.g. Cebu Pacific GetGo, Philippine Airlines Mabuhay Miles, AirAsia BIG) or reward cards like BDO Reward Card, and from hereon, you may then book a slightly higher rate for your hotel room in order to earn AgodaCash AND reward / miles points at the same time! 

Click here for a list of Agoda's partner programs for PointsMax.

Their 100% FREE Cancellation options are also 100% legit.

And again, the reason I can say this with complete confidence is because I've had to cancel some bookings (for various reasons) several times, and it always worked. I wasn't charged a single cent!

Also, if you need to cancel more than one booking right after another, there may be a delay in cancellation for the second and other subsequent cancellations. I think it's because it takes a bit of time for the system to update its records for multiple cancellations under one account. BUT not to worry, it will work. 

They have MULTIPLE PAYMENT OPTIONS.

Aside from immediately paying for your booking, you can also opt for the following:

• Book now, pay later (you will need a credit card for this)
• Book now, pay at hotel (you DO NOT need a credit card for this)

Edit your reservation via Agoda's customer service.

In one of my previous bookings, I reserved and paid for multiple rooms in one transaction. Later on, I found out that the hotel had this policy where guests can only register one room each under their name. So I emailed customer support, explained my predicament, and gave them additional names for my room reservations. They forwarded my email to the hotel, and a few days after, I received email confirmation from the hotel re: additional names. 

If you find that impressive, well, you've seen nothing yet. More recently, my credit card was hacked, and I started to panic when I realized that I had used the same credit card for a Book Now Pay Later reservation I made through Agoda. Since they had an automated system, I knew that the moment they tried to charge me on the specified date and it didn't push through, I'd lose the booking and I might even have to pay a fine. 

So I contacted customer support, and long story short, I was able to change my card and successfully keep my booking. You can read more about my experience here. 

There you have it then: my FIVE absolutely excellent reasons why you should try booking your online hotel reservations through Agoda. I know no booking website is perfect, but based on MY experience, I can at least say that you can expect safe and hassle-free reservations via Agoda. :)

Note: This is not a paid post.