The right loyalty program for a hotel

These are their own pages, read on 10 October 2026.

D$ are DISCOVERY Dollars, which the page values at one US dollar each. Sunway's page also lists savings of 10% to 25%, by level, on the dining bill and at the spa, and says: "Book directly with us and use your membership to earn D$ on your purchases."

All three give members a room rate. Marriott's terms give Points only on a direct booking, and Sunway's page tells members to book directly to earn. Sunway's also reaches into the restaurant and the spa. These are published terms, not results: we found no sound study of a loyalty program at an independent hotel, and no measured Malaysian figure for how many bookings arrive through agents. Sunway's program sits inside an alliance of more than 850 hotels and has four levels. A small hotel has neither, and native.cards has no levels.

We have not read any agent's own rate card. What is on record is what hoteliers say they pay. In September 2022 the president of the Malaysian Budget & Business Hotel Association told The Malaysian Insight: "Hoteliers also need to pay commissions ranging from 17% to 20% to online platforms". That is an association speaking for its members, four years ago. The figure that counts is the one in your agreement.

An example with made-up numbers. A guest books two nights at RM300. The agent's commission is 18%. Your members' rate is 10% off, and members earn Points worth 5% in rewards.

You are RM21 better off and the guest pays RM60 less. Change one number and it turns: at a commission of 12%, the same offer leaves you RM15 worse off. The table leaves out card fees. It also prices rewards at face value, and a reward paid in food costs you less than that. Run it with your own figures before you promise a rate.

One caution. Before you show any price below an agent's, read what your agreement with that agent says about the rates you may publish, and ask a lawyer if it is unclear. This is general information, not legal advice.

An agent may have found this guest. The stay is your chance to make the next booking yours, and check-in is when the guest is standing at your desk with a phone. Put the join sign there. The guest scans it, confirms an email with a 6-digit code and adds the card to Apple Wallet or Google Wallet. No app and no password.

"Join for next time" is a weak reason to a guest who has just arrived. Give one for today: a welcome drink, or a late check-out when the room is free. Add it under Rewards And Benefits as a Benefit, and at "How do members get it?" choose It comes with membership: "Every active member of the program has it." The guest takes it on your Business page with Add to my rewards, and whoever serves them presses Use reward. Left as it is, each member can have it once. native.cards checks each benefit's wording before members see it, so add it well before the weekend you need it. How to use perks, offers and events, not just points has the detail, and How to get customers to join at the counter has the words to say.

No welcome goes out by itself when a guest joins, and no message follows a recorded bill. The welcome is the person at the desk.

On the join form, tick Phone: "Only if you need to ring or message them." You will, and your team will need it to find the guest later.

Add the rate as a second Benefit that comes with membership. Set Who can see it to Members only, "Shown once someone has joined", and switch on Can be earned more than once, so that a member holds it again after each stay.

native.cards is not a booking engine or a property system, and it connects to neither. It takes no bookings and no payments, and a Wallet Card opens no room door. So people honour the rate. The member rings or emails your reservations desk and gives a phone number or member ID. Staff open the Scanner, choose ID or phone, type it, read the name back and press Yes, continue. They quote the rate in your own system, and the front desk presses Use reward at check-in.

The best moment to mention it is check-out, while the folio is being recorded: the rate, and that it is for bookings made with you.

Count Points, at one for every RM1, and price the rewards in them: RM25 off dinner for 500 Points gives back 5%, inside the 4% to 7% on Sunway's page. Points do not expire in native.cards, so a guest who returns after a year finds theirs waiting.

Points are added when staff record a purchase: they scan the card, type the Purchase amount, enter their own Staff PIN and press Record purchase. A hotel has several counters, and that calls for two house rules.

• One bill, one record. A dinner signed to the room appears again on the folio. Record a bill where it is paid: the restaurant records the diner who pays at the table, and the front desk records the folio at check-out. Otherwise the dinner earns twice.
• Rooms booked through an agent. Decide whether they earn. Marriott's do not. Staff type the amount, so the rule is yours to keep: for instance, direct stays earn on the whole folio, and agent stays earn on what is spent in the house. A room an employer pays for raises the same question.

Add the front desk, the restaurant and the spa as separate outlets under Locations. native.cards reviews a new outlet before it appears, and each colleague's scanner works at their own outlet. See How to run one program across several outlets.

Nobody has to stay the night to join. Someone who lives twenty minutes away may eat with you every month, and for them the card works as it does for any restaurant: Points on each bill, and a first reward a few visits off. How soon should customers earn their first reward? covers the distance.

Locations shows what each outlet does. New members who came back is given outlet by outlet; it counts a return within 30 days, so expect the front desk's to be low. Use more than one outlet counts "Members who visited two or more of your locations in the last 90 days", the nearest thing to a count of guests who also used the restaurant or the spa.

Notifications go to Everyone, to New members ("Joined in the last 30 days.") or to Members with a reward waiting. If guests join at check-in, New members is mostly your current and recent guests. It is the nearest group for News about your business, such as the pool closing for a morning. A member who joined last year and is staying tonight is not in it.

A quiet-weekend rate is An offer or promotion, which "Only reaches members who agreed to offers". Cost it first, as you would the members' rate. It cannot be sent only to guests who have not been back for a year: there is no such group. The text cannot carry a web address, so tell them to ring. An agent is paid again each time it brings the same guest back. Zero notification fees.