Pay with Points MVP
A new digital checkout feature that lets Hilton Honors members apply points toward their post stay balance directly in the mobile app.
Hilton wanted to introduce Pay with Points at checkout to give Honors members more flexibility and perceived loyalty value beyond booking. This MVP explored a net new way for members to apply points during post-stay digital checkout, designed to support real-world stay complexity including single-room, multi-room, and multi-folio scenarios.
Problem
Before this MVP, members could not redeem points during checkout and had limited visibility into final charges at billing, often leading to questions or disputes discovered only after departure.
Outcome
This MVP introduced Pay with Points within checkout, allowing members to apply points at billing with real-time balance visibility. The experience increased billing transparency at a high-trust moment and established a foundation for future loyalty redemptions.
Company
Hilton Corporation
Role
Collaborators
Platform(s)
Mobile App
Year
2024
My role
I led all UX design work for this MVP from discovery through delivery, owning the end-to-end experience design across charge review, point selection, and confirmation flows. I partnered with Product to define MVP scope and feature sequencing, collaborated with Engineering on technical feasibility and backend constraints, and worked closely with Legal and Accessibility to ensure compliance. I delivered complete product requirements and engineering specifications prior to my departure, preparing the feature for full MVP build.
Understanding the system
Digital checkout in the Hilton mobile app was originally designed as a lightweight confirmation step at the end of a stay. Its primary purpose was to signal guest departure and optionally collect feedback, supporting internal operations such as housekeeping scheduling and inventory planning.
From a guest perspective, the experience was minimal. Guests could indicate they were checking out and leave feedback, but the flow was limited to confirmation and survey interactions. Beyond that, it did not meaningfully change the guest’s ability to understand or manage their stay outcome at checkout.
Despite its simplicity, digital checkout sat at a high-intent moment in the guest journey. It occurred after the stay was complete, when guests were naturally focused on wrapping up their experience and moving on. Operationally, it also remained an important signal for hotel teams managing room turnover and staffing. This made digital checkout a critical but underutilized touchpoint — operationally valuable for hotels, yet largely passive for guests. Any expansion of this flow would need to carefully balance guest trust, billing accuracy, and downstream hotel systems.
Below is the existing digital checkout experience.
Goals and success signals
Introducing Pay with Points into digital checkout aimed to rebalance value between guests and hotel operations while preserving existing checkout and billing workflows. These goals and success signals defined what success looked like before design decisions were made and guided trade-offs throughout the project.
Clear visibility into final charges when using points
Confidence taking action during post-stay billing moments
Strong perceived value of loyalty points at a meaningful point in the journey
Increased clarity and confidence when reviewing post-stay charges
Fewer billing questions or disputes after departure
Higher perceived value of Honors points during checkout and billing
Maintain digital checkout participation to support inventory planning and operational efficiency
Strengthen loyalty engagement beyond booking
Introduce Pay with Points without disrupting billing accuracy or existing workflows
Sustained or improved digital checkout completion rates
Reduced post-stay billing inquiries routed through customer support
Stronger perceived loyalty value associated with Honors points
Minimal impact to existing checkout, billing, and hotel systems
Clear ownership boundaries between guest actions and operational workflows
Constraints and complexity
Designing Pay with Points within digital checkout introduced several layers of complexity that shaped the solution and its scope.
Key constraints
High trust moment
Digital checkout occurs at a high-trust moment in the guest journey. Any errors in balance calculation, charge visibility, or payment application could directly impact confidence and lead to financial disputes. The experience needed to be clear, predictable, and forgiving, including in edge cases.
Support stay variability and complexity
The system needed to support real-world stay complexity, including single-room, multi-room, and multi-folio scenarios. Charges could span multiple nights, rate types, and incidentals, all of which had to be accurately reflected at checkout.
Integration into existing billing systems
From a technical and operational standpoint, the experience had to integrate with existing billing systems without altering established hotel workflows. Changes could not disrupt front desk processes, reconciliation, or downstream reporting.
Net new experience
There was no existing Pay with Points behavior at checkout to iterate on. The team needed to define interaction patterns, guardrails, and expectations from the ground up while aligning with loyalty, payments, legal, and accessibility requirements.
Early insight
Digital checkout represented a rare high-intent moment where adding the right capabilities could deliver immediate value. Guests were already motivated to review and confirm their stay, making this an ideal point to introduce new features, provided they upheld trust, billing accuracy, and operational reliability.
Design decisions and solutions
Guided by early insights and validated through multiple rounds of prototyping and usability testing, the design focused on introducing two core capabilities into digital checkout: clear visibility into final charges and flexible application of points at billing. Rather than treating these as isolated features, the solution was designed as a single, cohesive flow that supports review, decision-making, and confirmation at the right moments in a high-trust checkout experience. Each step builds on the previous one to balance guest confidence, billing accuracy, and system safety without increasing cognitive load or operational risk.
Review charges
Guests were given access to their stay charges directly within the digital checkout flow, allowing them to review billing details before completing departure. To balance accuracy, trust, and speed to market, the experience surfaced the existing itemized folio PDF that guests already receive after checkout. Making this document available earlier in the journey improved transparency while preserving alignment with backend billing systems and established hotel workflows.
Key design decisions
Surface billing visibility before checkout without modifying existing billing logic
Reuse the system-generated folio PDF to ensure accuracy and consistency with post-checkout records
Keep the experience lightweight and predictable to avoid introducing anxiety at a high-trust moment
Clearly communicate the value and savings of using points, while providing a simple, visible opt-out
Defer dispute resolution and billing changes to existing front desk and support workflows
Future consideration
In-app itemized charges: Render itemized charges directly within the app to reduce reliance on PDFs, pending backend readiness and reconciliation requirements
Change payment method in app: Enable guests to update payment cards during checkout using their existing Hilton wallet. In the current experience, only cards used at check-in are available, requiring front desk assistance for changes
Choose points
This step introduced a flexible way for guests to apply points toward their balance during digital checkout. Guests could dynamically adjust how many points to use and immediately see the remaining balance update in real time. Design iterations and user testing focused on making mixed payment behavior intuitive and forgiving. Guests were able to explore different point amounts without commitment, reducing cognitive load and increasing confidence before confirmation.
Key design decisions
Support both partial and full point redemption within a single, continuous interaction
Provide multiple input methods (slider, numeric entry, max-points option) to accommodate different preferences and accessibility needs
Maintain real-time balance updates to reinforce trust and clarity during decision-making
Allow easy reset to encourage exploration without penalty or fear of irreversible actions
Clearly surface stay and folio context so points are applied to the correct charges
Confirm points
This step served as the final commitment moment before completing checkout. Guests were presented with a clear, consolidated view of how points would be applied across their stay, including multi-folio scenarios, before finalizing the transaction. The confirmation experience was intentionally explicit and irreversible, ensuring guests clearly understood the outcome of their action and reinforcing trust at a high-stakes moment.
Key design decisions
Present a complete summary of point application before submission to eliminate ambiguity
Clearly communicate finality to set appropriate expectations in a high-trust flow
Support multi-folio stays with expandable details so guests can review charges by payment method
Maintain visual and interaction consistency with earlier steps to reduce cognitive switching at confirmation
Reinforce value by surfacing savings and remaining point balances at the moment of commitment
Future consideration
Post-confirmation adjustment window: Explore allowing limited adjustments to point allocation within a short, clearly defined window before checkout is fully finalized. This would require careful coordination with billing and reconciliation systems to preserve accuracy while offering additional flexibility for guests.
Final solution overview
The final Pay with Points experience brings charge visibility and point redemption into a single, cohesive digital checkout flow. Guests can review their stay charges, decide how to apply points, and confirm checkout with clarity at a high-trust moment in the journey.
The screens below show the full flow from the app entry point through final confirmation.
End to end solution walkthrough
The video shows the full Pay with Points checkout flow, from charge review through final confirmation.
Outcome and next steps
I designed the complete Pay with Points MVP experience and delivered detailed product requirements and engineering specifications prior to my departure. The work received stakeholder approval and was prioritized for full MVP build.
Delivered design artifacts
Complete end-to-end flow design across charge review, point selection, and confirmation
Interactive prototypes validated through multiple rounds of usability testing
Detailed product requirements and engineering specifications
Design system patterns and components for future loyalty features
Accessibility and compliance documentation
Expected impact when launched
Once implemented, this enhancement is expected to:
Improve transparency and trust by allowing guests to review charges and apply points with confidence at checkout
Increase clarity and control through explicit, real-time balance updates and flexible point redemption
Support complex stay scenarios including multi-room and multi-folio bookings without increasing cognitive load
Strengthen loyalty engagement by surfacing perceived value at a high-trust moment
Reduce post-stay support burden by helping guests identify billing questions earlier in the journey
Establish a foundation for expanding loyalty capabilities within digital checkout while preserving billing accuracy
Reflections & key learnings
Designing Pay with Points reinforced the importance of introducing value at high-intent moments rather than adding features broadly. Digital checkout wasn't lacking functionality. It lacked meaningful guest value at a moment where trust and clarity matter most.
This project deepened my approach to designing within complex, regulated systems. Progress required understanding technical constraints, operational realities, and user trust simultaneously. By grounding decisions in testing, sequencing features intentionally, and respecting system boundaries, we delivered a net-new experience that felt intuitive, safe, and aligned with both guest and business needs, even without the validation of live metrics.
The work also highlighted the value of complete delivery. Designing through to detailed specifications ensured the team could move forward confidently after my departure, demonstrating that impact isn't only measured in launches but in creating clear paths forward for others to execute.