Travel Discounts For Essential Personnel

Although travel has been disrupted for the time being due to COVID-19 and many people are opting not to leave their house, let alone head out for any kind of travel, we are looking ahead to when we can get back to something approaching normal and once again embrace getting out and exploring the greater world. One thing that has been obvious though is the appreciation people have for our first responders, medical personnel and teachers during this unprecedented crisis. In order to show our appreciation for those on the front lines of this fight in our own small way, we have compiled a list of travel-related discounts and perks that are being offered for essential workers for when travel is once again a possibility.

ID.me Discounts

The first group of discounts that we are going to cover are on the website ID.me. ID.me is a website that has discounts for a variety of different industries: veterans, first responders, nurses, and teachers are all included in the categories that are able to take advantage of discounts on the site. All you need to do is head over to their website and verify your credentials through the accepted methods and just like that, all the discounts on the site are available. The accepted credentials vary by profession and you can find a list of the acceptable verification methods here. After you get signed up, you can click the drop down menu on the home page and see all the discounts that apply to your specific profession. It is worth noting that in addition to travel discounts, there are a tremendous amount of other retailers on the site that offer a variety of savings so it is worth signing up even if you aren’t planning on traveling any time soon!

Hotel Discounts

Hotels.com - 10% off - First Responders and Teachers
Hotwire.com - extra 12% off Hot Rate Hotels - First Responders and Nurses
Wyndham Hotels - 20% off best available rate - First Responders and Teachers

In addition to these there are also discounts for multiple Harrah’s properties, Caesar’s Entertainment properties and Horseshoe Properties for varying percentages.

Car Rental Discounts

Enterprise, National, Hertz, Dollar, Budget, Alamo - Up to 25% off - First Responders, Nurses, Teachers
Hotwire - extra 12% off hot rate cars - First Responders and Nurses (not shown under the rental car category. Listed under hotel discounts)

*One thing to note with the 25% discount is that it does stipulate up to 25% so may be less than that. Also, we tried to click through to see what the prices were with Chris’ veterans discount and every date we tried showed no availability, so we can’t confirm the savings on this one.

Theme Park Discounts

There are some great discounts to the most popular theme parks across the country for first responders, nurses, and teachers. Disney World, Disneyland, Six Flags, Legoland, Universal Studios, Wet N’ Wild, and many others all have a variety of discounts off ticket prices.

Ski Sports Discounts

We focused on these since snow sports are a huge fixture of New England and there were some great discounts on some of the Northeast mountains on here. Those include:

Attitash - 30% off lift tickets Mt Snow - 50%
Bromley - 40% Pats Peak - 30% off lift tickets
Cannon - 25% Stratton - 40%
Cranmore - savings Sugarbush - 35%
Crotched - 30% off lift tickets SugarLoaf - 20%
Jay Peak - Savings Sunday River - 20%
Killington - 45% off lift tickets Wachusett - 20%
Loon - 20% off lift tickets Waterville Valley - 30%

There are also other discounts for some of the resorts out west, which you can find mixed in with the other resorts.

Other Discounts

In addition to the discounts from ID.me, companies are also running their own promotions that include:

Choice Hotels - Choice Cares rate for those deemed essential by the Department of Homeland Security (includes food service and mass transit employees as well)

Hyatt - Friends and Family rate available for health care workers all the way through September 12th, 2021! Use code THANKYOU at time of booking and verify professional status

IHG - Although IHG were giving away rooms for essential personnel who relocated for work in 2020, that program has since ended. The press release states that they are still giving a reduced rate if you call their customer care number at +1 877-888-3181.

Mariott Bonvoy - Essential personnel enjoy what Mariott are calling the “Community Caregiver Rate” that will give an instant rate reduction at checkout on select properties booked through June 30th of 2021. Valid ID required at check in.

Radisson - Radisson is offering a 20% discount and a room upgrade for eligible personnel (police, firefighters, doctors, nurses) at participating properties. Eligible properties include: Radisson Collection, Radisson Blu, Radisson, Radisson RED, Park Plaza, Park Inn by Radisson and Country Inn & Suites by Radisson hotels. Valid ID required at check in. Use promo code MEDICAL when searching and discount should be taken off best available rate price.

Wyndham - Rewards program members who are essential employees (also includes warehouse workers, truck drivers, sanitation workers and grocery employees) get free upgrade to gold status which includes late checkout and preferred room choice


Check back as time goes on as we will continue to update this list as we find more discounts available to essential personnel.