40% discount redeeming SPG points in Las Vegas – a decent deal?

In January, Starwood Preferred Guest – the W, Westin, Sheraton, Luxury Collection, St Regis etc hotel group – announced a partnership with Las Vegas hotel group Caesars.

Caesars runs the following resorts in Las Vegas and Atlantic City:

• Bally’s Atlantic City, NJ
• Bally’s Las Vegas, NV
• Caesars Atlantic City, NJ
• Caesars Palace Las Vegas, NV
• Flamingo Las Vegas, NV
• Harrah’s Atlantic City, NJ
• Harrah’s Lake Tahoe, NV
• Harrah’s Las Vegas, NV
• Harrah’s New Orleans, LA
• Harrah’s Reno, NV
• Harvey’s Lake Tahoe, NV
• Nobu Hotel at Caesars Palace, NV
• Paris Las Vegas, NV
• Planet Hollywood Las Vegas, NV
• The Quad Las Vegas, NV
• Rio Las Vegas, NV
• Showboat Atlantic City, NJ

If you stay at any of the above properties, you will earn 2 Starwood points per $1 charged to your room.  You will also earn ‘nights’ towards earning Starwood elite status (capped at a maximum of 10 per year from Caesars properties, and they do not count towards SPG lifetime status) although oddly it will not count as a ‘stay’ if you earn status on the basis of stays.

Starwood Preferred Guest benefits are NOT given at Caesars hotels.  Don’t expect free internet, free breakfast or an upgrade.

SPG also let you redeem your points for rooms in Las Vegas.  Full details are on the SPG website.  The problem with this arrangement is that the redemption rates are very high compared to the standard prices of Las Vegas hotels, especially midweek.

Between November 7th and December 30th, you can save up to 40% on SPG redemptions in Las Vegas.  This promotion is not mentioned on the link above but if you click ‘Redeem’ the point prices that comes up will be discounted.

For November 19th, rooms included:

Flamingo – 5,200 points ($33.06 inc tax)

The LINQ – 5,200 points ($52.41 inc tax)

The Cromwell – 18,000 points ($128.22 inc tax)

As you can see from the cash equivalents, these are still not exceptional deals.  You can usually get around 1.5p of value for an SPG hotel redemption.  Even with a discount, these deals are coming out at around 0.5p, a terrible deal.

Hyatt has a similar partnership with M Life, which includes Bellagio and Mandalay Bay.  InterContinental also has two ‘InterContinental Alliance’ deals in Las Vegas.  In general, whilst you would be daft not to take the points if you were paying cash to stay in a property that was part of one of these partnerships, none of the Las Vegas hotel chain tie-ups make much sense from a redemption point of view.  Even, as we see here, in a ‘sale’.

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How to earn Marriott Bonvoy points and status from UK credit cards (April 2024)

There are various ways of earning Marriott Bonvoy points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

The official Marriott Bonvoy American Express card comes with 20,000 points for signing up, 2 points for every £1 you spend and 15 elite night credits per year.

You can apply here.

You can also earn Marriott Bonvoy points by converting American Express Membership Rewards points at the rate of 2:3.

Do you know that holders of The Platinum Card from American Express receive FREE Marriott Bonvoy Gold status for as long as they hold the card?  It also comes with Hilton Honors Gold, Radisson Rewards Premium and MeliaRewards Gold status.  We reviewed American Express Platinum in detail here and you can apply here.

You can also earn Marriott Bonvoy points indirectly:

• American Express Gold (20,000 bonus Amex points)
• American Express Rewards Credit Card (10,000 bonus Amex points)

and for small business owners:

• American Express Business Gold (20,000 bonus Amex points)
• American Express Business Platinum (40,000 bonus Amex points)

The conversion rate from American Express to Marriott Bonvoy points is 2:3.

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which can be used to earn Marriott Bonvoy points. 

(Want to earn more hotel points?  Click here to see our complete list of promotions from the major hotel chains or use the ‘Hotel Offers’ link in the menu bar at the top of the page.)