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Last minute Marriott Travel Package panic – and other things to do today and tomorrow

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Today, Friday 17th, is the last day to book hotels using the old Marriott and Starwood reward charts.

After a period of downtime, hotels will become bookable under the new charts from some point late on Saturday or on Sunday.

Here is the link to the new reward chart on the Marriott website which lets you see the new pricing.  Note that this pricing includes the new Category 8 which doesn’t come into effect until January – you won’t pay more than 60,000 points per night until then.

First …. a warning on Marriott Travel Packages

A worrying announcement was made on Flyertalk on Wednesday night by the official Starwood representative.

You can read the relevant post here but this is the key line:

“After 8/18, certificates cannot be upgraded or downgraded, regardless of when they were purchased.”

This is a BIG problem.  Historically, the smart thing to do with a Marriott Travel Package was to buy the cheapest one (Category 1-5) and then, when you’d decided where to go, ring Marriott and pay the difference to upgrade it to the relevant category.  This made sense because you didn’t get a refund if you bought a high category certificate and ended up booking somewhere cheaper.

The Starwood representative is saying that anyone who did this is stuffed after today.  They will have to stay at a Category 1-5 hotel – and those are not exactly the luxury end of the portfolio – or surrender their certificate for presumably the same 45,000 points compensation that is offered today.

If you are sitting on a Category 1-5 certificate you need to have a very quick think about whether you believe the statement above and whether you should call Marriott today to upgrade it or whether you would be happy to accept 45,000 points to surrender it.  If you do surrender, you would have spent a net 225,000 points for 120,000 Avios which is still not a bad deal.

Who should book a reward room TODAY?

In general, if you want to book a five star hotel in a major city (London, Paris, New York etc) then you should book today.

JW Marriott Essex House in New York, for example, jumps from 45,000 points to 60,000 points tomorrow.  The same happens with the Grosvenor House in London, Marriott County Hall, Marriott Grosvenor Square, Marriott Champs Elysees in Paris, The Shelbourne in Dublin etc.

Domes of Elounda in Crete is, oddly, the hotel with the biggest price rise of all (89%!) as I discussed here.

From the SPG side, lock in (for London) the Great Northern and Sheraton Skyline at Heathrow.  The Sheraton Grand in Edinburgh also jumps up as do the two Le Meridien resorts in Dubai.  The Sheraton Miyako in Tokyo also goes up, as does the Hotel Bristol in Vienna if you ever wanted to try that.

In general it is the luxury hotels which are going up and the mid market hotels which are going down.  There are some exceptions, eg the excellent Renaissance Paris Republique which I reviewed here is going down from 40,000 to 35,000 points.

Who should book a reward room TOMORROW?

If you want a book into a lower end hotel, you may find that it gets cheaper tomorrow.

More interestingly, there are MASSIVE discounts on the hotels which are currently in Starwood Category 7.  If you book these hotels today, they will cost you 105,000 points per night.  From tomorrow, they will drop to 60,000 points per night.

This page of the Starwood website lists their current ‘Category 7’ hotels.  These cost 30,000 to 35,000 SPG points per night at present, equivalent to 90,000 to 105,000 points in the new scheme.

You can find a full list of ‘top category’ Starwood hotels here.

Some hotels in SPG Category 7 are classified as ‘all suite’ and it is not clear how these will be treated from Saturday.  These are (this list also includes some ‘all inclusive’ exceptions): Vana Belle, a Luxury Collection Resort, Koh Samui, Thailand; The Naka Island, a Luxury Collection Resort & Spa, Phuket, Thailand; Sheraton Steamboat Resort Villas, Steamboat Springs, Colorado; The Westin Golf Resort & Spa, Playa Conchal, Costa Rica; The St. Regis Bora Bora and the Le Méridien Bora Bora, Bora Bora, French Polynesia; Mystique, a Luxury Collection Resort, Santorini, Santorini, Greece; The St. Regis Bali Resort, Nusa Dua, Indonesia; Hotel Cala di Volpe, Hotel Pitrizza, and Hotel Romazzino, Costa Smeralda, Italy; W Maldives,  North Ari Atoll, Maldives; W Koh Samui, Surat Thani, Thailand; Al Maha, a Luxury Collection Desert Resort & Spa, Dubai, U.A.E.; St. Regis Residence Club, Aspen, Aspen, CO; and Phoenician Residences, a Luxury Collection Residence Club, Scottsdale, AZ.

A reminder of the new rule on booking without points

From tomorrow, you can continue to book ex-Marriott hotels if you don’t have the points.  You have until 14 days before check-in to get the required balance into your account.

However, you will not be able to book ex-Starwood hotels in this way.  This means that you can’t lock in a deal at any of the current Category 7 SPG hotels I listed above.

What am I planning to do?

My only personal plan, before anyone asks, is to try to lock in a couple of nights at the St Regis New York for September, dropping my current Essex House booking.  I like the idea of trying it once and 60,000 points is a good price.

We won’t be rushing to book the Maldives etc because I have decent visibility of our 2019 holiday plans and I don’t see this fitting in.  I’d rather wait a couple of years until my kids are older and can get more out of it – after all, even if the hotel is an excellent deal I’m still on the hook for four flights ….

How to earn Marriott Bonvoy points and status from UK credit cards

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.

Marriott Bonvoy American Express

20,000 points sign-up bonus and 15 elite night credits each year Read our full review

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.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

You can also earn Marriott Bonvoy points indirectly:

and for small business owners:

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.)

Category

Marriott Bonvoy

Comments (92)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Alex W says:
    17 Aug17 August 06:42

    Rob, I understand it’s Cat 8 that’s introduced next year (there will not be a Cat 9).

    I did think Cat 1-5 was a gamble, so went for a Cat 9 which was as much as I could afford thanks to the Amex MR > SPG suspension. Still a bit of a gamble as who knows which new Cat it will map to.

    • BJ says:
      17 Aug17 August 07:21

      If I understoon his comment correctly, MarkH was told by CS agent in Ireland that existing certificates will map directly to the same category in new certificates with a points refund for those with cat 9+who will all receive a new cat 8.

      • Alex W says:
        17 Aug17 August 07:33

        That would be a good result, though the FT post says “We will convert existing certificates to similarly valued categories” which might not be so good… Who knows.

      • Alan says:
        17 Aug17 August 07:53

        Hmm I’d be a bit annoyed if that did happen unless they gave you the difference when booking down a category.

  • BJ says:
    17 Aug17 August 07:14

    It is difficult to believe comment from the SPG rep given that it then becomes impossible to predict anything at all about existing TP certificates because we do not know how they will map to new ones. If it is true then arguably the best certificate to hold is the basic one because presumably there will be more hotels to choose from albeit not in major world cities. I could believe that with a new cat 6 we will not be able to upgrade it but surely we can likely book a lower category (possibly without points refund)? I recall Rob passing on advice from Marriott Rewards boss during his interview that if we knew which specific hotel we wanted then we should book it now; that advice now makes a lot of sense within context of SPG reps comments. I upgraded a cat 1-5 to a 7 yesterday, might be my daftest loyalty decision of the year, time will tell. I am getting tired of trying to micromanage this already and now faced with whether or not to have a final roll of the dice today. At least I benefitted from the 162k avios with the transfer bonus if the worst comes to the worst with hotel certificate. Bottom line, is I just don’t see Marriott leg over customers with a current TP despite all the frustration of mixed messages.

    • Alan says:
      17 Aug17 August 07:55

      Hope you’re right, although I’m less certain about them treating things generously than I thought! I went for UA so 132k miles was decent. Here’s hoping they let us know soon what’s happening and we don’t need to wait until mid-September to find out!

      • BJ says:
        17 Aug17 August 08:15

        The overall number of unattached certificates must be small so they can afford to be generous. On the other hand, that’s relatively few customers to upset should it be brutal. Given they need a month to convert existing certificates, that suggests there are either much more of them than I imagine or they have a tedious manual mapping and refund plan to carry out. Trying to be in position to book Paris Republique, new cat 5. If Marriott render our two TP of limited use it is unlikely we will be paying customers again.

  • Roger says:
    17 Aug17 August 07:37

    Now can’t even move my points from SPG to Marriott

  • Elijah says:
    17 Aug17 August 07:40

    Hi there. OT but any feedback appreciated. I have “had” household account with BA and used miles to make bookings 2 weeks ago. I now cannot access any of the accounts. Says does not recognise details etc. contacted centre and was told accounts have been closed for a long time as no activity in 3 years. Accounts only open past 12 months.

    • KevMc says:
      17 Aug17 August 08:53

      I would give them the booking references of the bookings you made and ensure they are attached to the correct accounts (Presumably you have an email confirmation with booking reference etc?)

  • Alan says:
    17 Aug17 August 07:52

    I must say I didn’t expect to be able to upgrade or downgrade the old certs when the new system came in – therefore opted for cat 6 in the hope it becomes cat 5 new. If it maps more or less generously than that I’ll have a problem though as where I want to use it is cat 5 and I don’t really have other easy options trip-wise. Here’s hoping the SPG properties I want to use it at still have availability come Sept too when we can actually start booking these! Of course the get-out rate may move from 45k – if it went up a bit I’d probably just take it!

  • Ian M says:
    17 Aug17 August 08:15

    I think it’s dreadful by Marriott to announce (if you can even call a post on flyertalk that) at such late notice this change in policy regarding being able to upgrades TP certificates. The vast majority of people holding them have cat 1-5 and it probably took a lot of them years to acquire the points to purchase them. They bought them in the knowledge they could upgrade. Now Marriott at the 11th hour and not even through an email to all TP holders announce you will no longer be able to! Dreadful way to treat some of their very best customers.

    • New Card says:
      17 Aug17 August 09:20

      Surely this can’t be legal given they said that upgrades were possible at the time of purchase.

  • MarkH says:
    17 Aug17 August 08:30

    Yep that’s what I was told but others have been told many other things so we’ll just have to wait and see.

    I also bought the TP during the BA conversion bonus for 162k avios and so happy enough from that perspective and at the end of the day the hotel part will still have value – frustratingly I just don’t know if it will go up or down.

    Worst case I see my cat 8 TP being mapped to new cat 5 with no points refund which would be very annoying as I just upgraded from the 1-5 TP but taking the avios into account, the TP on the whole would still be decent value.

    Obviously i’d be happy if it mapped to new cat 8 like I was told but if it went to new cat 6 then it’s still not a bad outcome.

    I have already spent a disproportionate amount of time thinking about what the best strategy is so a last minute scramble to book something doesn’t appeal.
    If I knew where and when I wanted to use it I would have booked already to lock it in but I don’t so will have to roll the dice.

  • MattyS says:
    17 Aug17 August 08:49

    I’ve got a current Cat 7 hotel booking for 5 nights coming up but hadn’t attached the miles.

    Based in speculation over the past few weeks, I transferred a bunch to get the 1-5 package as could use the miles and kind of hoped there might be a bonus on the hotel points depending on how it played out. However, there are now too many blogs / FT comments over the past few days being very cautious about this no down/upgrades after 18/8, plus we definitely can’t make any changes until 18/9 which is very close to my travel dates.

    Agree with MarkH , I’ve too much of my time trying to think how this will play out, so ended up cancelling and rebooking the 5 nights stay to 7 nights, upgraded the cert to a Cat 7 and attached it. Wasn’t even comfortable a current Cat 6 cert would map to a new Cat 5.

    There may be the opportunity once the final T&C’s are released but if not, don’t think I am any worse off than I would have been, and I’ve got a late checkout guaranteed given I won’t use the last two nights.

    • Tom H says:
      17 Aug17 August 09:51

      I m in a similar position, upgraded cat 1-5 to cat 7 TP as that’s all I could afford on the points I had. Could I ask what hotel was your target, I was initially hoping to upgrade at time of booking to use the TP at Domes, but that doesn’t now look like its going to be possible and if the cat 7 maps to cat 5 I cant see any ‘sweet spots’ in either SPG or Marriot for a beach type break?

      • MattyS says:
        17 Aug17 August 11:13

        Its a Residence Inn in Washington DC, mainly for the free breakfast now my Marriott gold status will not count for much. Not quite as exciting as Domes and never really found anything that great for a beach break at a reasonable points level.

      • Louise says:
        17 Aug17 August 12:08

        I’ve gone for a residence inn in San Diego with mine

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