Marriott has started to send out emails to its Bonvoy guest loyalty program members about the extensions and changes to the program announced on Tuesday (read more here and here).
Marriott tries to bury the terrible program news (entirely dynamic award rates for stays from 2023) with good information regarding tier, certificate, Suite Night Awards, and point expiry extensions.
You can access Marriott Bonvoy’s page frequently asked questions about these changes here.
READ MORE: Marriott Bonvoy Rate & Bonus Points Offers
Here are the two pieces we published about these changes on Tuesday
“Status Extensions, Redemption Flexibility, and Pausing Points Expiration” Email:
Marriott has come up with a new word for its most significant point devaluation ever, “Flexible Point Redemption Rates,” which means that the point redemption rates go up and down based on the room prices.
On the piece that we published the other day, we expect the value of Marriott Bonvoy point to be valued at roughly 0.6 cents each compared to other programs with fully or partially dynamic options (IHG, Hilton & others). Marriott already uses this for Homes & Villas awards (entirely dynamic), and members can offset their on-property charges at 0.4 cents per point.
Here’s how Marriott tries to battle the question on the FAQs:
Will it now cost me more Marriott Bonvoy® Points to redeem?
While an award night can still be booked the same way it always has been, the redemption Rate of an award night is now more flexible. That means when there is more availability at the Hotel – during slower periods, for instance – redemption Rates may be lower. In general, the range of Marriott Bonvoy® Points required to redeem a Stay at a Hotel will be the same as they are today.
First, don’t get fooled by “the range.” The range already is up to 100,000 points per night. This would cover hotel redemptions for up to $600 per night, which is more than most Marriott hotels charge.
Note that Marriott also uses words such as “evolve,” “may,” “in general,” and “could.” So expect to pay more in terms of points for most of your award stays unless you end up booking a cheap hotel during a slow period when you previously should have paid in cash anyway.
Pros and Cons of Dynamically Priced Awards
Here are the main two pieces we published about these changes:
Marriott Bonvoy Moves To Fully Dynamically Priced Hotel Awards In 2023
Marriott Bonvoy Status, Point Expiry, Suite Night & Free Night Award Extensions Announced
Conclusion
It is difficult to see how this would benefit most Marriott Bonvoy members. Swiping their co-branded cards with Chase, Amex, and other issuers is essentially a lose-lose proposition. So why would you earn Marriott Bonvoy points instead of cashback or convertible points?
I have roughly 800K Marriott Bonvoy points left from all the redemptions I have done in the past few years, and will get perhaps two 5-night stays at top of the line Marriott Bonvoy properties before the program is decimated.
I am not renewing my credit card, that is for sure. They just killed the goose that lays the golden egg. I am a free agent come March 2022.
Keeping the Bonvoy credit card is usually cost neutral, at least you get the annual free night that more than makes up for the annual fee. However as John said I’d probably avoid spending a lot on the card and rather use something like the Chase Sapphire Reserve or a full fledged cashback card.
I suppose that is true but that also means i will need to make it a point to stay at Marriott once per year AND have enough points on hand to supplement the free night certificate which will otherwise qualify for a Fairfield Inn in North Dakota, if I am lucky. At this point, I’d just rather be done with them and become a TRUE free agent.
Totally agree. The price just went up significantly for redemptions at the times you actually want to travel and stay (holidays, summer, etc.).
I was going to apply for one of their cr cards before Nov 2… but now it’s just not worth it. Marriott is being disingenuous when anyone with any knowledge knows this is a devaluation. If they were just up front, people would get past it quicker. It got me wondering as to how even TPG could paint a positive picture of this. And I was very surprised to see that even they didn’t. That’s when you know it’s VERY bad!
A good reminder of why you should always keep points in transferrable currencies.
Technically, Marriott points are a transferrable currency to numerous airline partners (at least for now). Although I think its just a matter of time before they devalue their 60k -> 25k airline points conversion ratio.
Key word = “technically” 😉
True. This will be gutted soon. You can compare the conversion rates from Hilton and IHG to airlines…