SHLTP

You clearly are loyal (and very helpful in your posts btw, so thank you for that).

I just know many people w Marriott plat that they have gotten in large part from credit card spend (corporate card). They hit plat every year without really trying and they seem to think it is no big dea to achieve. The SPG plats on the other hand I know seem to going all out to stay in program and change entire family vacations based on Starwood. This also might be because starwood gives free breakfast at resorts while Marriott usually doesn't. But many seem to plan lives around hitting plat.

Anyway both are good programs. I have been surprised actually at how little uproar Marriot members have had for letting SPG gold match w Marriott gold status. SPG gold is simple to get and correspondingly has little benefits - but the opposite is true for Marriott.

Marriott has really been generous so far to SPG members Overall.

I hope they don't calculate merger nights to hit some higher tier, unless they grandfather LTP in. I pretty much only hit Starwood and other chains like Shangri La or mandarin oriental. I only do 1-2 nights a year at most w marriottt.

SkiAdcock

And I find you & others helpful as well. Again, when I responded I was thinking linearly & because I've always gotten my status (re: of airline/hotel) based on miles flown & nights slept.

Agree that both are good programs, & let's face it - both have cons as well as pros. There's not a perfect program out there. But between them we have 2 good programs.

I think part of the reason for lack of uproar from the MAR folk re: lack of Gold bennies is what I somewhat surmised at the beginning. For the most part SPG folk who are happy w/ SPG properties are still going to stay at them & MAR folk who are happy w/ MAR properties are staying w/ them.

So some of the MAR Golds haven't really noticed unless they've stayed at a SPG property & then been told/shocked they don't get lounge access (which pretty much ends their wanting to stay at SPG properties). However, we get lots of inquiries now on the MAR forum re: SPG Golds getting lounge access at MAR properties & being quite happy re: it. The MAR Plats were less than happy when the combo was first announced & they were told they'd get basic SPG Plat bennies vs. Plat 75 bennies, given it takes more nights (and again not everyone does the cc, rollover, etc).

I'm w/ you on the hoping for grandfathered. I hit MAR LTP legit, but if they up requirements due to combining w/ SPG then I might not do as well because I focused on MAR. SPG was always my 3rd/4th choice over the years - MAR, Hyatt, Hilton, SPG.

Cheers.

controller1

First, yes I place just about everything on my SPG Amex card. With that said, I just looked at my SPG Amex billing statements for 2016. If I had the Marriott equivalent, with the 15 nights credit each year and one additional night for each $3,000 of net purchases, it appears I would have qualified for Marriott Platinum without ever spending a night in a Marriott property. Is that allowed by the T&C?

3rdworldresident

^^^

Viks

So what? How does that make it easier? You have to earn 2m Marriott points anyway, be it over 2 or 20 years. MLPT can de done faster, but I'd say doing it slowly is actually easier.

If you have unlimited funds and travel time, then yes, it can be done in a couple of years, but in that case why care about status at all, you can buy all the benefits (suites, lounge, late checkout etc).

joeags

It doesn't matter how you get to 75 nights, you would be platinum. So you are correct there. That being said, if you earned 1/3 the number of points on your non-hotel stays, would you still put all of your spend on that card? I think most people would prefer to earn 180k SPG vs 60k SPG + platinum. Maybe I'm mistaken there though...

I know I have put a few K in spend on the Chase Marriott to hit a few extra nights, but never in huge quantities.

X-ON

​​​​​​My guess would be that at least spg accounts not going to be "grand fathered" in based on their current Life time status. The reasons for why I think so is that
1) LTG with SPG is not equal to LTG with MR not by a long shot hence putting them to be equal does not make sense at least not to me
2) LTG with SPG can be very different, theoretically you can have 250 nights or a 1000 nights as a LTG with SPG.

The same goes for LT platinum but to a lesser extent. Hence in one way or another the actual nights and/or money spent at hotels over the years will be a factor when the SPG accounts get "grand fathered". What goes for MR accounts I think that the crucial question is if in the "grand fathering" process you can can continue to count bonus and roll over nights. If not there might be some demotions on the MR side as well.

Just my five cents

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Oxon Flyer

As thread topic has been steered away from light-hearted dissection of Sorenseon's remark to stuff that's better suited to, and already discussed at length in, the main merger thread, this is a good time to close this thread and invite further contributions be made in the master thread.