Originally Posted by
frisbeeace
Certainly not. Marriott is entitled to do many things by their own T&C including terminating the Rewards program tomorrow morning or just keep devaluating our points every year. However, all these changes do not come at no cost for them. Many MR members have already decided to shift to Starwood or Hilton and many timeshare owners have decided to sell and not refer any more friends as potential buyers. As the trade-for-points option is gone, there is no reason left to buy from Marriott as you can find resales at Ebay at a 25% of the developer's cost. As any business, you can stick to the small print to deceive a customer but eventually you'll pay for that down the road.
Good luck with that. SPG points are devalued almost annually, and they have never reimbursed their timeshare owners for the promises that weren't kept. In fact that is one of the reasons I cite when I tell the timeshare salespeople that I must decline their offer.
However I do sympathize as the timeshare sales pitch is fraudulent in that they never disclose that your points will be periodically depreciated.
Originally Posted by
CPRich
Ouch.
Some math - average increase
By # nights
1 - 0
2 - 7.2%
3 - 12.8%
4 - 20.4%
5 - 0.6%
6 - 12.0%
7 - 22.1%
By Category
1 - 8.5%
2 - 4.7%
3 - 5.7%
4 - 6.0%
5 - 14.8%
6 - 17.6%
7 - 17.8% (actually higher due to Cat 8 movement)
No devaluation is welcome, but this isn't bad compared with what SPG has done over the last 2 years (not to mention UA's new award chart). Of course it hurts more for the high value awards. Marriott does not want to continue giving away rooms in the top cities that it could sell for $500. The timing is rather ironic, as business is expected to plummet over the next year due to the imploding economy.