And here in lies the trouble with these certs. Over the last two years, category inflation has made all of them quite useless. While hotel categories have steadily increased, many moving up two categories in two years, the certs have stayed the same.

Megabonus Certs remained at 1-4 or 1-5 and Chase Certs remained at 1-5.

This could be part of the reason why you're seeing wholly points based Megabonuses now.

In order for the Chase certs to regain the allure they had a few years ago, they really need to change them to Category 1-6 validity.

The Ritz-Carlton side of the house has the same problems. Their promotions for Tier 1-3 certificates are almost meaningless to me now, as many properties have moved up to Tier 4 over the last couple of years.