I must admit, I've never waved the T+C's to a FD before - or even knew this was a thing - although have certainly asked about/gently pressed for certain kinds of upgrades. Additionally, my experience in recent years has been that any upgrade generally gets pre-assigned in the app at around the 12-36 hour mark before check in and as a LTT, I've had pretty good luck with upgrades in the last couple of years - suites or otherwise. But I have also seen some pre-blocked upgrades get taken away at the last minute too. Understanding that this may happen for any number of reasons, I would honestly be irritated if I had a suite assigned in the app, only to be re-assigned to a lower level room because some other Plat guest coerces the FD to "abide by the T+C's".

If this language change eliminates this behavior without limiting the # of upgrade opportunities, then I'm all for it. Time will tell of course, but I just don't see this as a doom and gloom "no more suite upgrades" move on Marriott's part. Perhaps this was simply a way of streamlining their check in process because it's a hassle and a waste of time (and not fair to other status guests) to have to constantly re-assign upgrades/rooms to T+C's sticklers?