kamchatsky

Reading this thread now, I am so glad that I burnt all my pre-merger TP 7-night certs on stays, as well as burnt just about all my points on hotel stays just before the COVID-19 took hold of the world.

It would be an absolute pain to manage all these TP certs going forward with all the uncertainty on travel, especially international.

pazza2000

Isn’t this situation! They’ve already extended based on the point and their prediction where we were 2 months ago, hopefully they’ll do so again as the situation deepens. Perhaps ill prove too optimistic

Counsellor

Good grief, people! Those packages were supposed to have been used in 2018, and Marriott has already extended them multiple times, now into 2021, as an accommodation. They were never intended to be "stockpiled" forever, you know. I think they've been very accommodating; it's time to use them, or let them expire. (You already got the miles, which were the most attractive part of the packages.)

RedSun

Ya, but only extend the FNs and probably TPs to 1/31/2021. On the other hand, Hyatt extends the FNs to 12/31/2021. 11 months difference.

So you'll have to twist Marriott's arms again to get another extension. Probably to 6/31/2021? Why can't Marriott just do the right thing and extend all the outstanding FNs and TPs to 12/31/2021, like most other hotel loyalty programs do? Regardless, its devaluation kills the value of those FNs and TPs anyhow.

Part of this is true. But do not forget the waves of point devaluations and Marriott's system failure for members to track those TPs and use them. I'm glad that I used some of them before the huge category changes. A current Cat-8 property for old 45,000 rate. Those days are long gone.

cfischer

Completely agreed. If mine expires 1/31/21 so be it ... would be nice if Marriott would show some goodwill in the current situation though. Not expected in any way, but I am sure many would appreciate the gesture. In the end loyalty is a 2-way street.

RedSun

Here I just try to think what Marriott has given away as part of the two-way street.

The FNs and TPs have stated 12-month life. It is unspoken rule that Marriott would allow one time extension if you ask. If you bought a TP right before the 2018 merger, you were supposed to get a TP good through 8/2020. But travel has essentially been frozen since February 2020 to present time. So Marriott just granted us a 5-month extension on those TPs due to Covid-19..

Those TPs are nothing like they were prior to 8/2018. We really have ourselves to blame to holding to this long. The value has dropped quite a bit.

rny321

Until this year, I have never had a problem using either the credit card or the travel certificates. This year, I have gone through multiple rounds of rebooking in new locations due to some combinations of hotel closures, flight cancellations, and travel bans. Since many of the hotels I was considering have gone up in category, finding replacements has been difficult. Although I hope Marriott will extend certificates beyond January, 2021, I be fine if nothing changes. Whether my certificates had expired as expected in August, as currently planned in January, 2021, or at some later date, I will find some use for my credit card and travel certificates before they expire.

RedSun

I think we all are led by Marriott to this point trap.

With the point/miles loyalty game, we all strive to optimize the point/mile value. A lot people, particularly the online bloggers, claim to get Marriott point value up to 1.5 to 2 cpps. So we all save our FN, points and TP to get the move value for the bangs.

But right now, Marriott has continued to devalue the points, FN and TP with the annual category change implemented in March 2020. AND the cash prices have dropped due to reduced or eliminated services. So the redemption value has deteriorated even further.

To make things more interesting, Marriott has been running a 20% discount on its gift cards. So even more people save the points, FN and TP and buy those GCs for the cash discount. This is exactly what Marriott wants us to do. Those points, FN and TP have no use to Marriott. They just get off Marriott's balance sheet (or off-balance sheet) liability.

This is one of the reasons why those TPs have lasted this long. With the ways things are going, I see those TPs would last another year. But we just postpone the inevitable. The Marriott points, FN and TP will continue to drop in value. A Cat-6 TP is not really a Cat-6 TP, but a Cat 1-6 TP. Get some value out of it if you can. They are perishable.

pazza2000

Lets hope so! I think most of us will finally get rid of them next year, if given the opportunity via an extension beyond January, admitting that we have maybe held on to them too long. I’m also optimistic that next years category changes won’t be as sore, however I may be proven wrong there.

holocker

What date did they change the point requirements on the travel packages earlier this year? I ordered a travel package right before the change and booked a hotel in New York for later this year I will probably need to cancel.

Ripley62

I have two of these things, the problems I had buying took weeks to straighten out. The first agent 'sold me' different ones than I ask for that took hours on the phone and weeks to fix. Unfortunately one of the CSR supervisors I was dealing with but I hadn’t heard from in a week came back on the scene and undid the resolution I’d gotten to with another supervisor. I was offered all my points back, which given the horrible experience getting these things I was very happy to be rid of. But then this other supervisor reappeared and the TP I’d actually request were put in my account and all the points that had just been refunded were gone. Then a few months later I tried to use one and a CSR refunded the hotel portion Of the partial package, 45k points, instead of converting it to the new system and attaching it to the reservation. The reservation the CSR made was a on points advance, which was odd since I had close to a million points at the time, and the hotel increased in category in the normal March increases. Luckily a very good supervisor fixed that. But she didn’t tell me that if I converted my other TP I’d never again be able to increase it category. So not only did I lose 5 months of but the ability to increase. I then tried to use this other TP at a hotel in Hawaii and in the day I was working out dates, it was at the end of airline booking calendar for rewards booking, the hotel increased in Category without announcement. Luckily I’d made a points reservation online as a placeholder until I could call and over the phone have the certificate attached. Again I hit this fixed but it took emailing Marriott VP office and getting it fix by an executive assistant. Well that one was for Hawaii in July. I’m pretty sure that’s not going to happen. The things for me were both a trap, a huge waste of time, a big mistake to get involved with and jinxed.

I do have one problem, when I acquired these thing it was very clear that for a seven day certificate for a 25k/night package the surrender value of the partial package, hotel portion, was 45k points. Cat 5 partial package was 105k points. My activity records while they were fixing the problem the Marriott CSR caused showed this both before and after the rules changed. Then without any forewarning or in fact any official announcement that refund went to 5k. Yet even after that their fix for the unannounced category change Those 'old' refund level were still being used in my account. If any US business had changed without warning a product I had purchased materially in value or usefulness after I bought it there would be legal repercussions but these were acquired with Marriott points. This change was unquestionably legal but also unquestionably unethical without proper forewarning.

If purchased in 2018 they had a one year validity but Marriott clearly stated they could be increased or decreased in category. Also since any conversion automatically caused reissue and there was a mandatory conversion to the new categories at the very least these end date of the end if a 8/2020. In my case the fixes meant mine were converted at least three times in July and August of ‘18 under the old system.

I really have no big problem with what’s called devaluation because to me it’s just simple inflation in a closed system. Increase FN from 25k to 35k and increase the amount by giving everyone tp with the old SPG cards 35k FN and that’s going increases demand on Hotel in the Cat 5 category and thus since a properties category is solely dependent on redemption demand many desirable Cat 5's are going to increase to Cat 6. Also much is made if the devaluation of the SPG card but it’s not often mentioned how many more points have been put into the system by increasing the Chase Marriott cards earning, hotel spending went up In earning 20% and none hotels spending doubled from 1x to 2x. There were far more Chase Marriott cards in circulation than SPG AmEx cards.

pazza2000

Is Customer Support a little more organised now? Looking to make changes, mostly cancellations, to TP’s that were manually attached to reservations, and in once instance try and date change with a property that has since moved categories, who have in principle agreed to doing so! Any tips on who or how to get a hold of someone more competent to help right now, having had issues with doing similar in the past. Thanks

soy

If you are trying to do a date change, the best hope seems to be do it directly with the hotel and steer clear of Marriott.
I have not heard anything to suggest they are improving, most likely they are worse. All things TP have to be done manually, and the institutional memory of how to do it continues to fade as time passes

SPN Lifer

This makes sense, as they are no longer issuing new Travel Package certificates.

Edit: Erroneous recollection from upthread.

Ripley62

Yesterday I call the regular Titanium number and detached two TPs from two different reservations. Both TPs were back in my account with an expiration date of 1/15/21. Odd that it was not 1/31/21. The one reservation was for Hawaii, Westin Hapuna Beach, in mid July. The other for Madrid in November.

I had made a points booking a month ago for the Hapuna Beach in January as a place holder in case the July was a no go. The agent attached my one TP and refunded the points from the points booking. No problems.

My TPs have been jinx I never had an initial call about a TP that I haven’t had to call back and fix problems with a long call to a supervisor or even higher up the Marriott chain. The CSR I talked Yesterday to was by far the best non-supervisor and better than most of the supervisors I’ve spoken to since I’ve been dealing with this set of TPs. I originally had three in this batch.

I’d suggest if the property increased in category I’d try to move the reservation at the property end instead of Marriott.