The bonus deals are awesome! We leveraged a travel package into (3) Biz Class tickets DC-Bangkok last year. Transferred to US Airways and got award Tix on ANA/United.

There wasn't a Delta one.....Last one was May 2010

thanks will keep an eye out for it!

Question about flight portion of vacation packages
 

Seems that the consensus for best use of points is the vacation packages. I searched here and couldn't find how the flight portion of this works exactly.

According to the T's & C's on the Marriott site you call your airline of choice and find out how many miles you need. Then Marriott will transfer that amount to your FF account . So is this a 1:1 point/mile transfer? Is it based on saver awards or full price awards? If it takes up to 6 weeks to transfer what if award flight availability disappears? Once the miles hit your airline FF account are you then booking an award flight on your own with no consideration from Marriott?

Sorry for all the questions, Thanks in advance for the answers.

Actually, you just tell Marriott how many you want. If you look at the redemption chart, you have several options (if you have enough points, just go with the maximum, I would think).

Depends on the airline, but for US airlines (plus Aeroplan, British Airways, and a couple of others), the answer is yes.

What you do with the miles, once they hit your account, is of no consequence (you could transfer them over and give them to charity or buy a TV, if you like). They market it like you're purchasing a hotel and a flight with Marriott points, but really, you're just getting a 7 night stay certificate and transferring up to 120k points into miles.

You run that risk, if you've already got your flights picked out, but it doesn't take anything like 6 weeks. Last time I did it for BA, it took about two days, I think. They will also expedite it for a small fee (waived if you're platinum). I'm actually not sure if the 2 days it took for me was the "normal" time or if that was expedited with the fee waved.

Yes.



The award chart is here, so you can see the different hotel categories/tiers and airlines. Basically, you pick the category/tier of hotel, then tell them how many miles you want (you have four choices), then give them your FF number.

OK....Thanks for clearing that up for me about the airline portion.

Using the Cat 6, 50k miles award for 230,000 points as an example-

50k points transfers to my airline. Leaving 180k points that go towards a 7 night Cat 6 stay witch at 30k points a night (using the redeem 4 nights get the 5th free) equals the same 180k points if I do the package or not.

So what's the benefit here? The 25% Hertz discount?

I've never used the Hertz certificate that comes with the award. The benefit is that one airline mile is more valuable than one Marriott point, and the ability to convert points to miles at a 1:1 ratio is a wonderful thing.

Obviously, that's going to depend on how you choose to use the airline miles, but since miles are the only way I'm going to be flying in first class on long haul international flights, I'll convert as many points as Marriott will allow at a 1:1 ratio.

The benefit is the 1:1 conversion rate marriott points:miles.

We would all redeem the maximum option to get 120,000 Miles at 1:1

Using the airline examples above if you convert points to miles as a non travel package option you would have to use 125,000 points to get 50,000 Miles. That is why the Travel Package is such a good deal.

I have personally used travel packages for just 3 night stays to get the better Miles ratio.

I am also new to Marriott Rewards and I have a few more questions for the experts here when I am reading this thread:

So, if my flight only need 75K, can I still use the 120K? or can I only be able to select 70K or 100K package.

Or do I have to use my miles at all, say I am going to stay somewhere for 7 nights anyway but going to purchase my flights, can I just pick any package and transfer the miles while I make my hotel booking?

OK.....starting to see the light! Now how do I find those 3 night travel packages? I only see 7 nights.

You can use the miles and stay separate. You can transfer to United and buy tickets for your stay on AA. The miles are yours to do with whatever you want. You are not booking the flights through Marriott. They are just depositing the miles associated with your Travel Package to your FF account.

There are only 7 night travel packages.

I am sorry I did not make it clear. What I meant to say was that the 1:1 conversion rate is so good, that I will use my 7 night voucher for less than 7 nights.

I know it sounds silly to waste nights by using a 7 night voucher for less than 7 nights, but I don't often want to stay in the same place for 7 nights,
and I do need Miles.

Tom

I think he meant that he redeemed for a 7 night package, but only used 3 of them.

In case you are wondering about the 7 night hotel stay, I just talked to MR about the same package last week. They will split it up between a 3 night stay at one property and 4 nights at another. I pressed them about a possible 2/2/3 stay and the rep would not answer, just saying they did 3/4. Helpful if you want to see a couple of islands on Hawaii or different countries in Europe.

Wow--this is big news (for me anyway). I thought they could not be split! There was a Europe award that was multi-stop, but not a normal Travel Package.