Michilander

I might have tried this, but right now we are chasing LT status for my wife. The only reason I have any nights coming up is because I am making a rare trip on my own. Unless they were to offer enough bonus points to trump the room points she would get we are better off putting the rooms in her name. Besides, two of those stays got us long term rates and going to one night at a time would cause the rates to go up a lot.

ehallison

Yes, my husband got the same 12k point offer. I like it. He typically stays 1 or 2 nights, so the stay-based offers work ok for him (versus nights-based). And I like the offers that give smaller rewards as you make progress, instead of a "mega" bonus for staying 25 nights. He missed the spring goal and only got a fairly useless Cat 5 cert out of that one.

He stayed at a Hilton last week for their double points, and we also have a Hilton stay this weekend, but with this new offer he'll go for at least 6 stays with Marriott this summer.

rylan

No email and nothing showing in my acct yet. Guess it goes out in batches.

kklems

I called in this am and they were able to add it to my account. I haven't received an email confirmation and the website hasn't updated yet though so we will see. No stays until this weekend so I will give it some time

Saidoh

I'm also enrolled in Rewards Plus and got the same offer as TomBrady, for a 20% bonus as a cardholder, which I would prefer since I don't fly United (although I guess it would've been a wash since United miles can be transferred to Marriott 1:1 as a Rewards Plus member). It could be that it depends on whether you are United Gold/Marriott Gold or Marriott Plat/United Silver. I'm the latter.

SkiAdcock

Rules for the sweepstakes:

http://www.marriott.com/File_Blocks/...eep_rules.html

Also, alternate method of entry if not staying at a Marriott (snail mail).

"To receive additional entries without making a stay, you must first register for the Offer to receive a registration entry. Then, hand print your name, Marriott Rewards number, address, city, state/province, zip/postal code, country, telephone number, date of birth, and email address on a plain 3" x 5" piece of paper, insert it into an envelope, affix postage and mail it to: Marriott Rewards Global Summer Sweepstakes, P.O. Box 7650 Melville, NY 11775-7650 USA, to receive one (1) additional entry into the Sweepstakes. Entries must be hand-addressed, postmarked by September 5, 2016 and received by September 15, 2016 to be eligible for the Sweepstakes random drawing. Mechanically reproduced or photocopied mailed entries are automatically void. Incomplete entries are void. Limit one (1) mailed entry per envelope. Mailed entries received from anyone who has not registered for the Offer are void.

Limit one (1) additional entry (via stay or mail-in) per person/Marriott Rewards account per day for a maximum of one hundred four (104) additional entries per person/Marriott Rewards account, regardless of method of entry. No information regarding entries, other than as otherwise set forth in these Official Rules, will be disclosed. Entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. ET on September 5, 2016 to be included in the random drawing. Mailed Entries must be postmarked by September 5, 2016 and received by September 15, 2016 to be included in the random drawing. Use of any automated or computer system to participate is prohibited and will result in disqualification. Normal Internet access and usage charges imposed by your online service may apply. If entering via mobile device, normal phone/data and usage charges imposed by your phone service may apply.

GoodOmens

Hehe will someone send in 104 mailings??

igoncrazy

10,000 points and 2,000 miles? That's it?

goodeats21

Interesting that the bonus points are predicated on stays while the sweepstakes entries are based on nights.

orca15

I got to the promotion through this MI announcement link.

Same 10K plus 2K for credit card.

SkiAdcock

Only promo in my in box is a Protea one & also a credit card one. Nothing about the summer promotion. I'll call cust svc this week to get them to sign me up. Sometimes the promos are in my account later, so maybe there is something to the batch process.

Once I register I'll send in a few snail mail entries (maybe 1/mth, certainly not 104).

Cheers.

alc

Here are the T&C links for the different version of this promo (not the sweepstakes T&C that SkiAdcock already posted this morning)

10K for 5 stays, starting at the 2nd stay

10K for 5 stays, starting at the 2nd stay + 2K for 6th for being RewardsPlus

10K for 5 stays, starting at the 2nd stay + 2K for 6th for having Marriott CC

Michilander

Can't, for the life of me, figure out how Marriott figures it would be better off if we did short stays instead of long stays.

This year, as has been true for a number of years now, we will get enough nights that both of us would make Platinum if we split them. And, we stay at a lot of full service hotels. We spend a goodly chunk of change at Marriott every year. Why in the world would they want us to change our behavior? Seems to me that they would want to encourage us to continue our current behavior.

Besides, isn't it a time honored FT tradition; grumping about things that don't break your way?

sdsearch

Well, as you can see, these promos are not particularly targeted, so there's no way they can be encouraging your current behavior if they don't know what your current behavior is (the designers of this one-size-fits-all promo).

In other words, i didn't meant they're traying to change your specific behavior, just that they're designed to get people to stay more.

And you're missing a point about long stays vs short stays. Only some smarter people like you and I figure out that you max out stay promos with short stays. Many other people just don't do the math, and so don't ever shorten their stays (or even think about it).

So Marriott doesn't want you do shorter stays; Marriott wants you to do longer stays so that it doesn't have to give as many points! They're hoping you don't figure out (or can't act upon figuring out) that "hotel hopping" maximizes your points in this promo. Me, I will "hotel hop" through this promo, simply because I'm already "hotel hopping" through stay-based promos at other hotel programs this summer. (And my only big vacation this summer is in a quite expensive place, so all my hotels there are on points anyway.)

I belong to lots of hotel programs, including some where every single promo is always stay-based, so I'm used to doing my "everyday" stays (where I'm out of the hotel all day anyway) as 1-night stays, "hotel hopping", when not staying at Marriott properties. Yes, on some vacation trips I do otherwiise, but my whole summer cannot be one long vacation.

I doubt Marriott designs their summer promos suddenly only or primarily for vacationers, while clearly not designing their MegaBonus promos the rest of the year only or primarily for vacationers.

More likely they're looking at this as a short promo. And keep in mind, the "short" version of the MegaBonus has always been stay-based (though typically earning a free night cert rather than bonus points); it's only the "long" version of the MegaBonus that tends to be night-based. It's just that Marriott Gold/Plats usually get the "long" version of MegaBonus, but in this case there's only one "short" version of the Summer 2016 bonus no matter who you are, just because the calendar period of this promo is much shorter than most other Marriott promos.

sdsearch

No, in fact it's not clear even who gets the 2000 miles version. I'm RewardsPlus, but from Marriott side (ie, Marriott Plat/UA Silver), and I have the Marriott credit card too, and I got the version with 12,000 points period (phrased 10,000 points plus 2,000 more points) for having the credit card.

So it's not necessarily as simple as being RewardsPlus. Maybe it's being RewardsPlus and not having the Marriott credit card, or maybe it's being RewardsPlus from the UA side as opposed to from the Marriott side?

Plus, the RewardsPlus version sounds very confusing. You get 2000 bonus miles, but only if you earn points? Since:
(And that's from the T&Cs of the RewardsPlus version!)