No. That's another one of the highly contradictory elements. Some FTers have reported Marriott to be non-committal about whether members will receive the 50 and 75 night gifts if they reach the night targets before August. But if you are currently Platinum from 75 nights, you will be Plat Prem at changeover and so there is no rush for you...

You might think that is clear, and it certainly is for any year before 2018. However, you might not have noticed that the past tense is used... "achieved"...

So for now we're relying on the word on the SPG Lurker, which I am inclined to believe but have my legitimate concerns about the IT implementation of it.

Another data point about "what management says will happen will happen" (but won't). The debacle about promising SPG Golds Marriott Platinum through the end of the year...

Exactly. The Marriott members website is useful, but is clearly intended for the 90% who just go about their business without caring too much about the finer details. Until there are proper T&Cs that cover all of the random and wonderful travel hacks we pursue, we can't know for sure.

The written materials always stated SPG Gold would be Gold in the new program, a few execs gave wrong information in the press and Marriott corrected that after taking time to see if they needed to follow what the incorrect execs said. The point is the company has been very careful since then about what information is released.

As for the poster asking if there is any advantage to hitting 75 nights by Aug, NO. Even if you put aside the nonsense about nights after Aug not counting as legacy nights as has been explicitly stated repeatedly, hitting fifty nights gets you a year counting towards LT status in the new program so there is no need to get to 75. None. This has been stated repeatedly and is in the written materials. You will get no additional year if you hit 75 nights that you do not already have at 50. Unless you refuse to believe Marriott and you are looking for potential problems that do not exist, you are set and get your year towards LTP or LTPP at the fifty night mark.

I thought the sweet spot was to go over fifty before the implementation of the new program to get ten and to go over 75 once the new program is implemented so as to get fifteen total for the year.

Only if you're on the SPG side of the merger... i.e. reach 50 SPG nights before the merger

correct. my bad.

The theory being floated is you will only get the SNAs when you "cross" the threshold. Now what IT will implement is unknown, what CSRs will have the ability to do is unknown. I am firmly in the camp to read, read, read all released material before taking any actions.
To the OP, if having the nights as Plat is a goal, then absolutely strive to make Plat in both programs before the end of the year. BUT, do keep current with the posts to find out what happens if you merge your accounts. Just like they haven't stated what happens to your legacy accounts, they haven't stated what benefits merging early will get you.

My understanding was that in order to have a chance of getting 15 SNAs this year, one would need first to hit 50 SPG (only) nights by the end of July and then go over 75 either when the programs are combined or later in the year (maybe after merging the accounts). I don't think having between 50 and 75 MR (only) nights on August 1st will do it.

Sorry to say, from what has been posted by the SPG Lurkers, you need to cross the 75 nights during the new program to get the 5 SNAs. Since you will start with 84 combined nights, no SNAs should be expected. NOW, will MPG change that? Possibly and probably should. I'm thinking it might be a good reason to call in after the programs have merged and you have merged your accounts. I see so many corner cases, many very valid, and I suspect MPG will be able to make appropriate adjustments.

I've seen comments like this sprinkled around Flyertalk. Essentially from people who called Marriott and simply didn't receive a clear answer.

Now maybe that's because the agents didn't know, or maybe because the IT systems will be set up to trigger the gifting options upon hitting 50 and 75 nights. I would be very surprised if this couldn't be manually fixed but let's face it, for the next few months Marriott is going to be swamped with problems, so anything you can do to have things happen smoothly and automatically...

P.S. Read the Starwood thread with the wiki containing the Q&A with the lurkers. Some things are made clear. Some other elements have no commitments made.

I see your point and agree with you, but when on another thread I wrote hitting fifty nights and hitting plat were "kinda the same thing" many legacy SPG members attacked and said kinda is different than is and hitting fifty nights and getting Plat are different. Apparently that is the world we are entering. Same would apply for 75 and PP.

Yes, it's a Simple Matter Of Programming (SMOP) and anything can be done. With the bean counters running too many operations the resources just aren't going to be assigned for one-off functions. On the MPG side, they will be looking at the combined accounts, some MR and some SPG numbers that I doubt will be maintained separately in the system. The SPG members may have already chosen their 10 SNAs, should they get another 5 just because they have more than 50 nights in MR too? And what about those that have already passed 75 nights? Should they get another 5 SNAs even if they picked the 10 SNAs (many hoping/expecting yes)? There are so many corner cases the cost of coding for all that would be immense, especially for a one-time run. I suspect this will be yet another "one-time exception" process where those that call in and make the request will be able to request what they want (and that would be much cheaper in that many will not bother).

Anything can happen and we won't know until it does. Even if it's not there day one, both programs have been known to backtrack to correct missteps in the past. Keep reading the releases and see how they apply to you and your account.