Take the points or the miles?
 

I'm returning to Marriott's Rewards program after a few years of inactivity when I didn't do much business traveling. I've retrieved my account number and am in the process of signing up for online account access. Now it's asking me if I want points or miles.

I am focused pretty much exclusively on building miles (yes, I know, for many here the travel packages are a better use of the points, but not in my case, thank you). So regardless of which bucket they go in initially, things will end up as miles in my FF program (either directly, or as a transfer). My questions for the cogniscenti are...

1. Do I have access to the mega bonus promotions if choose points or miles? (I don't exactly know what the mega bonus promotion is, but with a name like that, I'm sure I'll want to at least try to collect on it.) In terms of maxmizing miles, is there any benefit to designating either bucket?

2. Can one switch between earning points and miles anytime, without penalty or cost?

FWIW, Northwest Airlines has a 25% bonus for Marriott transfers; I've already signed up for that (with NW). My goal is obviously to maximize my miles...so I want to make sure that I set things up right to do that.

I'll be paying for my stay with a corporate amex card. I'll need to pay the $75 fee for the amex rewards program if I want to get points thru amex. Does this present the opportunity to double-dip - earn the Marriott Rewards points, plus the amex points? That seems too good to be true. If, as I suspect, you need to choose one or the other, I could skip the amex rewards program and save myself $75. I'm sure others have been down this road before me...

Tips/suggestions? Your help is greatly appreciated!!

Megabonus and miles:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showt...ight=megabonus

"Double dip" is a misnomer in this situation (as well as a Hilton trademark). You earn Amex points when you use your Amex. You earn Marriott points (or miles) when you stay at Marriott. The two programs have absolutely nothing to do with each other.

I understand that the two programs have nothing to do with each other. OTOH, in my experience most reward/affinity/loyalty programs tend to only allow you to earn points/miles/whatever once, and in this case (if I'm reading things correctly), it sounds like you can get miles twice for the same dollars spent. Just seems TGTBT (too good to be true).

In other words...if you stay at a Marriott property, say the bill is $1000, and you pay with your amex card, you earn points in the amex program for $1000 spent, plus you also earn points (or miles) in Marriott's program for $1000 spent?

That does sound like double-dipping to me, regardless of what the IP attorneys at Hilton may say (but I won't call it that if it ruffles their feathers). Of course if I can get the miles through both programs, I'll happily take them. In my case I'll have to pay the $75 fee for the amex rewards program; if it results in an extra bunch of miles, it'll be worth it.

I do points because my goal is lifetime plat status. I think that you something like 3 million points for that. I've been with Marriott since March of this year; have ~150K points.
There are also the 1000 night and 12 years of membership requirements. I joined around 2002, but only stayed a couple of times before this year.

You cannot get lifetime elite status if you select the miles option.

As I said, I'm ultimately focused on the miles. I am not interested in the other benefits. My question really is, if I want the maximum number of miles, am I better off having things initially in the points bucket (and then I transfer them later into my FF account), or have them go directly into miles? Or does it make any difference?

On the surface this sounds like a silly question. Of course, there are all sorts of rules and "gotchas" in any program....I'm looking to avoid getting snagged by them.

First, here is a thread with a miles or points discussion that might be helpful for you: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=629665

1. My understanding of the Megabonus promotion is that it is only for those that earn points, not miles. So if you choose to earn miles for stays, you will lose out on this and many other Marriott bonus offers.

2. It do believe that you can change your earning basis from one to the other. But the real question would be why would you want to do that? Personally, if you can earn enough stays/nights to get bonus points out of the Megabonus promotion, then you should choose points. The reason I say this is that as a worst case points to miles conversion rate, you would get the same amount of miles as you would if you had chosen to earn miles. So with points, you can't do worse than earn the same amount of miles through a conversion as if you had just chosen the miles to begin with. But if you can earn enough points to get a travel package, now your points to miles conversion ratio gets much, much better.

3. Yes, you can still earn the normal stay points for Marriott no matter how you pay for your stay (cash or credit card). What you will miss out on will be extra points you could have earned (upto 5 points per $ spent) if you were to use a Marriott branded Visa card. If you are a member of the AmEx rewards program, you will get your points for the $ charged to the card, including your Marriott stays. Now as to whether the $75 per year cost is worth it, you will have to make that decision based on the benefits you receive (i.e. do you derive at least $75 worth of rewards points per year?)

You should opt for points. Marriott does not give elite bonuses to those who go for miles. If you get a Marriott card, you will gain automatic silver status which is good for a 20 % point bonus. The Premier card has a $65 annual fee, but you will get 15 nights of elite credit and a free room certificate each year, in addition to 15,000 points for getting the card. This will make it easier for you to get gold status, which will give you additional perks like concierge lounge access and a coupon book which has free weekend nights (BOGO).

Although you have to use your Amex card to pay for your stays, you will need a Visa card to qualify for the Megabonus offer. You can split your bill and pay for a meal on the Visa and the rest on your Amex card in order to get the Megabonus offer.

I would almost definitly say points. If you are planning on staying at Marriotts with any sort of consistancy it makes the most sense. Here is my logic.

At a full service marriott and the upper teir sub marriotts, you could elect to earn 10points/$ or 2miles/$. You can basically consider this an instant conversion from points to miles at a rate of 5points per mile.

The smallest air mileage reward on the site is 10k points for 2k miles, the same ratio. However, as you redeem increasingly large amounts, this ratio goes down, in your favor. You can redeem 70k points for 25k miles, a ratio of 2.8.

The air mileage rewards top out at ratio of 2.5. If you could earn enough points to do this conversion, you would be effectively getting double the miles compared to earning them directly.

The ratios improve even more in your favor with the vacation packages. You can redeem 235k points for 120k miles, and have the hotel stay converted back to points for additional savings.

The Marriott Rewards Home Page lists all of the T&C of the program. You can also find precise information there about the Megabonus promotion.

• Bottom line is Megabonus does not allow you to participate in that promotion if you are designated as earning miles.
• You can indeed change your earning preference as often as you wish. No penalty incurred.

Familiarize yourself with the full T&C of Megabonus to determine if the promotion will work for you making it more advantageous to earn MRP for the duration of that promo. It could indeed be worthwhile if can gather a 25K MRP bonus and then roll all of your MRP into your NW account and receive that 25% bump that NW is offering.

Barry

why not just stay at Hilton and get points and miles, or take your choice and take points and extra points, and switch at times that they are offering double miles where you are staying. My feeling is that Hotel points are amuch better value (if used correctly) than airline miles. The airlines have promos up the ying yang every month, with double miles or more (NW) for high tier status. My miles pile up so fast its hard to use them. The airlines also make them HARD to use also. OTOH point stays at $500+ a night hotels are usually avail and easy to get. Just my 2 cents ps Marriotts 75 nites for top tier is absurd for what you get for it.

I came to the conclusion many years ago that earning miles through Marriott rewards was not the best return on my money spent. For example:

If I earn miles and have spent $20000 at full service Marriotts over then past couple years then I would have earned 40,000 miles in my favorite airlines program (in my case AA) and 1 mile per dollar charged, or an additional 20,000 miles, assuming one has a mileage earning CC in the same program. Total of 60,000 miles.

If on the other hand I had chosen points I would have earned 340,000 points ($20000 x 10=200,000 + 20% silver bonus 40,000 + 5 points per dollar spent for using MR Premier VISA 100,000). More if one is Gold or Platinum. Also many bonus promotions only apply to those earning points, Winter Double Points promo (last year) I earned another 100,000, and the Spring Promo I earned 30,000 points. But even not counting those bonus points, for the 340,000 points I can get a week at a category 6 Hotel, plus 120,000 AA miles by cashing in a 250,000 points for a travel package and I would still have 90,000 MR points left over. Since a week at a Category 6 usually runs 130,000 points, that means I just swapped 120,000 (250,000 points for travel package less 130,000 points for the free week award) MR points for 120,000 AA miles, a 1 for 1 exchange. So reducing this to comparable currency, by earning points it basically translates to a net of 90,000 points, a free week at a category 6 Marriott, and 120,000 miles which is more than double the earning power under the miles earning preference of 60,000 miles (40,000 miles and 20,000 miles from a CC).

On top of that, there was a promotion at American Airlines that ended on May 31 last year that gave a 20% bonus in points transferred from Marriott Rewards, so I got 144,000 AA miles for my 120,000 Marriott Reward points. With the double points and mega bonus points promos, my Platinum elite status bonus points, and AA points transfers bonus (if it comes around again) the comparison for me would be more like 240,000 points, a free week at the Vail Marriott, AND 144,000 AA miles as compare to 40,000 miles and 20,000 miles from a CC. A huge difference IMO.

Tip/suggestion:

My recommendation is to make your earning preference points, the rate of return is much better.

To answer your questions:

1. a. Promotions are only avialable to those choosing to earn points. b. To maximize miles choose to earn points.

2. Yes, but it would be foolish to choose miles instead of points as the number of miles earned is much, much less as detailed above.

25,000 miles for a $199 ticket Think about it

This is the real deal - one airline mile per Marriott Reward point. And since you can get up to 18 points per dollar spent, this works out to up to 18 miles per dollar spent!

How do you do it?

1. Stay at a Full Service Marriott or Renaissance, choose to earn points (not miles), earn 10 points per dollar spent. (Even if you stop there, you can get 10 miles per dollar spent after you make the 115K "nut".)

2. If you are Silver you get an extra 20%, Gold an extra 25%, and Platinum an extra 30%, therefore if Platinum, +3 points per dollar spent.

3. If you pay with a Marriott Rewards VISA, you get an extra 5 points per dollar spent, for a total of up to 18 (10 + 3 + 5) points per dollar spent. (Doesn't work if you pay with the corporate AMEX, but you could get Membership Rewards points, I guess.)

4. Work the promotions for additional points.

5. When you've earn 165,000 points, redeem for a "Hotel + Air" award, consisting of 7 free nights at a category 1 - 5 property (which would otherwise cost 115,000 points), plus 50,000 Frequent Flyer miles (can be Northwest).

6. Return the "7 free nights" part of the award for a credit of the 115,000 Marriottt Reward points.

7. Rinse, repeat.

Or, you might even use the free nights part of the award. Beats paying cash in most cases.

Unfortunately this is not the case.

There is a severe devaluation of points if you return the hotel portion. For a Cat 1-5 travel package if your return the hotel portion your will receive a credit of 45,000 points (hearsay from posts here on FT). On a cat 6 travel package you will receive a credit of 50,000 points (this one I know for sure). On a cat 7 my GUESS would be 55,000 points.

Even with the devaluation you would still come out way ahead. 120,000 points for 50,000 miles in the case of your example which is much better than 13333-20000 miles if one had chosen to earn miles instead of points.

I agree with the previous posters who suggest that points is the best earning preference; which gets you bonuses and status - and then to use or transfer those points into mileage programs or awards.