Well.

I believe Marriott had a promo for last winter, which I worked on. Then they had the special Megabonus promo (50K for a lot of us) which I didn't get to use because of my employment situation, but I'm finishing the current 30K deal, and just signed up for the Fall Mega-do for another 50K.

As a Platinum, that's well over 150K bonus points just for staying in Marriott properties. Can you say 7 nights at a Cat 7? As a bonus?

Meanwhile, I'm also a Hilton Diamond. I haven't seen a promo there since they let FT have a 5/10/15, and that was, what, two years ago? And their properties have pretty much priced themselves out of my league (although there is a glimmer on the horizon -- I'll see if I can sneak enough in). But basically Hilton has fallen off my radar.

Anyone else notice this?

I don't know about Hilton but SPG has(and usually has)several consecuative stackable bonuses-which do not require a Visa for payment.
Visa sponsers the current "Mega"(hah)bonus-not Marriott.
The 30k bonus was very nice and offered a glimmer of hope to me that Marriott has gotten past the greediness upon which the company was founded,unfortunately that does not appear to be the case.

Sorry Blackstone is running Hilton into the ground,for some reason I have never been attracted to Hilton as a chain(I can hear the folks over in the HH forums shouting Hurrah )

It is nice to see you back in the MR forums again BigLar.

I don't mind the Marriott requirement for Visa on certain promotions. Marriott promotions have been quite valuable for me, and I have probably racked up at least 250,000 points from promotions in the past 4 years.

Hilton has been running a lot of TV ads, but they have not had many systemwide promotions lately. (I am not including the double and triple point rates available at some properties.) Blackstone overpaid for Hilton, and they need to squeeze out additional cash to cover the cost of servicing debt. This might also explain their recent cutbacks to lounge access for gold members (along with the fact that they give gold status away to almost anyone).

I use a Hilton Amex, and it is my backup chain. However, I seldom stay at a Hilton on a paid stay. I will see if I can get a nice stay at the Conrad Tokyo with my Hilton points next year. If it turns out to be less than expected, I will switch to either SPG or Hyatt as my backup. Both companies have been building more hotels on the mid-service level, and I think they offer decent promotions.

Not quite sure what your problem with the Visa card is, but I'm guessing your company forces you to use another card or else prepays it or something.

Didn't we (FT) come up with some sort of workaround for that? Something like charging incidentals to the Visa or something like that? It would certainly be nice to rack up a juicy bonus, especially now that you've re-discovered Fairfield Inns.
I was never away ... just hiding.

Whats the beef with having to use a VISA. Just order a few of Marriotts Vacation Gift Cards get 1000 DL miles per $1000 and the face value of the GC is $1000 but you are charged only $900 so you get a10% discount. And the GC are considered VISAs so you will get credit towards the Mega Bonus^

Speaking of the gift cards - I have mis-placed the link, and need to order a few cards. Can anyone provide it?

The gift card thread is here.

thank you.

Slightly off topic - but related -

When you order one of these gift cards, and charge it to your marriott visa - does it fall under the 5 points earned per dollar as a "marriott" spend, or the 2 points (air/dine/hotel) OR the all other 1 point earned?

Anyone know for certain?

5 points. Other wise the 10% discount is not worth losing those extra points

Hmmm - I agree which is why I did it - but in looking back, I cannot seem to locate where I received the 5 points per.......will look again. thanks.

I'm required to use an AmEx for hotels per company policy. So I am a little peeved at the Visa requirement. I am familiar with the incidentals setup but it doesn't always work so it will be a "We'll see" scenario for me. If I make it...Great, and if I don't...No big loss either.

Same here, AMEX required.. I've never tried the workaround to charge part of my bill to Visa (since then I would not get reimbursed for that part of the bill, and at a typical hotel I only have room and tax expenses, nothing else).

So the scenario is use Amex, then on checkout use a Visa card (including gift cards which count as Visa) for some of the folio, and keep the Amex for the rest? Has this worked for other people to count towards these card-specific promotions?

PS I agree about Hilton. I'm Hilton Diamond and Marriott Gold and other than a couple targetted promotions earlier this year, nothing from them. And I'm travelling to a location with Hilton and Marriott properties across the street from each other, both of which are fine and available with corp rates, so I just stay at whichever one gives me a better promotion... without a promotion I prefer Hilton due to the double dip of airline miles.. so if I can't work this new Marriott promotion out I'll be back to Hilton.. though they don't seem to care that much!

Well, if you're staying at full service Marriotts, usually internet and/or parking is a necessity for me so I split that off to my Marriott Visa. And it actually helps me with expense reporting because they now become separate receipts saving me the math.

For limited service properties, I buy a water and when checking out I ask them to put the room rate and tax on Amex and whatever is left on my Visa. This usually closes out on a Visa but sometimes it doesn't. I think it really depends which order the associate does the transactions.

When is some other bank, like BofA, going to get around to offering an AMEX that earns Marriott points? Hilton has both AMEX and VISA, so I don't think there is any kind of exclusive contract. I also have the AMEX usage requirement, but they never check to see which AMEX I used.