Nearly all airline and hotel chains have announced over the past week how they intend to deal with elite status seeing as most of their loyalty program’s members will have a hard time attaining status during 2020 for 2021 as a result of COVID-19.
One of the last remaining holdouts was Marriott, but they’ve finally announced today how they plan to deal with elite status.
Elite Status
The status you earned in 2019 would normally be valid through February 2021. This is being extended by a full year, so it’ll now expire in February 2022. That’s in line with the announcements made by other hotel loyalty programs and is a welcome decision.
Points Expiration
No Marriott Bonvoy points will expire before February 2021. Beyond that, your points will only expire if you haven’t had any activity on your account during the prior 24 months. They’d previously announced that points expiration would be paused until August 31, 2020, so it’s good to see an additional six months being added to that date.
Free Night Certificates & Suite Night Awards
Marriott had already announced that they’d be extending free night certificates and Suite Night Awards. As a quick reminder, Suite Night Awards are being extended to December 31, 2021, while free night certificates are being extended to January 31, 2021 if they were originally due to expire in 2020.
Update: Marriott has advised that their policy on free night certificates is as follows:
Members who have active Free Night Awards or The Ritz-Carlton Club Level Upgrade E-Certificates (where available) as part of a credit card benefit, 75-Night Annual Choice Benefit, Promotion or Travel Package, and have an expiration date of March 1, 2020 through December 31, 2020, will be extended through January 31, 2021.
Our System will automatically complete these updates. You will see updates in your Account on marriott.com by the end of April 2020. You do not need to take any action. I regret the inconvenience this delay may cause.
Cancellation & Change Policy
That prior announcement also provided details of their updated cancellation and change policy. Here’s a reminder as to what that was:
For guests with existing reservations for any future arrival date, including reservations with pre-paid rates that are typically more restrictive, we will allow full changes or cancellation without a charge up to 24 hours prior to arrival, as long as the change or cancellation is made by June 30, 2020. Please note that any changes to existing reservations will be subject to availability and any rate differences.
For guests making new reservations for any future arrival date, including reservations with pre-paid rates, between March 13 and June 30, 2020, we will allow the reservation to be changed or cancelled at no charge up to 24 hours before your scheduled arrival date.
Quick Thoughts
It took Marriott a while, but it’s good to see them extending status through February 2022. It’s also good to see them pausing points expiration until February 2021 as that provides much more time to generate some kind of activity on your account.
It would’ve been nice to have some kind of idea as to what elite status earning requirements will be this year. However, it’s understandable that Marriott hasn’t announced their policy on that yet seeing as there’s no knowing right now as to quite how long COVID-19 will have an impact on travel. It therefore doesn’t make sense for them to announce a policy on that right now, only to have to potentially change it in a few months.
If you have both a personal and business Marriott credit card, your elite earning is already easier as you can now earn 30 elite nights per year by holding both types of Marriott credit cards. Quite how much easier will hopefully become known in the coming weeks, although it might take even longer than that.
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[…] spending requirement for Ambassador status in 2020. I’m only marginally surprised about this: since status has been extended until February 2022, anyone who earned Ambassador status with $20K spend last year is keeping that status until […]
[…] Then Dan’s Deals reported a couple of days ago that he sent a message as he’d dropped from Titanium to Gold. Marriott upgraded him back to Platinum status and confirmed that it’s good until February 2022. That falls in line with the status extension Marriott is giving to those who earned status last year. […]
So what are they doing for those who have completed the loyalty requirements & ALREADY earned elite status for THIS year?
As example, if you are already @ 50 nights this year, under normal conditions you would have had status already, from the time of reaching the requirement in 2020, till Feb. of 2022, EITHER way….
Marriott Could reward this LOYALTY, or as they are currently are doing, they Could NOT.
If you can’t travel now, utilizing the status you earned this year & Marriott decides to give the loyalty out for those who won’t be able to repeat a push for status this year, I guess Marriott is telling you, those loyalty choices you already made this year, well they wouldn’t have mattered anyway.
I think it is RIGHT to extend status for those who, “Can Not, yet, Might Have”. It is also RIGHT to reward those who HAVE been LOYAL already. These folks ARE loosing the ability to utilize what the HAVE been loyal for, not something they “Might have been” LOYAL for.
WHY not just extend nights earned this year into next?
Or @ LEAST acknowledge these folks, maybe subtract a year from the lifetime required count for them? They HAVE already earned it.
We’ll no doubt see some kind of announcement relating to status earned during the 2020 calendar year. It’s still early in the year though and they don’t know how long this is going on for, so no hotel chains are in a position to accurately amend their status earning requirements.
IHG has already dropped their requirements by 25%, but their decision to announce that was probably premature as they’ll likely have to reduce that further or run promotions offering additional elite nights seeing as reduced travel will go on for more than 1/4 of the year.
Well well well… first they lower the requirement to 20 nights for platinum (the sweet spot) for this year if you hold both business and personal cards, and then they remove the need for even those 20 nights. Good all around.
have a Ritz FN expiring on 09/16/2020, are you saying its now “January 31, 2021 if they were originally due to expire in 2020.”.
Yep! I’ve just added their stance in the post and it confirms that your certificate will get extended:
Members who have active Free Night Awards or The Ritz-Carlton Club Level Upgrade E-Certificates (where available) as part of a credit card benefit, 75-Night Annual Choice Benefit, Promotion or Travel Package, and have an expiration date of March 1, 2020 through December 31, 2020, will be extended through January 31, 2021.
Our System will automatically complete these updates. You will see updates in your Account on marriott.com by the end of April 2020. You do not need to take any action. I regret the inconvenience this delay may cause.
cool, thx. Now will the extended elite status count toward LT status?
That is the pertinent question…
Late to the party but not unwelcome.
I received this email but I’m still Gold Elite, even though I was Platinum Elite last year. Any idea when it will be updated?
You were platinum in 2019, that was based on your 2018 earnings. If you didn’t earn platinum in 2019, I think you would continue to have gold, not platinum
I signed up for the Ritz card in 2018 and got the free upgrade to platinum (I think it was in 2019) when Marriott and Starwood programs merged. Does that count?
You’ll have whatever status level you have right now.
I also earned platinum status from the ritz Carlton cc. Marriott just switched me to gold this week. Any chance they will upgrade me to platinum ?