As a loyal Marriott Reward member since 2002, I have always been pleased with the various promotions that Marriott has offered. Over the past year, I have been traveling a lot more (130+) nights per year so I'm new to the Platinum Premier status with Marriott. My complaint is that Marriott promotions generally require 25 nights to get the max promotion benefit which can be a challenge for most but for those individuals who stay on average 3-5 nights per week with Marriott the challenge/promotion is completed within 1-2 months. Taking this into consideration, I'm now left wondering if it really makes sense to stay the additional nights at Marriott Hotels after the promotion is completed? Yes, I understand that I'll still get points as though it's a normal stay but there is no "added benefit or additional bonus points" so perhaps, it makes more sense to stay with another hotel chain so you can have upgraded status with them and participate in their challenges as well...I have contacted Marriott Rewards about my concerns over the past few months only to be told that they could not do or offer me anything and that I should write to the corporate office with my concerns.
In my mind, Marriott should consider changing the challenges/promotions to be a set number of nights equals X amount of points then for any additional nights stayed you earn say 3,000 points per night with no cap on the maximum. This will prevent loyal members from going to the competition. Take the two promotions so far this year; the spring promotion was 35,000 points for the first 20 nights and then 15,000 if you stayed an additional 5 nights (basically 3,000 per night for the last five nights). During the three month promotion, I stayed a total of 42 nights. So there were 17 nights that I could have stayed at Hilton or Starwood property and earned additional rewards and status with them. If Marriott would have set the promotion up to be 35,000 points for the first 20 nights and then 3,000 points for any night above the 20 nights it would be a no brainer to continue to stay with Marriott. The summer promotion is 10,000 points less than the spring promotion for the same amount of nights not sure why it’s 10,000 points less? Based on the design of the promotion, it only makes sense to stay the necessary 25 nights and then take my additional nights to another chain.
I’m interested in your thoughts, please share your comments with me; I'm trying to see if anyone else has any other ideas or reasons why one would continue to stay with Marriott once the maximum nights per promotion are hit? I'm on pace for about 150 nights this year and strongly considering using another hotel chain in addition to Marriott since the point promotions don't seem to benefit guests who stay more than 25 nights per promotion with them. Obviously this was not a concern in the past when I only stayed 75-90 nights a year but now that I’m staying a lot more the promotions don’t seem to value and reward loyal guests who stay over 100+ nights a year in a Marriott property.