So I cashed is 135,000 point to get Fifty $20 Marriott gift Checks. Let me tell you about my first experience using them...
First I found out that you can't use them if you have booked a AAA rate of a Marriott Rewards rate. You can only use them on "pubically available rates" . OK great. I booked my 2 nights at a Fairlfield Inn for $84/nt instead of $79/night. No big deal.
Apparently you don't earn Points on your purchase either....
For $84/night I should have earned the following:
$84 X 2 = $168 x 10 pts/dollar = 1680 X 1.5 platinum bonus = 2520 + 200 platinum arrival gift = 2720 points.
Instead I got the following:
$168 - $50 = $18 x 10 pts/dollar = $180 X 1.5 platinum bonus = 270 + 200 platinum arrival bonus = 470 points
So, due to the restrictions on their use, I paid $10 total more for the room and got 2200 less points.
By making the reward so restrictive, they have made it much less of a good deal.
I wanted to make people aware of this in case this figures into your decision to get this "reward"