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Update: This offer ends today!
Originally posted on 9/1:
You can register here for 30% bonus when you transfer hotel points to United miles.
- The promotion runs through 9/30. It is run by United, so you won’t see any mention of it on the hotel’s points site or during the transfer process. As long as you initiate the transfer by 11:59pm ET on 9/30 you will get the bonus from United.
- United will add 30% bonus miles for all transfers from hotel programs made between 9/1-9/30.
- You can earn up to 25K bonus miles with this promotion per United account.
United will add the bonus miles by 1/31/22.
Hotel point transfers to airlines are generally not worthwhile even with this bonus, with the exception of Marriott.
You can transfer 60K Marriott Rewards points into 27.5K United miles.
United will add 30% more miles by 1/31/22, leaving you with 35,750 miles!
Note that years after the SPG merger, the Marriott’s mileage conversion tool still doesn’t account for the 15K bonus Marriott points they add onto a transfer when you transfer in increments of 60K points, but those points will be added. The tool calculates 60K points as converting into 22K United miles at the 3:1.1 ratio (or 20K miles with other airlines at the 3:1 ratio) but you’ll actually get 27.5K United miles (or 25K miles with other airlines) for every 60K points transferred thanks to the 15K bonus Marriott points that will be added onto that transfer. The 30% bonus will then give you 35,750 miles.
If you want to come close to maximizing this promotion you can transfer 180K Marriott points to United the tool will say you’ll get 66,000 United miles, but you’ll actually get 82,500 United miles due to the bonus 45K Marriott points you’ll get for making the transfer in 3 increments of 60K points. United will add 24,750 bonus miles by 1/31/22, leaving you with 107,250 miles.
If you value Marriott points at 0.65 cents each, 180K Marriott points would be worth $1,170. You would get 107,250 United miles from a transfer of 180K Marriott points. At that valuation, you’re looking at an effective cost of 1.09 cents per United mile, which is an excellent deal! Of course this depends on what value you typically get for your Marriott points and United miles. It also doesn’t take into account that it’s easier to generate United miles at a good value than it is to generate Marriott points.
If you have a plethora of AMEX points, you can also move some of them over to United at a subpar, but not ridiculously low rate. Normally 60K AMEX points would transfer into 60K Marriott points, which would transfer into 27.5K United miles. However currently you can get a 30% transfer bonus from AMEX to Marriott and a 30% bonus from Marriott to United. 47K AMEX would become 61,100 Marriott points and 60,000 Marriott points would become 35,750 United miles. Like I said, subpar, but not ridiculously subpar as it normally is.
Another possible option is with Marriott’s miles+nights travel packages. 7 nights at a category 1-4 hotel and 71.5K United miles (after a 16.5K bonus from United) would cost 255K Marriott points. 7 nights at a category 1-4 hotel and 135K United miles (after a 25K bonus from United) would cost 330K Marriott points.
You can earn Marriott points with the Chase Marriott Bonvoy Bold Consumer Card, Chase Marriott Bonvoy Boundless Consumer Card, Marriott Bonvoy Business AMEX, and the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant Consumer AMEX. You can view a chart comparing 6 Marriott cards here.
Will you transfer points to United with this promo?
HT: Davidthebest
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16 Comments On "[Ends Today!] United 30% Hotel Transfer Bonus; Transfer 60K Marriott Points Into 35,750 United Miles!"
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Why would I transfer the 180k Marriott points in 3 increments? Don’t you get the same bonus in a single transfer?
I’m confused on this as well, and hope Dan will clarify. On the Marriott site it mentions a 10% bonus and that appears to happen in the website calculator: for example 180K points says 66K miles (3:1 plus 10%).
Reading this post again, it appears that there is some sort of promo of 45K Marriott points for transferring? Perhaps it is this promotion that requires 3 transfers, but I am not finding information on this.
Ignore the calculator, it’s been Bonvoyed for years. The calculations in the post are correct.
3 increments of 60K, not 3 transfers of 60K.
You get the same bonus if it’s 1 or 3 transfers.
Can I transfer to a relative’s united account, same last name, different first name?
Not sure, but you can transfer Marriott points to the relative and they can transfer to United.
It seems that the website says you get 5k for every transfer of 60k what am I missing?
Sitting on 400K marriott points and 160K united miles. I typically stay in low category Marriott hotels and fly out of EWR. Do you recommend I transfer or hold tight with Marriott? Thanks!
Whats the minimum amount to transfer?
You’ll want to transfer in increments of 60K to maximize the promo.
Dan, do we need to do this into multiple United accounts? If I have 120K Marriott points, am I giving anything up by transferring in one shot to just my United account? I’m admittedly a little confused by the 25K bonus max.
120K Marriott points would get you 71,500 United miles instead of the normal 54K United miles.
That takes up 17,500 of your potential 25K bonus miles from this promo.
Dan, if I transfer now on 9/30, will it post into my United account still today, so the United bonus will apply?
As long as you transfer today you’ll get the bonus.
I hope so. I transferred 180K over 10 days ago and they still haven’t shown up in United on 9/30.
update…though the 30% hasn’t been added yet, the transfers from Marriott showed up in my account today with the date I actually requested the transfer, so all’s well. (I hope)