Today is the final day of one of the best loyalty program ever created, Starwood Preferred Guest, or SPG.
Marriott takes over the program tomorrow and while many have praised them for how many SPG features they have saved, I can’t forgive them for the massive devaluation that happened to the SPG AMEX card, with card earnings being devalued by 33%.
Marriott phone reps are also all over the place with bad information provided and offer much less consistency than SPG phone reps. Marriott’s is significantly worse than SPGs and there’s no doubt that I’ll miss SPG.com.
But good things come and go and we’ll just have to adapt.
Today, don’t forget to:
- Book SPG and Marriott hotels that will go up in price tomorrow. On the Marriott side you don’t even have to have sufficient points in your account now to lock in a reservation under the current rates. You can search for current points required and new points required here.
- Book SPG and Marriott hotels that will down in price tomorrow in order to lock in availability before it dries up after pricing drops.
- Combine household SPG points before more restrictive Marriott rules go into place.
- If you are thinking of transferring SPG or Marriott points to miles with United, Aeromexico, Air Canada, Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, British Airways, Copa Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Frontier Airlines, GOL/Varig, Hawaiian Airlines, Iberia Airlines, Southwest, or Virgin Atlantic, you should call Marriott now to buy a travel package. With just 90K Starpoints you can get 132K miles with United or 120K miles with the other airlines. By itself that’s a great deal, but Marriott sweetens it by also giving a free 7 night hotel certificate at category 1-5 hotels, which will likely become a category 1-4 certificate after the merger. Marriott has several options for how to decide how to map current certificates to the new program. Personally I went with category 9, tier 1-3, and tier 4-5 options and attached them to properties going up in cost.
- Save screenshots of your Starwood and Marriott point balances.
- Buy Starpoints for 3.5 cents each (1.167 cents per Marriott point)Â if you need points for a redemption.
Tomorrow, Marriott and SPG systems will be down starting at 6am to complete the program merger. Afterward, you can merge your SPG and Marriott accounts and use the new merged website and award chart.
- Your Starwood member number will be retired and the Marriott member number will survive.
- Starpoints will be multiplied by 3 to become Marriott points and elite nights will merge together.
- Airline mileage transfers from Starwood will change from 20K:25K to 60K:25K, tripling the cost to keep parity with the tripling of Starpoint balances.
- New elite status and benefits will go into effect.
- New airline transfer options including El Al will be added.
- You can book awards using the new award chart.
- Find new hotels rates here.
- You can book awards using the new Cash+Points and PointSavers award charts.
- You can call to get an adjustment on hotel awards that go down in price on this date, you wonât need to actually cancel the stay to get a points adjustment.
- New devalued travel packages will be available for significantly more points that offer fewer miles.
What else are you doing today before the end of SPG?
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57 Comments On "It’s The Last Day Of Starwood Preferred Guest! Did You Remember To…"
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Why screenshot our points balance?
In case of IT glitches.
What if you only have spg but no Marriott points or account?
You can open one now or open one after the merger.
Thank you for this. I appreciate the clear, bulleted plan of action/information.
Could you please clarify what you mean by “On the Marriott side you donât even have to have sufficient points in your account now to lock in a reservation under the current rates”? Could we reserve a category 9 with a category 1-5 cert and pay the outstanding points after the merger?
I’m not sure if that will work with certs, but you can try.
Without the points? I’d ask to “reserve a stay, and pay the balance upon check-in?”
No you can’t, I tried, had to buy the extra points
If you need to buy Marriott points to have sufficient points to buy the travel package, it takes 2 days to transfer. BUT, if you call and give them your order number they can immediately lend you the points you bought and they will take them back when they actually post. I just did this and it worked great, I now have six travel packages.
Correct.
Will there still be spg flights? I only use my spg points for flights or to transfer to airline miles. Should I change then all out today?
SPG flights is a poor value. Airline mile transfers are not affected, but the current travel packages are more lucrative than mileage transfers.
Is it not to late to transfer SPG points between household accounts since it can take 5 business days?
You can still initiate it now.
Website doesn’t seem to let you start the transfer anymore. Errors out.
You missed to buy a box of Kleenex for all the tears…
True story.
Hi Dan, I booked several reservations at Domes of Elounda next summer not knowing which week will work for us yet. I applied a travel package to one of those weeks. If we end up needing a different week do u think they will allow me to âtransferâ it to another week?
Hopefully.
What is going to happen to my SPG credit card? Will I get a Marriott card instead?
Next February there will be a new program name and you’ll get a new card.
From Amex or Chase ? This is the confusion Dan.
how long does it take to to combine standpoints? if i do it today will it be complete by the merge? is it possible to transfer all at once (55k)?
5 business days.
Will I be able to get the new CC a(nd the Sign up bonus) if I get the Marriott now?
Sure.
Thanks
Till when do I have to open it?
can i book a reservation in the maldives now if i dont have sufficient points in my account? and wait till the point cost goes down to pay with points?
No, SPG hotels require the balance upfront.
thank you and have a good shabbos,
How do I book the maldives if the st Regis and Sheraton are both still spg
Is there a glitch in Marriott today? I can’t log in to my account or my wife’s, says invalid ID. I am on hold with them now…
I couldn’t get in either.
Same thing happened to me.
Same here
Same here
Yeah, confirmed with a rep that site is down today and I can’t merge accounts or transfer to SPG. She was able to tell me my balance though and I recorded the conversation.
SPG no longer processing member to member transfers. Tried online didnât work. Called and was told that they canât do it. I guess the glitches and outages started a day early.
me too.
Ditto. Tried first thing this morning and again just now.
Will I be able to sell Mariott points the way I sell SPG points?
If I want to book an SPG hotel that will be Category 7 until 2019 before jumping up to Category 8, do I need to wait until tomorrow to be able to get the rate for 60K marriot points rather than 32k SPG? SPG phone rep said I can’t cancel reservation if I make one at this point since it’s for next week and that SPG points only transfer at 3:1 if they are in your account at the time of the merger so won’t be able to do rate adjustment. Since the merger happens on Shabbos, I’m concerned the award rooms will get book immediately post-merger. What is best way to do this?
Sadly canceling my SPG amex after 17 years of loyalty.
i just tried to combine mine and my wife points. after few unsuccessful trials over the website i called them, but the rep told me that transfers will be allowed only from tomorrow and on, with the max amount of 50k per 24 hours đ
Are they sending new credit card?
Is it worth keeping this card?
if i am planning on going to the st regis bal harbor florida in december and using points should i book today before the merger?
@dan I have 29.5k spg points. What do u recommend I do today? Whatâs the best course of action? I called them but they were very unclear.
Thanks and have a great shaboss
I booked a couple different date for a vacation because points on that hotel will be going up in points. When I cancel am I getting the new Marriott points? the new rate or the old?
If i have an SPG account, but don’t have a mariott account will my SPG credentials be converted and become my new Mariott login credentials?
do the stays on these certs count towards elite status?
Just confirming what’s already been said. Tried to transfer and they said no more transfers as of 12am today.
do we need to merge accounts or spg do it all? will the provide marriot numbers to people who are not part of that program yet?
Hi Dan,
I have 144,000 Marriott points and 1-5 certificate, would it make sense try to upgrade it to Category 9 and get the same hotel as well you did?
Iâm on the phone with SPG now and rep is saying that no more transfers till tomorrow 6 am and getting an error online. Anyone else having a problem transferring ?
Marriott telling me system down and nothing they can do. Then they hung up on me.
Do I need to transfer the spg points into airline tonight?