Marriott pulled a fast one on loyalty members last August. Their social media representatives made posts implying that Marriott would treat members who purchased travel packages generously, but once it was too late, Marriott revealed that they would take the low road. The only plausible reason for hiding the information was to fleece their own members. They partially relented in how they would deal with people who bought the worst possible packages, but it wasn’t nearly enough.
One fiasco led to another and the era of #Bonvoyed begun.
Certificates expire a year after you redeemed for them, so if you bought a travel package before the merger it will probably be expiring very shortly.
If you convert them from the old category certificate to the new category certificate you’ll get another year of validity added from the date you make the conversion.
A few months ago I went through the painful process of converting over an old tier 4-5 certificate that wasn’t attached to a reservation into a new category 7 certificate. You’ll likely need to HUCA a few times until you find a competent rep to make the conversion.
Bonvoy reps may have an easier time converting the old category 1-9 certificates than the old tier certificates.
- If you have an old category 1-5 certificate you can either convert it to a new category 1-4 certificate or cancel it for a 45K points refund.
- If you have an old category 6 certificate you can cancel it for a 75K points refund or you can convert it to an old category 1-5 certificate and get a 30K points refund. You can then convert it to a new category 1-4 certificate.
- If you have an old category 7 certificate you can either convert it to a new category 5 certificate or cancel it for a 105K points refund.
- If you have an old category 8 certificate you can cancel it for a 135K points refund or you can convert it to an old category 7 certificate and get a 30K points refund. You can then convert it to a new category 5 certificate.
- If you have an old category 9 certificate you can either convert it to a new category 6 certificate or cancel it for a 165K points refund.
- If you have an old tier 1-3 certificate you can cancel it for a 195K points refund or you can convert it to an old category 9 certificate and get a 30K points refund. You can then convert it to a new category 6 certificate.
- If you have an old tier 4-5 certificate you can either convert it to a new category 7 certificate or cancel it for a 315K points refund.
You can also use more points to upgrade to a higher category if you manage to find a rep that knows how to do so. Good luck and post how it goes!
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42 Comments On "Don’t Forget To Convert Your Marriott Travel Package Certificates To New Certificates Before They Expire!"
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Hi. I converted category 8. They gave me new category 5 plus 30,000 points. Could I have done better?
As the post says, that is correct.
Oy! This Dansdeals business is turning into a full time job! (No fault of yours, Dan )
has anyone had any luck converting a Cat below what they bought? I have the old Cat 9 and that converts to New Cat 6, but I want a new Cat 5. Has anyone been able to do this and the the 30K points returned for bumping it down?
Yes.
Does this apply to the certificate that comes annually with the card?
No.
My old cat 7 was attached to a property that moved up to a new cat 6, but they converted the package to a new cat 5. Did I get bonvoyed or is it possible to upgrade the cat 5 to 6?
Is there a chance that they will extend a 1 – 4 certificate another year ?
Is there any chance of reinstating those packages. I had one expire 2 days ago.
TARB
I just did that last week and they extended them for another year. The did though put my 1-5 into a cat 1-4……..as the article says they will
Did you extend after they expired?
Yes
Had an old Category 4-5 tier and got them to upgrade it to a new Category 8 Certificate 🙂
Took quite some time, and a bunch of HUCA’s, won’t say how much time or calls….but it was done and tied it to a week Maldives Trip for this coming April 2020
How many points to upgrade?
did attaching certs to domes of elounda lst year before the merger help to switch it over to a tier 4-5 or 1-3 cert?
No.
Those poor staff who had to deal with all the ridiculous reservations from people that had no intention of staying there…
I booked 3 reservations that I had no intention of using. But I actually did use one of them and I can’t recommend Domes highly enough!
Does this work for the certificate that comes annually with the card?
No.
If my certificate expires next week, can I use the certificate to book something in 10 months from now?
Basically I’m asking if you can ever book for a larger date then the certificate date.
They are very strict now regarding COMPLETING the stay before the expiration date. Attaching the cert before the expiration date for dates after the expiration date will no longer be allowed. Rep I spoke to even said it won’t work if the stay starts before the expiration date, but extends after. The entire stay must be completed before the Exp-date. That being said, I was able to extend my cert for yet another year even though I’d already extended it a year by converting it to the new category last summer. Apparently they don’t consider the conversion to the new cert your complimentary one-year extension so you’re allowed the one-time 12-month extension on your new cert. They could have easily not allowed that, so it’s nice that they’ll extend that courtesy.
Dan, by any chance did you have any luck or you know someone who managed to upgrade package to higher category. I called probably 5 times and had no luck. Simply said that upgrades are not possible anymore.
I converted mine last week. Category 6 became 1-4 with a 30k point refund.
I am not sure if I will be able to use it. Right now it is hard to leave home for more than 3 days. How many times (years) can they be extended?
This morning converted my cat 1-5 into cat 1-4 cert. now expires aug 2020. Very easy process
Did you get any points back after the conversion??
in the end of the day, what’s the best way to use these points int these days, transfer to unite points?
Dan,
Used my cert for Aruba Stellaros….last year did the same zero cost now they added $700 in fees for a “free certificate”….what’s up with that?
I converted last week without upgrading. Is it still possible to upgrade?
How do I know if I have an old or new certificate ?
When did you get it?
What is the expiration date? Check online under “Activity”
Expire 10/22/19 1-4 certificate
about a year before the merger, but online it says its a 1-4 Marriott does that mean it was already converted ?
As a data point, I had an old 1-5 certificate expiring 08/10/19
Took one phone call, 5 minutes, to switch to 1-4 expiring 08/07/20
Thanks for the reminder, Dan!
Oh no! My certificate expired July 31. Anyone have any luck getting them to reinstate???
Data point: Just called “to book my cat 7 voucher stay” and when they told me they had to convert to cat 5, I played dumb and complained (nicely) about not getting a current cat 7 hotel using my voucher that states cat 7 for 7 nights. The rep was very nice but I definitely didn’t get anything beyond the new cat 5 voucher with the extended expiration date. I didn’t push the issue. Thanks for the reminder Dan!
As a related data point. I had several one night certs missing from my account after cancelling some reservations. After a bit of a runaround got them back, but the rep mentioned that cancelling online doesn’t always put them back. It’s better to call and have rep cancel and put back the cert.
FYI. Marriott rep says they can only convert 3 travel certificates in a 24 hour period. Any similar data points? Rep said that more than doing more than 3 changes to a profile creates an error message. If this is correct then don’t wait to absolute last minute if you have a lot of packages to convert.
I just concerted my cate 6 certificate to the new cate 1-4 but I don’t see the 30K point refund reflected. The rep told me it is all systematical and will be reflected within 2 days. Is that true?