Earning American miles with Marriott, or transferring Marriott points into American miles, ends June 30.
An email from American yesterday stated:
We would like to provide you with an important update to the American Airlines AAdvantage® program. Effective July 1, 2010, the Marriott Rewards program will no longer offer AAdvantage miles for stays at Marriott hotels.
All qualifying stays at participating properties completed by June 30, 2010 will be eligible to earn AAdvantage miles. It is also important to note the final date to convert your Marriott Rewards points to AAdvantage miles will be June 30, 2010.
Presumably they couldn’t agree on the price of miles in a new contract, perhaps American wanted a higher price, Marriott wanted to lower the price, or they’ve been successful with other programs and not with American on reducing their cost of miles.
Either way, it’s hard to imagine a hotel chain as large as Marriott not partnering with the oldest airline program of them all in American. But that’s the news. Which also means that American Airlines miles will no longer be an option as part of a Marriott Rewards travel package.
This is going to be a nasty blow to Marriott! I know a lot of FTers are very upset, as the travel packages (for AA miles) was one of the best values with MR points – especially when you factor in the accumulation of miles towards 1mm or 2mm status.
Do you think there’s any chance that either Marriott or AA will cave closer to the dealine due to the bad PR?
Yes, I agree – quite hard to imagine these two won’t be partners – it puts a dent in our travel planning. Ditto Chris’s comments – these are (were) our two main programs, with the travel packages a great boon for getting miles. We are not happy – to say the least. But I’m sure it was all a financial decision and as a business, pretty much that’s all they look at, the bottom line. Wonder if there will be a dropping of use of Marriott, with this partnership gone? Probably so for us……
This is another blow to Marriott Rewards members. They devalued the points in 2009 and the split with American is one more betrayal to members who have tried to stay loyal to Marriott. We live in Dallas and American is our lifeline for travel without having to make connections. They are also the only ones that allow for one way mileage awards. We were working on attaining Platinum status with American through our travel packages from Marriott and it will not be possible now. We are very upset about this change. Thanks again Marriott for letting your members down.