Marriott’s promotion leaked a week early, you couldn’t register yet but we learned that through September 4 Marriott would offer:
- 2000 bonus points for each paid stay beginning with your second paid stay during the promotion
- 2000 bonus points for staying at each different Marriott Rewards brand during the promotion beginning with your second brand
Registration though is now available and it’s marketed under the ‘MegaBonus’ name even though it’s different than classic MegaBonus offers.
Meanwhile affiliated Ritz-Carlton Rewards’ promo is double points, triple points for cobrand credit card holders.
And Starwood — whose promo leaked a little early as well — is offering triple points on weekends, double points on weekdays May 27 through September 4.
Hilton’s current promotion is double points through August 31 — triple points for Diamonds. This is stackable with 500 points per mobile app booking.
Hyatt is running double points starting after your second stay through June 30 only.
IHG Rewards Club has their personalized Accelerate offers with earning through August 31.
Here’s my offer:
I’d argue that the Ritz-Carlton and Hilton promotions are most generous, and Hyatt promotion least generous (how IHG shakes out depends on what you’re targeted for). All require registration. It’s always worth registering — goodness knows I find that my hotel plans aren’t perfectly predictable, I wind up staying places I wouldn’t have expected, and I don’t remember to go back and register later for bonuses I might earn. It’s best to take the time all at once to do it.
The link to the Marriott promo registration page doesn’t work for me- it stated 3 reasons for the error mesaage, none of which made sense to me. Neither can I find this modified MegaBonus promo on Promotion Central after I logged.in to my MR account. Any idea why?
For Ritz Carlton, I have the cobrand card, do I input my Marriott number if I’m not primarily a RC member?
Thanks for the tip!
Here’s a “catch” I hadn’t anticipated: Ritz-Carlton tells me that I’m ineligible for their Summer Sojourns promotion because I opted to make Marriott my “preferred” provider. I’m sure they don’t want people switching their “preferred” vendor back and forth repeatedly, but this strikes me as being really disingenuous.
Marriott hotel brands are much more readily available in places to which I travel on business, so it makes sense for it to be my preferred “chain.” But I also hold a Ritz-Carlton Rewards card and stay at Ritz-Carlton’s fore leisure travel whenever I can. So despite the partnership between the two, and the fact that Ritz-Carlton is only too happy for me to spend my money in their hotels and to use their co-branded credit card, I’m denied access to the current promotion.
It seems as if Ritz-Carlton is almost encouraging me to spend my money elsewhere this summer — which is precisely what I think I’ll do. It’s novel, though — a promotion that encourages loyal customers to take their business elsewhere.