Marriott Bonvoy, Marriott International’s loyalty program, has announced that it will be removing its Award Charts from March 2022. The loyalty program will introduce Dynamic Award Pricing starting in March 2022. Let’s find out more.
Marriott to remove Award Charts
Presently, Marriott Bonvoy prices award nights based on a standard award chart. Each hotel participating in the program is assigned a category number where there are off-peak, standard and peak award prices. Because of the presence of a award chart, customers have a general idea of how many points they will need to spend on an award night.
In March 2022, Marriott Bonvoy will remove its award charts with set redemption rates. When this happens, hotels will be able to change their award pricing night by night. The good news is that travellers have until March 2022 to lock in award nights at current prices, and most (but not all) hotels are expected to only price award nights within the off-peak and peak bands of their current category through 2022.
The hotels will keep the points pricing that will more closely reflect paid hotel rates. For 2022, 97% of Marriott’s properties will still effectively be in one of the program’s eight categories with prices expected to fluctuate only within the current off-peak to peak ranges. However, each hotel will be able to set its own points prices every night within that range.
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In some ‘not-so-great’ news, this could very well mean that we will see sky-high award rates during the holidays and peak times at popular tourist destinations like the Maldives, French Polynesia, Hawaii and many more.
As previously mentioned, around 97% of hotels all stay in their current pricing bands for 2022. However, unfortunately, around 3% of hotels are expected to change pricing beyond those parameters beginning in March 2022. We can expect high-end properties to come under this 3%. Unfortunately, Marriott has not said how high these hotels can raise points rates or provide a list of those specific properties. While 3% doesn’t sound like a lot, with over 7,000 properties in its portfolio, that comes out to over 210 Marriott properties that will be totally free of award charts starting March 2022.
Marriott has confirmed that there will be no category shifts this year.
Elite status, upgrades and points extended
In some good news, Marriott Bonvoy also announced some extensions and improvements to its benefits. It will extend members’ 2021 elite status through February 2023, regardless of when it was originally earned. In addition to this, points expiration will remain paused until 31st December 2021 and Suite Night Awards will receive a 6-month extension. Free Night Awards that were set to expire between 3rd January 2022 and 29th June 2022 will be extended through 30th June 2022.
All extensions will be automatically reflected in member accounts.
Marriott Bonvoy has also announced that it will make Free Night Awards more flexible. Soon, Marriott Bonvoy members will be able to upgrade Free Night Awards with up to 15,000 points from their accounts.
Meanwhile, Marriott recently announced the opening of Courtyard by Marriott Mahabaleshwar, the hospitality chain’s second property in the Indian hill station after Le Méridien Mahabaleshwar.
Featured image by Marriott
What do you think of Marriott removing Award Charts from March 2022 and introducing Dynamic Award Pricing? Let me know in the comments section below.
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