Marriott adds Category 9, bumps 36% of hotels up a tier
Effective 16 May 2013, Marriott Rewards adds a new top Category 9 at 45,000 points a night and moves over a third of its portfolio up a category, with no compensating bump in elite bonus points.
Marriott Rewards has a new ceiling. Effective 16 May 2013, the program’s 8-tier award chart becomes a 9-tier one, with the priciest hotels slotted into a brand-new Category 9 at 45,000 points a night — up from the old top rate of 40,000.
The new tier is only half the story. Marriott also quietly re-shuffled over a third of its global portfolio up a category. That’s 36% of hotels getting more expensive in points terms overnight, and there’s no compensating bump in elite bonus points to soften it. Earn rates stay flat; redemption costs don’t.
For Indian cardholders funnelling ICICI or Amex spend into Marriott for that one aspirational Bali or Maldives redemption, the math just got meaningfully worse. The points you banked yesterday buy less hotel today.
Our take: this is a textbook stealth devaluation — a 12.5% hike at the top plus a portfolio-wide category creep, dressed up as a chart “update.” Points are a depreciating currency. Burn them; don’t hoard them.