Since the August merger of the Marriott Rewards and SPG (Starwood Preferred Guest) programs, Marriott has been working towards integrating the programs onto one technology platform. To-date, the integration hasn’t been smooth, but there are now signs of progress. I previously reported that Sheraton and Four Points hotels had been fully integrated into Marriott.com. And now, as of November 27th, many more brands are fully integrated: Design Hotels, Le Meridien, W, and Westin.
According to an inside source, the rest of the SPG brands (Aloft, Element, Luxury Collection, and St. Regis) will be fully integrated by December 11.
The integration is great for hotel members because it means that you can finally make use of Marriott.com’s best features. For example, you can do a points advance to make an award booking even if you don’t have enough points (you must acquire enough before your stay). And you can apply free night certificates online. Here’s the W Maldives for example, where I have the option to apply a points advance (If I had any 60K per night certificates in my account I’d be given the option to use those as well):
Travel Package Implications
If you bought a travel package before the program merger and if you were hoping to use your stay certificate at an SPG property, this should be good news. People have reported lots of issues with trying to apply stay certificates to SPG properties, but I expect that applying certificates will be easy for those properties that are integrated.
Look for St. Regis and the rest on and after December 11
According to an inside source, the rest of the SPG brands (Aloft, Element, Luxury Collection, and St. Regis) will be fully integrated by December 11.