Wyndham has uncharacteristically occupied a larger chunk of the points and miles world’s attention this week with the addition of a new premium credit card, along with a “refresh” of its existing cards.
You can read Stephen’s thoughts on the new Wyndham Premier credit card here. Whether or not it’s worth the $395 annual fee will vary by individual, but a commenter on the post clued us in to a perk of the card that Wyndham and Barclays have curiously decided not to highlight: your points don’t expire as long as you hold a Premier card.
Normally, Wyndham points will expire after 18 months of inactivity, but any point-earning will reset the clock, even a credit card purchase. That seems easy enough, but Wyndham irritatingly has two tiers of expiries, and each point also has a hard expiry of four years, regardless of any activity on the account.
However, after this week’s card changes, it looks like Wyndham has modified its terms to carve out an exception for Premier cardholders:
Except as may otherwise be required under applicable law or set forth herein with respect to Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Cardmembers, Wyndham Rewards points expire four (4) years after the date on which the applicable points are posted to the Member’s account (the “Four Year Rule”), unless the points are forfeited or cancelled earlier due to membership inactivity (as more particularly described below), or otherwise in accordance with these Terms and Conditions. For clarity, posting dates vary based on the type of activity for which they were earned. Except as may otherwise be set forth herein with respect to Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Cardmembers, all accrued points in a Member’s Wyndham Rewards account may be cancelled or forfeited if the Member has no Account Activity (as defined below) for a period of approximately, but never less than, eighteen (18) consecutive months. For purposes of these Terms and Conditions, “Account Activity” means any (i) point earning, and (ii) redemption or transfer activity involving a change in the Member’s Wyndham Rewards point balance, in each case, conducted in accordance with these Terms and Conditions.
Without limiting any other section of these Terms and Conditions, points earned by a Wyndham Rewards Earner® Premier Card Cardmember do not expire under this Section I(14) as long as Cardmember’s account is open and in good standing.
Now, it goes without saying that most folks with a $395 Wyndham card probably use their points within 4 years of earning them. That said, I still find it very strange that Wyndham took the opportunity to create an exception for those who hold its new premium card, but then failed to tell anyone about it.
I’m probably not alone in having a significant Wyndham Rewards balance, accumulated when you could still redeem them for Vacasa vacation rentals. Now it’s no longer possible, and I’m using those points at a fraction of the rate that I used to. Within a couple of years, I could reach a juncture where a couple of hundred thousand might be about to expire. The fact that I could pause their expiration with the Premier card is something I’ll keep in my back pocket in case of an emergency.
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Is there a site that describes what specifically are the relevant dates for keeping points alive by transferring back and forth to Caesars? Would transferring back and forth 30k a year create a separate bucket with its own expiry?
Caesars shows when your accounts 6 month expiry would be. I believe that the 30k back and forth would create a new expiry for those pts.
I’m in the same boat. The loss of Vacasa has sidelined my 100k WR points. If you get the card for a year and then close it, how will the expiration policy be enforced?
I read that as ONLY the points earned by that card do not expire, meaning previously earned points earned by other means would still expire under the 4yr rule?
You just might be right. The language can be interpreted almost either way. Barclays needs to clarify.
That’s exactly how I read it and it seems unambiguous to me. I don’t know how it could be interpreted any other way.
It doesn’t refer to the card; it refers to the cardmember. Ie, all points earned by that cardmember, regardless of whether they were earned from the card. Then it goes on to state that they do not expire under Section I(14), which refers to the 4-yr rule.
Thank you for the clarification. I will introduce myself at the Chicago Points Travel Festival 2026.
It will be interesting to see how this exception is implemented. If you (Tim) wait a couple years and are getting close to having a big stash of points expire, could you add the Wyndham Premier card for a year and then cancel it and get a new 4-year window at the end? Or would you still be tied to the original 4-year date? In other words, is the 4-year expiration simply unenforced for Wyndham Premier card holders, or does it reset the clock on points while you are holding the card?
That wording also seems fairly clear that they only plan to offer the exception go the 4-year expiration for the Premier and no other cards. Me and my lowly Business Earner Plus are disappointed by that, so I am glad I did a version of Greg’s convert-to-United-for-decent-return late last year after the Vacasa nerf was announced.
Has anyone gotten any clarity or figured this out yet?