tl;dr – This ‘hack’ could save you a few dollars on your next points purchase.
I’m a big proponent of purchasing loyalty points for travel. Oftentimes, buying points can save you a lot of money (when compared to the cash price of a hotel stay or flight). Recently, I was hoping to redeem points for a stay at the Westin Bora Bora (one of the subjects of our Deal’s I’m Booking That You Should Too Series), but I was short 100,000 points.
When Marriott is actively running a sale on Bonvoy points this probably isn’t as helpful as you’ll often receive a better deal – for example there’s a 40% bonus sale on your purchase right now.
However, there was no sale at the time I needed to purchase the points back in late January, so my options were: 1) buy the points at full price, or 2) simply pay the cash rate for the room (at least for the one remaining night I needed).
I decided to go the route of purchasing the points as I would have still saved a few dollars off the cash rate by doing so, and frankly, I valued that more than the ‘earn’ I would have made from paying that one night in cash.
However, instead of purchasing the points in an independent transaction, I decided to purchase the points while in the ‘booking flow’ of the room. When doing so, I noticed I received an offer for up to 25% if I purchased 50,000 points or more.
Marriott allows its Bonvoy members to purchase up to 150,000 Marriott Bonvoy points per calendar year through the main storefront powered by Points.com. Members can purchase an additional 100,000 points while in the process of booking a hotel stay (while you’re in the reservation path of booking a room).
It appears that when purchasing through the booking flow, you may receive a flash offer (like above) for a few more dollars off your points purchase. Again, there was no Global Marriott points sale at the time of my purchase (where you can usually receive even better deals on points), so finding the 25% discount was a nice little surprise.
In the end, the 100,000 points I needed dropped from $1,250 to $937.50 for an additional savings of $312.50. Not a bad deal for simply choosing to purchase points alongside booking the room!
