Your Starwood Points Are Likely Safe Through 2017

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It’s now official.  Starwood is merging with Marriott.  So what does that mean for the future of your Starwood points?

President and CEO of Marriott, Arne Sorenson, said in his letter about the hotel loyalty schemes, “We don’t anticipate launching a newly combined program until 2018.”

And, “Our merger is on track to close midyear.”

While the word “anticipate” allows Marriott wiggle room to combine the programs earlier, it does give us a sense of the timeline.  So we don’t necessarily have to run out and use all our Starwood points by the end of 2016.

Though to be absolutely safe, you still might want to do just that!  Because while Marriott doesn’t plan to combine the programs, it’s always possible the company will change Starwood’s award chart or remove perks.

Sorenson wrote, “After we become one company, we expect to run parallel loyalty programs while we engage in the complicated work of integration.”

That’s good news for those of y’all who signed-up for the best-ever offer that ended recently.  That includes Emily with her shiny new small business AMEX Starwood card!

Best Ways to Use Starwood Points

Here’s my series on how to get Big Travel with Small Money using Starwood points for hotel stays, flights, and travel packages.

And my recent Top 5 series where I listed fun examples of how to use Starwood points for great stays in Europe, the US, Asia, and more.