Marriott Bonvoy program is best known for the amazing redemption opportunities it offers at some of Marriott’s most aspirational properties. The program has undergone significant devaluation over the years which has taken much of the sheen off it, as a result redemption rates in most cases have skyrocketed.

For instance, until a couple of years ago you could redeem Marriott points for a stay at the luxurious Al Maha in Dubai, where cash rates are routinely over US$1,500+ per night, for as little as 60,000 points, even during peak holiday and travel period.

Al Maha, A Luxury Collection Resort, Dubai

This redemption will now set you back as much as 120,000 points per night, ouch 😬

It’s the same story at many other top-tier Marriott hotels such as St Regis Maldives, The Ritz Carlton Kyoto and so-on. And that’s not all, many of the low-mid tier properties also now command insanely high number of points.

Having said that, there is one area of Marriott Bonvoy program that Marriott have left unchanged and it continues to offer tremendous value to members, ie, transferring points to airline partners.

This is a pretty compelling feature on it’s own but is further enhanced by the 50% transfer bonus you can earn by transferring Amex Membership Rewards Points to Marriott until 30th September 2022. If you take advantage of this promotion, you can effectively convert 1 Membership Rewards Point into 1 Marriott Bonvoy point.

Transfer to Airline Partners

At the time of writing, Marriott Bonvoy boasts a humongous 38 frequent flyer programs as transfer partners. You can transfer Marriott points to most of these programs in the ratio of 3:1 (3 Marriott points = 1 Airline point or mile).

This opens up transfer opportunities into programs such as British Airways Executive Club, Alaska Mileage Plan and American Airlines AAdvantage, programs which are generally pretty difficult to access in a meaningful manner for Australian’s. Check out the full list of partners over here.

Transfer Amex Membership Rewards Points to Alaska Mileage Plan via Marriott Bonvoy

But that’s not all, each time you transfer Marrriott Bonvoy points to one of its airline partners in 60,000 points multiple, Marriott will throw in an additional 5,000 bonus points or mile. This effectively improves the transfer ratio from 3:1 to 2.4:1 (2.4 Marriott points = 1 Airline point or mile). This means that :

• 60,000 Marriott points convert to 25,000 Airline Points.
• 120,000 Marriott points convert to 50,000 Airline Points.
• 180,000 Marriott points convert to 75,000 Airline Points.

Let’s take a look at the sequence of transfer to make it easier to understand.

Transferring Amex Points to Airline Partners via Marriott Bonvoy

Step 1

Transfer Membership Rewards Points to Marriott Bonvoy, preferably in multiples of 60,000. Let’s say you transfer exactly 60,000 Points, with the current 50% transfer bonus in play, this will give you 60,000 Marriott Bonvoy Points.

Step 2

Transfer 60,000 Marriott Points to your preferred airline partner. Including the 5,000 bonus points, this will net you a total of 25,000 Airline points.

Redeem Membership Rewards Points to fly Fiji Airways Business Class

If you have an Australia issued Amex card, you can transfer Membership Rewards Points to most airline partners at 2:1 (60,000 MR points = 30,000 Airline Points). So at face value, transferring to airline partners via Marriott does lead to a nominal loss of 5,000 point (for each 60k transfer).

For this reason, you should only ever take the Marriott Bonvoy detour if you want to transfer points to a partner not available through Membership Rewards Program.

The 5,000 points loss is largely inconsequential when you consider the range of programs you get access to when you go via Marriott Bonvoy, many of which offer much better redemption rates than Amex’ own airline partners in Australia.

Note that transfers to airline partners start at a minimum 3,000 Marriott points and you can transfer up to 240,000 points per day. Transfers are not instant and can take anywhere from a few days to up-to 6 weeks.

Best Value Redemptions

With over 3 dozen airline partners, it is impractical to cover every single redemption sweet-spot. The purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate redemptions that make most sense for Australia based points and miles enthusiasts.

So in no particular order, here are a few programs that provide excellent value for your points.

ANA Mileage Club

All Nippon Airways, commonly known as ANA is Japan’s biggest airline with a network spanning 119 destinations. At present, ANA operate daily flights between Sydney & Tokyo (Haneda), with plans to add Perth to it’s network, hopefully once Japan fully reopens for tourism.

Redeem Membership Rewards Points to fly ANA Business Class

ANA Mileage Club operates a seasonal zone-based award chart which may be a little difficult to get your head around at first. But don’t let that dissuade you as the program offers irresistible value. For instance, if you can find availability during low season:

You can fly ANA Business Class between Sydney and Tokyo return for just 65,000 ANA Miles. Go on, find a better value award between Australia & Japan, I dare you.

With the current 50% bonus, you will need to transfer just 165,000 Membership Rewards Points to Marriott Bonvoy and then onwards to ANA Mileage Club to cover the flight.

As a comparison, Qantas and Singapore Airlines Krisflyer program will set you back 82,000 points and 100,500 Miles respectively, just to fly one-way on this route.

Note that ANA Mileage Club imposes hefty carrier charges on it’s own metal as well as on many partner flights. Expect to pay upwards $650 if you fly ANA between Sydney and Tokyo.

Alaska Mileage Plan

Alaska Mileage Plan might seem like an odd choice at first, particularly when you consider that the airline does not fly into Australia. Heck it does not even operate flights to anywhere in Asia, Europe or Africa. In-fact, this North American carrier hubbed in the beautiful city of Seattle predominantly operates on the US west coast, with a smattering of flights to cities in mid-west and eastern seaboard of America.

It’s International route network is tiny and for someone based in Australia, it would require an 8,000 km flight to Honolulu (Hawaii) to actually get on an Alaska plane. It is precisely for this reason that redemptions through Alaska Mileage Plan can be so lucrative.

Take for example, the incredible redemption possibilities it offers if you want to fly JAL within Asia.

JAL B-787 Business Class Seat

You can fly any of JAL’s intra-Asia routes for a tiny 25,000 Alaska miles. For instance, a few years ago I flew from Delhi to Tokyo, an 8+ hr flight redeeming Alaska Miles.

Redeem 25,000 Alaska Miles to fly JAL Business Class from Delhi to Tokyo

If I wanted, I could have continued onward to Jakarta at no extra mileage cost. This is because both of these sectors are intra-Asia, as you can see below.

All up, that is 16 hours of Business Class flying for a meagre 25,000 Alaska Miles, which you can pocket by transferring just 60,000 Marriott points. Let that sink-in.

Closer to home, for a paltry 20,000 Alaska Miles (plus $50 in taxes), you can fly Qantas Business Class one-way between Sydney/Melbourne/Brisbane and Perth. That is crazy good value when you consider Qantas charges 41,500 points to fly this route.

One other high value Alaska Mileage redemption is on flights between Australia & United States.

Although availability is hard (but not impossible) to come by on this route, for just 55,000 Alaska Miles, you could fly Qantas or Fiji Airways in Business Class between Australian East Coast Cities and places such as Los Angeles and San Francisco.

Fly Fiji Airways Business Class between Australia & U.S. for 55,000 Alaska Miles

Aeroplan

Aeroplan is the frequent flyer program of Air Canada and also a Marriott Bonvoy partner. It operates a mix of distance and zone-based redemption chart which you can look-up over here.

The program applies dynamic pricing to Air Canada flights, so unless you can find saver level availability I wouldn’t recommend redeeming points for Air Canada flights. However, it’s a completely different story when it comes to redemption on partner flights.

Air Canada B-777 Business Class Seat

Aeroplan possibly has the highest number of partners of any frequent flyer program in the world. Besides the 26 Star Alliance partners, you can also redeem Aeroplan points to fly the likes of Virgin Australia, Air Mauritius, Vistara & Oman Air to name a few.

Before I talk about the redemptions, here are a few features of Aeroplan that makes it so appealing to the points and miles community.

• Aeroplan does not apply carrier charges on it’s own metal or on partner flights which keeps the cash outlay low.
• You can add a stopover for an additional 5,000 points.
• Aeroplan allows you to mix partners on award flights.

Here are a few Aeroplan redemption’s that offer very good value for your points.

• You can fly Thai Airways Business Class, one-way between Australia & Bangkok for 45,000 Aeroplan points.

Redeem Aeroplan points to fly Thai Airways Business Class

• You can also fly ANA Business Class, one-way between Sydney and Tokyo for the same 45,000 Aeroplan points.

Redeem Aeroplan points to fly ANA Business Class

When it comes to non star-alliance partners, the choices are endless. For instance;

• You can fly Air Mauritius Business Class, non-stop between Perth and Mauritius for 60,000 Aeroplan points.

or, you can mix and match partners and build an itinerary like the one below.

Mix and match partners and build your own awesome itinerary with Aeroplan

On this itinerary, you can fly Virgin Australia from Adelaide – Perth and connect on Air Mauritius to fly to Mauritius. And because Aeroplan lets you take a stopover for an extra 5,000 points, this is what you can build for just 85,000 Aeroplan points:

• Fly Virgin Australia Business Class from Adelaide – Perth.
• Fly Air Mauritius Business Class from Perth – Mauritius.
• Take a stopover of up to 45 days and explore Mauritius and neighbouring islands such as Comoros & Reunion Island’s to your heart’s content. When you are done:
• Fly Air Mauritius Business Class from Mauritius to Madagascar and explore it’s beautiful beaches and some of the most unique flora and fauna.

All of that for just 85,000 Aeroplan points.

I haven’t run the numbers, but my hunch is that if you booked each one of these segments individually it will cost you at least double the number of points with other programs. And that doesn’t even factor the stopover which let’s you create 3 holidays on one ticket.

If you are prepared to put in the time and effort and maximise Aeroplan’s features, you can build yourself some unbelievably good itineraries not possible with most programs.

Note that you can’t yet include stopover’s if you make the booking online, for that you will need to contact Aeroplan and provide the details to the agent who will make the booking for you.

In Conclusion

These are just a few examples of what is possible if you want to cash-in on the 50% transfer bonus Amex is offering to Marriott Bonvoy. With 38 airline partners, the opportunities are truly endless.

Most points and miles collectors in Australia are too heavily invested in Qantas and Velocity Frequent Flyer Program’s and that is fine. They are after all two of the easiest and most widely available points currency you can earn in the country.

But if you have always limited yourself to those two programs, I implore you to expand the horizon and cast the net a little further and wider, you will be blown-away with what you may find.

Do you plan to take advantage of the transfer bonus? Leave a comment below.