As you may of heard by now Marriott’s rewards program, for better or worse, is getting a new name. Beginning later this month, February 13th to be exact, the Marriott Rewards program will become Marriott Bonvoy. Further, the Ritz-Carlton Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest loyalty programs will also fold into the new, single, Marriott Bonvoy program. While I’ll save my take on the new program name and marketing strategy for later date I wanted to quickly touch on one key item.
Specifically, today I wanted to briefly discuss the new Marriott Bonvoy Boundless card. I say briefly because the card isn’t actually new. Instead, the Bonvoy Boundless card is simply the brand refresh of the existing Marriott Rewards Premier Plus card issued by Chase. In fact, I received an email a few days ago from Chase confirming that very fact.
Marriott Bonvoy Boundless Card From Chase Benefits
If you have a working knowledge of the Marriott Rewards Premier Plus card then you can essentially gloss over this section as the benefits of the new Bonvoy Boundless card are identical. That is, Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit card holders receive the following benefits:
- 1 Free Night Certificate (35,000 Point Category)
- Earn 6X Points On Qualifying “Marriott” Purchases
- Earn 2X Points On All Other Purchases
- Automatic Marriott Bonvoy Silver Elite Status
- Opportunity For Gold Status With $35,000 Annual Spend
- 15 Elite Nights Annually
- Free In-Room WiFi
- 75,000 Marriott Bonvoy Point Sign-Up Bonus (with $3,000 spend)
- Increase to 100,000 Points in March 2019 (with $5,000 spend)
- $95 Annual Fee
As you can see, the benefits are identical to those offered by the current Marriott Rewards Premier Plus card. However, after the official launch of the Bonvoy program, Marriott and Chase will begin sending the newly designed and branded cards out to card holders with cards expiring.
Finally, if you are an existing Marriott Rewards Premier Plus card holder you should note that this rebranding has no effect on your existing card whatsoever. Your rates, fees, benefits, or cardmember agreement is completely unaffected by this change.
Final Thoughts
I’m personally find the whole Marriott Bonvoy rebranding a bit silly. I understand the need to eliminate the SPG brand and program, but I don’t understand why Marriott Rewards had to go. The decision to overhaul the entire program seems even more confusing when you factor in updating all of the existing Marriott and SPG credit cards to reflect the new brand.
All of that being said, I personally think the new Marriott Bonvoy Boundless card looks nice. I like the color choice and the texture of the black lines across the front of the card. I also appreciate that the new Boundless card will be a contactless card as you can tell by the massive contactless logo. However, I still am not a fan on the Bonvoy name or the name of this particular card.
