View from the Wing covers a report from a supposed Marriott insider indicating that Marriott is cracking down on what they deem to be “account sharing” (where two or more people travel separately but try to share the same account). I’m not sure whether this will become a widespread issue, but there are plenty of cases where I could imagine this could cause major inconvenience with no ill intent on the part of the guest, so it’s worth knowing what’s going on and planning accordingly.
View from the Wing points to a reddit report (with some “not safe for work” language in it), but I saw a similar report somewhere else over the past week (I can’t recall where) indicating that Marriott is pushing properties to turn away an additional guest, not allowing them to check in without the member whose account made the reservation being present.
The idea here is that Marriott doesn’t want multiple people “sharing” an account. For instance, they don’t want me making a reservation through my account with intent for my friend Joe to actually be the person checking in and enjoying elite benefits and/or earning elite night credit for me (which I might try to achieve my reserving a room in my name and adding Joe as an “additional guest” so that he could presumably check in without me present). Unlike Hyatt, Marriott does not provide a way for elite members to share benefits with others, so there are probably some members who Marriott thinks are abusing the system in this way.
Similarly, Marriott has a policy against gifting free night certificates to others. While Marriott does allow you to redeem your points for a reservation that you gift to someone else (up to a limit of 5 gifted award stays per year), they do not allow you to give your free night certificate to someone else. Presumably, they want some breakage there and want to make sure that only the member receiving the certificate can use it.
It’s worth noting that although Marriott has a way to use your points and gift a stay to someone else 5 times per year, they don’t make it easy. You have to call to do it, which means that you have to find a phone representative familiar with how to make the reservation. The member to which you gift the stay does not get your elite benefits and neither of you receive elite night credit. You can see more detail here.
Even if we accept that what Marriott is trying to enforce here is reasonable, the implementation is sure to cause some confusion and frustration. I think of the many times I have arrived separately and met my wife and kids at a hotel. Particularly when our sons were very little, I can only imagine my wife’s frustration if she arrived at a hotel ahead of me and was turned away because I wouldn’t be arriving until later in the evening. The obvious “solution” is to have made the reservation in her name, but what sense would that make if I would indeed be staying, albeit arriving a few hours later?
The reports I’ve seen indicate that in such a situation, my wife would be turned away and that my account might be reported for fraud and closed without warning. That just doesn’t make sense to me. I understand what they are looking to avoid, but the method of doing so here doesn’t appear to leave enough room for reasonable accommodation of members.
To be clear, enforcement here is up to the property, and it has long been against program terms to book a stay for someone else (apart from those 5 award stays per year that can be booked over the phone). I imagine that enforcement will always vary widely here, but the word on the street is that Marriott is pushing properties to be more vigilant. While I’m sure that properties don’t want to honor elite benefits for non-elite guests, I could also imagine a lack of incentive for them to turn away a paying guest. I’m not sure what to expect in real-world experience, but it’s worth being aware that this may be on the radar.
For what it’s worth, I imagine that most front desk agents won’t be looking to report a member and get their Marriott account closed unless they either have increased reason to suspect fraud or the person trying to check in early (or the member who made the reservation) reacts rudely (whether in person or in calling the front desk), but I could imagine some members being unpleasantly surprised here if “enforcement” ramps up.
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