Today we’re sharing why we love the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit card after using it this year to earn points and free nights on hotels in the Marriott family. We’ve used our points and free nights for hot stays at beach resorts in Thailand, quaint stays in the south of France, and the St. Regis.

Here are some of the main reasons we joined and the benefits that card holders get!

Sign Up Bonus – Normally, the sign up offer is 3 Free Night Awards (valued up to 150,000 points) after you spend $3k on purchases in 1st 3 months (each night you can redeem up to 50k), sometimes they have better deals like 5 free nights.

Membership Benefits:

• $95 annual fee 
• Free night award every year after your account anniversary, valid for 1 night hotel stay up to 35,000 points 
• 17x total points for every $1 spent at hotels participating in Marriott Bonvoy
  • 6x by using the credit card 
  • 10x for being a Marriott Bonvoy loyalty member
  • 1x points with Silver Elite Status

Silver Elite Benefits:

• Priority Late Check Out
• Exclusive Member Cash Rates when booking direct from Marriott Website
• Point Saver Redemptions. Rooms Point redemption cost is less in Silver Status
• Mobile Check in & Mobile Key

Additional Benefits: 

• Connect to Uber for Marriott points when riding Uber
• Complimentary in room premium internet access while staying at hotels participating in Marriott Bonvoy 
• Complimentary lake checkout and early check in (when available)
• No foreign transaction fees
• Points don’t expire as long as you make purchases on your card every 24 months 
• Bonus point specials on bookings to earn more points.
• Baggage delay insurance – For baggage delays over 6 hrs up to $100/day for 5 days 
• Lost luggage reimbursement – Damaged or lost by the carrier, covered up to $3k per passenger 
• Trip delay insurance – If delayed more than 12 hrs or requires an overnight stay, you and your family are covered for unreimbused expenses such as meals and lodging up to $500 per ticket 
• Purchase protection – Covers your new purchases for 120 days against damage or theft up to $500 per claim and $50,000 per account 
• Visa Concierge – Find tickets to the top sports and entertainment events, make dinner reservations

Check out our other credit card episodes for more tips to play the travel credit card game and travel for free and enjoy more perks!

Benefits of Marriott Bonvoy Boundless – Episode Transcript

0:37

Hey squadies, Travel Squad Podcast is back with Just the Tip, our Friday mini episode series where we give you quick travel stories, hacks and recommendations to set you off into the weekend, right.

Today we’re talking about the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit card offered by Chase.

0:55

Chase offers several Marriott Bonvoy branded credit cards, but today we’re focusing specifically on that boundless card as Kim and I both have this one and it offers some of their better sign up boziness across the Marriott branded card line.

We’re really taking our travel credit card repertoire to the next level here.

1:15

We’ve had the Chase Reserve, got the Capital One X, now we’re going into hotels.

You got to get into the hotel collection.

Yeah.

I feel like this year we’ve really started to play more with points and miles and we’ve been traveling for quite some time.

And I feel like we really did ourselves a disservice not looking into this more.

1:34

So I’m really glad we’re starting to dive in and to get more points and benefits from these credit cards.

And we’re really excited to share this one with you today.

So again, we’re talking about the Marriott Bonvoy boundless credit card.

So obviously you’re accruing points to use at the Marriott collection when you travel.

1:53

So let’s just mention some of the places that you can stay at with this credit card earning points under the luxury line.

You can stay at Saint Regis’s, Ritz, Carlton’s, JW Marriott’s which is the signature Marriott line.

Also regular Marriotts, Sheratons, Weston’s, Gaylord Collection and MGM.

2:14

And then again for normal stays, not in the premium or luxury.

We were talking about Courtyard, 4 Points, Springhill Suites, Fairfield, Residence Inn, Towns Place, and of course there’s so much more, but these are the main hotels that probably most of you have actually heard of that are part of the Marriott collection.

2:34

So we just want to let you know where you can potentially be staying when utilizing your points through this credit card.

And a great reason to get this credit card is to use and earn the sign up bonus.

So the normal sign up offer is 3 free night awards and this is valued up to 100 and 50,000 points, so 50,000 per night after you spend 3000 on purchases in your first three months.

2:58

But occasionally they have offers for five nights instead of three, so increasing the amount of points that you could use up to 250,000 points.

And I just want to reiterate something here.

Of course with normal credit cards and point collection, of course you earn actual points.

3:16

So when we’re saying up to 150,000 points if you’re doing the three night value or 250,000 if you get the special sign up bonus offer at the five, you don’t actually get those full amount of points.

You really get either three or five nights to stay and each stay is valued up to 50,000 points.

3:36

So as a good example, if you stay one night and it happens to be 45,000 points, you don’t get to keep that 5000 points, you lose it.

Now some of the other Marriott credit cards, they’re not structured that way.

You actually have those points, you don’t lose it.

3:51

But these bonus and free nights that they give you with the boundless card is specifically up to 50,000 that you can actually use.

So of course when you redeem these, you want to try to put them at places that you are at closer to 50,000 because those are going to be the nicer places and nicer stays.

4:09

So do keep that in mind.

I love that this credit card only has a $95 annual fee, which is pretty low, and every anniversary you get a free reward night that you can use for up to 35,000 points on a hotel stay.

So I feel like with what you’re getting on a hotel stay in the future, that really just pays for your annual fee and it probably is worth more than your annual fee actually.

4:32

I also like this card because now that I have it, I’m booking more within the Marriott family and Marriott hotels are nice.

So it’s up leveling my travel experience into more of the luxury level that I really want to be traveling at now.

I wholeheartedly agree with you.

4:47

I mean, I just mentioned some of the places earlier that’s within that luxury brand of Marriott and just in general, Marriott is a really nice place to stay, but minus the sign up bonus.

Some of the perks of this card is you get 17 times the total points for every dollar that you spend at participating Marriott Bonvoy locations.

5:07

So you get 6 times the points by using just the Marriott credit card.

When you book it, you get 10 times the points for actually being a Marriott Bonvoy loyalty member.

And then this card also gives you with it, Silver Elite status.

So this is the next level up in their tier system.

5:24

And because you’re in Silver, you get one times the point.

So collectively add that together 17 times the points.

So if you go ahead and spend $100 at a Marriott, you’re getting 1700 points at 17 times.

I mean, what a great deal on that.

I mean, what credit card do you see that gives you anywhere near 10 times points or higher for anything?

5:44

And we’re talking like 17, almost near 20.

There are tons of other ways to earn more points on this card.

You get three times points on the things that you buy that qualify as gas, grocery, or dining up to your first $6000 spent on the card.

6:01

So you can really maximize it when you purchase those things with that first 6002 times points on all purchases, including your travel purchases.

And then one other really cool benefit of this card is there’s different promos that they’ll run.

6:17

For example, well, I recently saw in the app that there was a bonus if you had booked two hotels within a month or two months during the summer, you would get an additional 22,500 bonus points when you book two hotels during that timeframe.

So if you are booking hotels with Marriott, you get extra points on top of points you’re already earning for those purchases.

6:37

Yeah, the points can really stack up very easily with this card, which then makes it of course very easy to redeem free nights for travel in the future.

Also, I had mentioned a little bit earlier that this card does give you elite status, more particularly in their silver category.

6:54

So what is the silver elite status?

So basically automatically by just having this card, it gives you 15 elite nights.

Now basically this is already saying that, oh, we’re just going to assume you’ve stayed 15 nights at a Marriott within a year to hit this new tier status.

7:10

So of course, you don’t have to stay the 15 nights.

They automatically give that to you.

At 25 nights you hit gold, so realistically you only need to stay 10 nights in the year to get to the next tier level.

But silver gives you priority late checkout.

So it doesn’t give you early check in, but it gives you late check out, which sometimes can actually be really nice.

7:30

If you have an afternoon or evening flight, there’s no rush to get out of a hotel exclusive.

By the way, I just used this when I went to South Padre Island.

I booked at a Marriott.

They only had a Courtyard Marriott so that’s where I stayed.

And when I checked in she said do you want a late checkout?

7:45

I didn’t even ask, they just automatically dramatically gave it.

What was your like check out time?

It was only an hour or so from 11:00 to 12:00.

An hour’s an hour and that still saves you from having to leave early.

You are able to sleep in, so it’s still a nice little benefit that you do have.

It also gives you exclusive member cash rates when booking direct through Marriott website.

8:06

So they’re already going to give you a discount just because you’re at the silver elite status.

You also do get point saver redemption.

So when you’re redeeming your points that you are earning, they will actually cost you less because you are in silver status.

And one of the things that I most recently actually used to that I really like is the mobile check in and mobile key.

8:28

So if you are arriving late or you just don’t want to have to deal with anybody, you can check in through the app and then they will give you a mobile key, which is then through the app really Bluetooth that will allow you to just go straight to your room.

So you don’t even need to get a physical key.

8:44

You can just go straight to your room and not have to deal with anything, which I think is actually a pretty cool unique feature.

And if you are redeeming your points for stays, that stay will still count as a night.

So you could be using some of your free stays and still earning towards the next status up, which is the gold status, which you only need 10 stays to get this.

9:06

So if you got the promo at 5 free nights and you book all of them the same here, you’re already at 5.

You only need to stay five more times at the hotel to move up to the gold status.

So your points bookings count towards your status.

9:22

Yes, and that’s not always true for all credit cards, especially in the hotel industry.

On top of that, for every 5000 that you spend on this card, you will actually earn one elite night credit.

So again, you don’t even have to stay at the hotel to even earn elite night credits to the next tier status if you spend a minimum of 5000.

9:44

So for each 5000 you can add on.

So of course, you know the credit card game is the credit card game.

You’ll figure out based off of what you have where you’re going to spread and put your purchases on.

But if you hit that 5000, here you go, already working your way without even staying the night at a Marriott to a higher tier status.

10:01

I’m going to be at gold so fast.

I know I was like thinking about it, but The thing is, Kim, you have to hit that by the end of this year.

It’s per calendar year.

Yes, it’s no, yes, it’s by calendar year.

So I was so bummed because we’re using our free hotels next year in January and I’m like, Dang, that counts for five nights next year, but I want to hit gold status this year.

10:24

Know what?

I think I might still be able to do it.

This is a challenge.

It’s on.

Keep our squatties in the know, Kim, if you end up hitting gold status.

Yes, by our end of your recap episode, I am going to be at Gold status.

So let’s talk about some of the additional benefits that the card actually does give you.

10:41

One of the coolest, most unique benefits that I noticed that isn’t the one that we all typically know is you can actually connect your Marriott card onto your Uber app and every time you ride with Uber, you collect Marriott points.

Love that one.

You also get complimentary in room premium Internet access while staying at hotels participating in Marriott Bonvoy.

11:01

No foreign transaction fees which also makes us a great international credit card to use.

Also I feel like a lot of times with cards with the low fees such as 95 on this one, usually they don’t include the no foreign transactions you have it on this one.

Your points don’t expire as long as you make purchases on your card every 24 months.

11:19

So you have to make a purchase once every two years.

If to keep your points active, that’s great.

It also gives you, even though this isn’t necessarily a travel credit card, yes, it is in terms of hotels, but not necessarily really in terms of you know flights etcetera.

But it does give you baggage delay insurance so that you also do have that bonus feature lost luggage reimbursement.

11:41

I have a question about this one.

So if you book your flight with your Marriott card, then bag is delayed for up to for say six hours, then you get $100 every day until your bag is delivered for up to six days or five days.

11:56

For five days, yes.

Wow, so.

That’s going to be to buy potentially like clothes, toiletries, things that would you would need out of your bag if it’s really lost and delayed again up to six hours.

Cool.

It has a trip delay insurance if you’re delayed more than 12 hours, and it requires an overnight stay.

12:13

You and your family are covered for unreimbursed expenses such as meals and lodging, up to $500 per ticket.

So book that luxury hotel.

Oh I love this.

This card also does have the Visa Concierge feature, which a lot of Visa cards do, but something a lot of people don’t know about, don’t necessarily really utilize.

12:32

But Visa Concierge you can use to find tickets to top sporting events and entertainment events, make dinner reservations, etcetera.

So Visa starting to become like American Express.

American Express back in the day used to be kind of like a more premier line because they did have these type of services.

12:49

You can call, have your own personal concierge set things up for you.

Visa has the same and you get that service here with the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless credit card just as well.

So I know these are some of the features of really great hotel branded credit card.

13:05

You’ve just earned your points, Kim.

You haven’t actually utilized them for redemption yet.

Brittany alluded to the fact that we have our bookings.

Brittany tell our squaddies where we are actually staying with the five free nights up to 50,000 each night on our trip in January.

13:21

Yeah.

So Jamal and I are going to Thailand and Singapore in January 2025.

So we have redeemed our five free nights for our our trip there.

So we’re spending two nights in Singapore at the Saint Regis Hotel and we are spending three nights at a beachfront resort in Phuket in Thailand.

13:40

So we got five nights of luxury accommodations for the $95 annual fee.

I mean saying.

My God, that’s.

Amazing, I know.

And Saint Regis is one of their top signature luxury lines that they have.

And we were able to find a place in Singapore, which is a luxury city also for 50,000 or less per night.

14:01

So again, of course, I’m not going to sit here and say all of the hotels you’re going to find under 50,000 because that’s not necessarily the case.

But I mean, you can still find those luxury brands at 50,000 a night for utilization.

So we’re staying for free in Singapore, which is already an expensive city, staying at a luxury hotel and then in Phuket Beachfront Resort for three nights, again, all those nights under 50,000 each.

14:26

So again, Britney said it, I’m going to say it again because I want to reiterate five nights for $95, which is just the fee plus all the other points and features that we have with this card.

I love it.

And I sent you the referral code Kim for you to sign up for this one.

14:42

If you have this card, send it to your friends.

It gives you 40,000 bonus points for every referral that you give out.

So I have 40,000 points coming to me.

And those points when you actually like earn them again, they’re not set up to like, oh, you could use them up to a maximum of 50.

14:57

These are points that you can earn and and don’t necessarily lose and have to spend it within that threshold.

This is just again 40,000 points that you really have for everyday normal bookings now, not on those bonus ones for the sign up.

Well, that’s a huge win for you all.

15:12

I’m so excited for your trip there.

Jamal, I have a question for you on the point usage.

So with Marriott, my welcome offer was three nights free.

Is it 3 nights or could it be 150,000 points?

Like let’s say I’m looking at some hotels in Nice, France and this one for example is 75,000 points.

15:35

Do I have 150,000 points to work with?

Well, no, so that’s what I was saying.

The bonus offer that you get for the sign up, they are really capping you at 50,000 per night.

So you would be able to use 50,000 towards that 75,000.

15:50

You hit a great question that I would have to double check on the answer for.

But they do allow you to actually pay the difference in cash or use some of your own points that you have on those bonus redemption nights.

So if you have add an extra 25,000 in points, you may be able to use those from your personal ones to actually pay for that.

16:11

But again, they are really capping you at 50,000 per night with those sign up bonus points.

But again, any other points that you have accrued outside of the sign up bonus, they’re not capping you at 50,000 a night.

If you actually legitimately had 75,000 points, book that with your normal ones.

16:27

But the sign up bonus ones, yeah, unfortunately they do cap you.

So that’s one of the unfortunate things about it, but still a great offer, again, especially if we’re looking into, you know, staying out of the Saint Regis in Singapore of what you can get.

But you’re going to the South of France and that’s a really popular place too.

16:43

So it doesn’t surprise me that it’s a little bit pricier there for you on that point scale.

There is one hotel, the Hotel du Cuvent, a luxury collection hotel for 132,000 points per night.

Saving up for it.

I told you they can actually be really, really pricey, but again, those are in certain locations, but you can see what you could still find at 50,000.

17:05

And again, for 95 bucks for three nights or five nights depending on which promo you sign up under, you’re still going to find great accommodations that make it worth it for $95.

Well, I’m so excited to finally be in this world.

And thank you, Squaties, for tuning into this week’s Just the Tip.

17:22

Make sure to subscribe, leave a review, and follow us on all the socials at Travel Squad Podcast.

And have fun traveling this weekend.

Bye, squaddies.