Data Point – AMEX Membership Rewards to SPG – Transfer Time

Up until Marriott purchased SPG, I have never transferred my American Express Membership Rewards (MR) points over to SPG because of the transfer ratio.

The current transfer ratio is currently 2 MRs to 1 SPG so it is typically is not a good use of your MRs but because you can transfer 1 SPG to 3 Marriott Rewards points, it can make a lot of sense if you are redeeming for a Nights and Flights Redemption or if you want to stay at a higher end Marriott property.

As my daughter and I are traveling to San Francisco for another father/daughter trip, it makes sense for me to transfer because hotel prices in San Francisco are ridiculously overpriced.  A 3-night stay at a nice central hotel would run us well over $1,150 CAD so I decided to use Marriott points instead.

The only problem is that I didn’t have a lot … thus the transfer from MR –> SPG –> Marriott.

The Process

The process to transfer Membership Rewards to SPG is pretty straight forward.  

Log into your American Express account from the homepage at www.americanexpress.ca

Find your points balance and click on the View and Redeem button.

Go to the Travel menu and find the Frequent Traveler Participants submenu.  Click on the link.

Scroll down until you find the SPG as a transfer partner.

Click on Transfer my points and then choose how many points you want to transfer over.  For security, you will need to confirm your credit card information.

In my case, I needed 40,000 SPG so I transferred 80,000 MRs.

After you click Complete Transfer, you will receive a confirmation.

How Long Does It Take?

The American Express site tells you that it takes 5 business days for the transfer to complete.

But how long does it take in actual practice?

Well, I made my transfer request at approximately 3:30 pm MST on February 12th, 2017 (Sunday) and the SPG points were credited to my account when I woke up this morning (February 13th, 2017).

So as the Count would say … it takes 1 … 1 ah ah ah … 1 business day.

Conclusion

While American Express tells you that it takes 5 business days to transfer your Membership Rewards to SPG Points, in actuality, it takes 1 business day but your mileage may vary depending on the day of the week you choose to transfer.  My guess is that transfers that happen on Friday nights and Saturdays don’t get credited until Monday morning … but that’s just a guess.