You Will Soon No Longer Be Able To Earn Starpoints On Uber Rides
Opportunities to earn extra points are critical to being able to travel for free or cheaply. Partnerships between hotels and airlines used to be one of the big keys to doing so. That expanded to rental cars and, ultimately, to non-traditional channels like Uber.
It’s been almost 3 years since Uber and Starwood Preferred Guest announced a partnership that was especially rewarding for SPG elite members who used Uber.
Plenty of Starwood Preferred Guest elites earned plenty of Starpoints. Now, it looks like that partnership is coming to an end. According to Zach at The Points Guy, SPG and Uber are winding down this partnership on December 31, 2017. After that, you’ll no longer be able to earn Starpoints for your Uber rides.
The Final Two Pennies
It’s possible that Uber is looking to focus on their own co-branded credit card that just came out. I need to sit down and analyze that credit card and report back, but I’m waaaay behind on a number of other things I owe my readers.
It is still possible to earn points from ridesharing. Lyft has a partnership with Delta if you’re looking for ways to leverage your spending.
It’s not entirely clear to me if this is Uber’s decision, SPG’s decision, or both. Or, for that matter, Marriott’s decision. Ever since the initial progress when the Marriott/SPG merger was finalized, we haven’t heard a whole lot more. This could be a result of Marriott/SPG playing hardball on the price they charge Uber for the points awarded. There’s not a whole lot of information out there right now, other than the obvious loss of a way for travelers to earn valuable Starpoints.
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I have it on good authority that Uber never paid a cent for the Starpoints. Starwood offered them for free in return for Uber data on rider profile, pick-up and drop-off etc.
The idea was that Starwood would be able to identify the share of wallet for its members (i.e. how often are they travelling and not staying at a Starwood property, which other brands are they staying at etc.) and presumably use this insight in their marketing.
I guess the insight was not as valuable as expected after all, or Marriott does not believe in it.
Stavros, very interesting. If that’s actually the case, it makes sense Marriott might decide they don’t want to continue subsidizing this research.