Post Updated 2020-05-13: Good news! This deal has been extended and is now valid until January 2021! Why not treat you and your loved one to a surprise vacation a the Atlantis Hotel and Casino in the Bahamas! This trip must be taken by January 31, 2020, so start planning now to take advantage of this American Express Platinum Card travel hacking loophole, reported here first, by PointsWise! This travel hack now works with the Amex Gold Rewards Canada Card too, since you’ll now receive automatic Gold Elite status with this Card as well!

The Offer: A 4 Night Complimentary Stay at Atlantis, Bahamas

• Complimentary 4-night stay in the Beach Tower, including hotel room taxes
• Up to 2 additional nights at a Special Casino Rate of $65/night; plus taxes & fees
• $100 Free Slot Play
• Atlantis Casino Experience Pass
• Access to Aquaventure, a one-of-a-kind 141-acre waterscape with 20 swimming areas and 11 pools

See the details of this offer here. Visit the Atlantis Paradise Island website to learn more about the resort. This offer does NOT include your flights! However, if you sign up for an American Express Platinum card, you’ll receive a welcome bonus of points. This is a promotion from Wyndham and Total Rewards to match your status. Your Diamond status will only be active until January 31, unless you re-qualify by earning 15,000 tier credits, so this trip must be redeemed by that date, as well as any other Diamond benefits. So if you plan to do this trip, start the process to gain your loyalty status with Total Rewards NOW (as outlined below)!

American Express Platinum Canada Cardholders, This Is For You!

So how do you get this offer simply by being an Amex Platinum or Gold Rewards Cardmember in Canada? I thought you’d never ask. You’ll simply need to match your loyalty status in a few easy steps. I’ll explain step-by-step below. This whole process took me a total of half an hour to fill out a few forms, and a few days wait time for my loyalty accounts to be linked. I’d say that’s an exceptionally good use of time and beats trying to work your way up to Diamond status the hard way.

Step 1: Apply for an American Express Platinum Card

You’ll need an Amex Platinum or Gold Rewards Card for this travel hacking loophole. I consider these cards to be Canada’s premier travel rewards cards, and this trick is just one reason why. If you’re already an Amex Platinum or Gold Rewards Cardmember, then that’s great, carry on with the next steps!

Step 2: Create Your Marriott Bonvoy Account

Marriott Bonvoy is Marriott’s hotel loyalty program. You’ll need to create your Marriott Bonvoy account if you don’t have one already. Marriott Bonvoy is a “frequent travel partner” with American Express, which means points you earn on your Amex card can be transferred to Marriott Bonvoy so you can pay for hotels with points! Marriott Bonvoy has 6 loyalty tiers:

• Member Status: Stay 0-9 nights in a year
• Silver Elite: Stay 10+ nights in a year
• Gold Elite: Stay 25+ nights in a year
• Platinum Elite: Stay 50+ nights in a year
• Platinum Premier Elite: Stay 75+ nights in a year
• Platinum Premier Elite with Ambassador: Stay 100 nights in a year and have a $20K annual qualifying spend

Notable benefits with Marriott Gold Elite Status include:

• Room upgrade (subject to availability)
• Late checkout of 2 pm

Once you’ve created your Marriott Bonvoy account, take note of your login info, including your Membership number. This can be found on your “Profile” page within your account. Click on your name in the top-right corner and you’ll see a navigation menu with a link to your “Profile”. Now we’re going to use our Marriott Gold Elite status to fast track our way to elite loyalty status with other hotel brands. Hotel loyalty status is a lesser-known trick for those new to travel hacking and one I will always make sure I look into before booking a hotel stay! Hotels want your loyalty, and if they see if are a loyal customer to a different brand, they will try their best to get your loyalty by offering the same benefits you’re used to.

Step 3: Link Your American Express and Marriott Bonvoy Accounts

You’ll need to phone American Express Card Services (1-800-263-1616). Simply tell the representative you’d like to link your Platinum or Gold Rewards card to your Marriott account. Just let them know your Marriott Bonvoy membership number as noted in the previous step. This step may take up to a couple of days to complete, so be patient.

Step 4: Create a Wyndham Rewards Account

Wait. You might be wondering how this is relevant? Wyndham Rewards is Hyatt’s loyalty program. They are also partnered with Caesars Entertainment Total Rewards loyalty program, which is our end game. We’ll talk more about this shortly. For now, create your Wyndham Rewards account here. Wyndham Rewards has 4 loyalty tiers, and I’m going to show you how to easily obtain Diamond status, their top loyalty tier just long enough to take advantage of this Bahamas promotion.

• Blue: At enrollment
• Gold: after 5 nights
• Platinum: after 15 nights
• Diamond: after 40 nights

When you first create your account, you’ll be a Blue member, but we’ll change that in the next step.

Step 5: Link Your Marriott Bonvoy and Wyndham Rewards Accounts

Remember how we got Marriott Gold Elite status a few steps back? By this point, hopefully, you should see that reflected in your Marriott Bonvoy account. When you click on your name in your account dashboard you should see “Gold Elite” beside it. If not, you might need to wait a little longer for the accounts to be linked. You’ll need it to move forward. Now we need to status match our Marriott Gold Elite status with our Wyndham Rewards account to obtain Diamond status with Wyndham! Side note, I originally tried to match my Platinum status with Le Club Accor Hotels (Fairmont) with Wyndham Rewards and they only gave me Gold status! Yuck. When I tried again with my Marriott Gold Elite status I was rewarded with Diamond. Some notable benefits with Wyndham Rewards Diamond status include:

• Late checkout
• Early check-in
• Welcome amenity
• Caesars Entertainment Total Rewards status match
• Suite upgrades

Note: Because this is a limited time promo, you’ll only have Diamond status with Wyndham Rewards for 3 months, unless you re-qualify and stay 14 nights at Wyndham properties during that time. You’ll simply need to take a screenshot of your Marriott Bonvoy Account showing you have Gold Elite status. Once you’ve taken a screenshot of your account, you can upload it to Wyndham Rewards here:

Step 6: Create a Caesars Entertainment Total Rewards Account

Now you’ll need to create a Caesars Entertainment Total Rewards account. This is the account that’s going to give us the 4-night complimentary stay at the Atlantis in the Bahamas. When you first sign up, you’ll be a “Gold” member, but we’ll upgrade that to “Diamond” in the final step to follow. Total Rewards has 4 tiers in their loyalty program:

• Gold: 0+ tier credits
• Platinum: 5,000+ tier credits
• Diamond: 15,000+ tier credits
• Seven Stars: 150,000 tier credits

You can view all of the benefits with the Total Rewards loyalty program here, and of course, sign up for your Total Rewards loyalty account!

Step 7: Link Your Wyndham Rewards Account With Caesars Entertainment Total Rewards

The last step in the process to match our hotel loyalty status! Now that you have Diamond status with Wyndham Rewards, you can link that with your Caesars Entertainment Total Rewards account. This may take up to a couple of days. When I matched my status, I didn’t receive an email notification, I just happen to log in to my account and see my status was upgraded to Diamond, so you may want to keep on eye on it.

Step 8: Call to Book Your 4 Night Complimentary Stay at the Atlantis, Bahamas!

Once you see you have “Diamond” status in your Total Rewards account, that’s great news! You’ll now be able to book your 4-night complimentary stay at the Atlantis, Bahamas! To learn more about this benefit, check out the Total Rewards promo page. Just call Atlantis Casino VIP Services at 800-752-9711 and tell them you’d like to book the Diamond package to receive:

• Complimentary 4-night stay in the Beach Tower, including hotel room taxes
• Up to 2 additional nights at a Special Casino Rate of $65/night; plus taxes & fees
• $100 Free Slot Play
• Atlantis Casino Experience Pass
• Access to Aquaventure, a one-of-a-kind 141-acre waterscape with 20 swimming areas and 11 pools

For more details of what to expect at Atlantis, check out this excellent trip report of the comped experience at the Atlantis from ‘Dem Flyers.

Get Your $100 Dining Credit for Caesars Properties

This travel hack is also useful if you plan to visit Las Vegas before January 31, 2019, because with your Total Rewards Diamond status you’ll also get a few other notable perks that can help you at the casinos including:

• No resort fees
• $100 USD dining credit (“celebratory dinner” for reaching Diamond status)

So if nothing else, make sure to take advantage of your free $100 dining credit to be used at Caesars properties! You can visit any Total Rewards center at Caesars Resorts to claim your prize.

Enjoy Your Bahamas Vacation!

I hope you Canadian travel hackers can take advantage of this amazing opportunity just by being an Amex Platinum or Gold Rewards Canada Cardmember! Be sure to let us know your experience with booking your comped stay at Atlantis in the Bahamas, or simply using your $100 dining credit at Caesars Entertainment properties!