Updated 9pm PT on 5/1: The reader who asked me this question sent me the following email.  It looks like the 15 Elite Nights Credit posts very quickly (in just a few days)!

Hey Grant! Just checked my Marriott account and I now have the additional 15 nights. Not sure if it just takes a few business days, or if they update on a certain day of the week, etc. That said, downgrading for the elite nights looks to work just fine!

Updated 5pm PT on 5/8: I just received a response from Marriott regarding my email that I sent on 4/29:

Dear Grant Thomas, Thank you for contacting Marriott Rewards. It appears the 30 Elite nights were credited for your two Marriott Rewards credit cards from Chase. You received 15 Elite nights for your Marriott Rewards Premier credit card from Chase on January 8, 2018, and 15 Elite nights for your Marriott Rewards Premier Business credit card from Chase on April 18, 2018. If I can be of further assistance, I invite you to reply to this email. Thank you for choosing Marriott.

---

Good afternoon everyone, I hope your weekend is going well.  I received an email from a reader asking about Marriott Rewards Elite Nights Credit.  I am not sure if this is useful or helpful to others, but thought I would share anyways.  Here is his question:

My question is simply whether or not you received the 15 elite night credits that the Marriott card provides, at or near the time that you did the downgrade. Right now I am at a point where those credits would push me up a tier of status in Marriott once the new loyalty program is implemented, but I have gotten conflicting answers from Chase when asking them if a product change would give me the night credits in the same way that a new application would.

This reader is referring to my post in early January regarding converting my JPMorgan Chase Ritz Carlton Credit Card to a Chase Marriott Rewards Visa Signature Credit Card.  I downgraded / converted / product changed to the Chase Marriott Rewards Visa Signature Credit Card in January.  I also received my new Chase Marriott Rewards Business Credit Card a few weeks ago.  I haven’t stayed at Marriott this year, but when I logged into my Marriott account, it shows 30 Elite Night Credits.  I tried to dig a little deeper to see when the Elite Night Credits posted, but that is not easy to find out.

I looked at my Marriott Rewards activity from the last 6 months, but there is no mention of having a Marriott Rewards credit card or when I earned the Elite Night Credits.  I sent Marriott customer service an email, but figured I would call and see if I could get an answer sooner.  Unfortunately, the only thing the rep could see in my account and share with me was “30 Elite Night Credits earned from Chase credit cards.”  I asked if the rep could see when the Elite Night Credits posted to my account (15 nights should have posted in mid January and the other 15 nights should have posted in mid April), but the rep could not tell me a specific date, other than saying that the Elite Night Credits was tied to when the annual fee and annual credit card benefits began.

My reader also shared his thought process of why he wanted to know about Elite Night Credits.  He mentioned that Chase is launching a new Marriott Rewards credit card on May 3 and didn’t know if he should convert now or wait.  I told him to convert sooner rather than later, since you never know what might happen after May 3.

That said, I’ve been looking into this now (rather than closer to August, when SPG/Marriott Rewards merge) because I am unsure if the option to downgrade the Ritz card to the Marriott Premier card will still be available once Chase launches the Premier Plus card on May 3. That new card doesn’t award elite nights until 2019, so you can’t stack it with all the other SPG and Marriott cards at the time that Marriott will be combining nights.

I don’t know if any of this info is useful, but I thought I would share with you anyway.  If you have any questions, please leave a comment below.  Have a great weekend everyone!