Man Arrested At Marriott Hotel For Stealing Bonvoy Points

It’s all too common for airline miles and hotel points to be stolen. However, it’s not often that a person gets arrested for this at a hotel…

Man arrested at Residence Inn Naples for stealing points

FlyerTalk member KRSW shares a story based on a police report from the Naples Police Department. This involves an arrest on April 27, 2023, at the Residence Inn by Marriott in Naples, Florida. Here are the details, according to the police report:

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• On April 26, the victim stated that her personal information had been stolen, including her Marriott Bonvoy account information
• The victim received an email confirmation from the Residence Inn Naples confirming a reservation using points, which she hadn’t made
• The victim claims to have called the hotel to cancel the reservation and changed her Marriott Bonvoy account log-in information, but on April 27, she received a notification that someone had checked into the Residence Inn under that same reservation
• Six police officers then went to the hotel, where the general manager stated that the reservation was in fact made in the name of the victim, but someone had called pretending to be the victim, adding someone else as a second guest, so they’d be allowed to check-in
• Police officers were then led to the room in question, where a 29-year-old male, 25-year-old female, and infant, were found in the room
• The suspect claimed that a friend had made the reservation for him, but he couldn’t say what his friend’s name was
• The man was taken into custody, and both adults were given a trespass warning for the property
• In this county alone, the man had six felony cases and nine misdemeanor cases, which might be why six police officers were sent to the scene

My thoughts on this Marriott Bonvoy® points theft situation

While hotel points are stolen all the time, it’s not often that someone is actually arrested on property for this. That’s because this kind of theft is typically caught either before or after the hotel stay happened. In this case, the arrest was only possible thanks to the swift actions of the Marriott Bonvoy account holder who had her points stolen.

It’s pretty terrible that this woman reached out to Marriott about the situation as soon as she received the confirmation, yet somehow the man was still able to check-in at the hotel a day later. She really did everything right here.

This case also exposes a pretty common security concern at hotels. It’s really easy to call and add someone to a reservation as a second guest, so that they can also check-in. All you have to do is pretend to be the person who the reservation is for, and most hotels don’t actually do a lot to verify the identity of that person.

I think the other question is how exactly this guy managed to steal the points of the Marriott Bonvoy member. The man claimed that a friend made the reservation for him, but he couldn’t provide the friend’s name. While I don’t think he was telling the whole truth, I think it might not necessarily be that far off.

I wouldn’t necessarily assume this guy is some savvy hacker who somehow figured out how to log into this person’s account and then made a reservation. I think it’s much more likely that he was somehow sold a reservation at a significantly discounted rate by a hacker who has access to a bunch of Bonvoy accounts, given how big of an underground industry this is.

Bottom line

A Marriott Bonvoy member noticed that an unauthorized reservation was made out of her account. She reached out to Marriott about this, but somehow the person was still able to check into the hotel. At this point the woman reached out to the police, who showed up at the hotel and arrested the man.

What do you make of this Marriott Bonvoy® points theft situation?