Originally Posted by
stimpy
Huh? If you were loyal, you would have stayed enough to earn more benefits. None of us knew about this, but a heck of a lot of us stayed 50 nights anyways. And for me it was mostly out of my own pocket. Just on this little thread,
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/starw...-rankings.html my 50 nights has me ranked 72nd. Since I was loyal and gave Starwood 50 nights, I earned the suite upgrades. The people who were even more loyal than me and stayed 75 or 100 nights get more benefits as they should. You didn't stay 50 nights so you don't deserve any of these benefits.
Even if I had missed a night and fell short with 49, I wouldn't be complaining about the wonderful changes we've seen to the SPG program.
Wonderful if you are not detrimentally impacted perhaps.
To give a linked example BA offer an additional range of benefits to those who go well beyond the qualification criteria for their top (normal) tier status Gold. These benefits include Upgrades for 2, partner silver/gold cards, Concorde Room access and Gold Guest list membership. Critically however not a single one of these new benefits detrimentally impacts existing Golds.
The issue for me here is that in not qualifying for the suite nights awards I WILL be detrimentally impacted, because a smaller amount of upgrade inventory for on the day allocation is going to be chased by a larger number of Plats (as a result of the Lifetime introduction). The new breakfast benefits, Gold gift, Ambassador for 100 nights and extra SPG points for those hitting greater than 75 nights do not cause negative impacts to those who do not qualify. The introduction of suite nights awards does impact those of us who do not qualify. The lifetime Plat introduction would also be far more neutral in it;s impact without the suite nights awards changes.
If the new benefits had been fairly trailed in advance of introduction then that would be fair, but is it wrong to feel cheated when I am unable to pick up the last few nights I would have needed to hit the 50 night qualification threshold because I did not know about it? Had I stayed the same number of nights as I did in 2011 and held a US SPG Amex rather than a UK SPG Amex I would also have hit 50 nights. Where is the fairness here?