Originally Posted by
TGLoyalty
The real IHG hack is buying Ambassador using it for a 2-4-1 night at an IC (basically getting what you paid back) and getting Platinum.
Personally IHG is also my second brand but only because of IC Kimpton Indigo and Voco properties most old CPs are poor but the newer ones are very good.
It was only a hack when you could extend Diamond status by renewing Ambassador. Now, it is just paying an extra fee to get Platinum status which provides little benefit. The 2-4-1 was somewhat useful when they allowed it to be used any day of the week at a Kimpton during the pandemic. Now, even that is not that useful--especially in the US where there are so few ICs and most of them charge stupid amenity fees which eat up the value rather quickly.