lefrid

The french version is clear (unfortunately). Bold is mine. It really says "for one night"
"Séjournez plus, gagnez plus :
- Dès votre statut Platinum, recevez un surclassement en suite pour une nuit, réservable à l’avance et garanti.
- Gagnez-en un deuxième dès 18000 points Statut.
- Et un supplémentaire tous les 4000 points Statut, dans la limite de 12 par an. "

Which makes that cert pretty unusable on vacation forcing people to change room,...
Hitting Diamond would grant you 4 certs which together make it possible to have a small-ish stay in a suite.
In short: useless for "<18000" Plats and Diamond is really the target to aim.

My 2 cents

tris06

Well in a way your making me feel I am a good candidate to use Fairmonts more often. Quite often I am paying near 300 Euros per night for my stays sprinkled with very cheap stays here in China.

Macau Sofitel cost me 300 Euros exactly per night in January. And my up coming stay in Zhuhai is costing 300 USD per night for the cheapest room.

I still think and you partially admitted that Premier would fit between gold and plat member levels. Hence it is entirely reasonable not to have suite upgrades for gold members as it would fall below Premier if comparing the 2 for qualifying.

Don't worry I probably will be gold in 2021 so I will experience it for myself but I have a pretty good record for upgrades here in Asia and Australia. Europe I found it to be around 60 or 70 percent for upgrades.

I am very happy to see the Accor rep online to give us clarification on suite upgrades.

It would definately be dissapointing if it was 1 night upgrades. I surely think that is a mistake. 5-7 nights is reason as others said. Also this is assuming it will only be a junior suite upgrade which is not that exspensive.

Dav77

CanadaDH

That would be me, and I did earn 14,000 points on a 5-night stay last August. But it's also true that I took a full 18 nights to reach 14,000 points so far this year. Jasper is correct, in that rates at Fairmont properties can be very seasonal. My summer trips to Lake Louise cost well over $1,000/night, and that's even with using an FPC suite upgrade. However, my winter visits cost less than half that. And, by finding deals (which are also more easy to come out of peak season), I never pay close to the full daily rate. I've managed to get some really great rates on my stays... really great rates. Definitely, I would characterize Fairmont rates as not consistent, and I think that has a lot to do with the very high percentage of leisure travellers, particularly at their resort properties (I rarely stay at city properties).

And I said that right from the beginning when the merger was first announced... the benefits of Accor LeClub were much worse than FPC, but at the same time, I also fully admitted that it was far easier to achieve LCAH Platinum than FPC Platinum.

Now I'm not sure I've ever stayed at any of these sub-$300 rates at Fairmonts that have been mentioned. Certainly they exist, but really, who wants to go to Winnipeg in the winter! One could certainly have gamed the FPC system easily if they had the time, but doing so would have meant spending some time in places one really would have no desire to go, and at off times of the year, and in room categories that are less than optimal. I don't think very many people did that.

AccorHotels Concierge

Dear members,

I am pleased to provide you more details regarding the "coming soon" Diamond status that will be launched on January 2020 ! Indeed 26 000 Status points cumulated within a calendar year thanks to your eligible expenses will be required to reach this new Elite Status. The number of nights is not taken into account.

Your 2019 expenses already count! I hope that these information answer to your requests.

Thank you again for your interest.
Amy

Yul_voyager

Except that 5 nights was enough with a Amex Plat... It was not that complicated to find some 200$ / night in Canadian properties even in not undesirable places...

nrouxel

Well if you are platinium with nights (and not status points), a one night suite upgrade is pretty useless. I don't think I will tell my wife "let's enjoy our suite tonight because tomorrow we will sleep in a poor standart room !" (but with a beautiful apple !)

CanadaDH

Perhaps. But I dropped the Amex plat a long time ago. It was pretty hard for me to justify a $699 annual fee for a credit card that didn't give much I couldn't get with cheaper products. I get more points using the Amex Gold, which earns double points at hotels and various places. If I remember correctly, the Canadian Amex plat, up until shortly before the merger, offered LeClub Plat status without any stay requirement at all. So, even with the Amex Plat, LeClub status was still easier to achieve than FPC!

I'm sure there are decent places one could go for $200/night. But, my passions are hiking and skiing, and I'm not going to ever get any accommodations in such destinations for anywhere near that price. I would absolutely love it if I could. When vacation time is at a premium, "not undesirable places" is not really the criteria I'm going for when choosing a hotel. I don't look through a list of Fairmont or Accor properties, sort them by price, and say which ones within a certain price point would I be OK visiting. I choose the destination I want, and then say, what's the best deal I can get there, at the time I wish to go there, for the room/suite category I want there.

lefrid

Clearly ALL is not focusing on lower end properties where your can get 100 nights for 3000$ in some markets

FrequentSherm

My two pence worth...I will comfortably hit Platinum in 2019 and I am looking forward to that next step, it will be off the back of 80/90 nights away from home. Given the changes, I will need to spend over 120 nights away to obtain diamond and so have no chance.

It depends on how Accor want to reward loyalty. 7 nights in one hotel in an expensive market (say NYC) will be rewarded more than 100 nights for Accor in a lower bracket where there will still be great margin for Accor.

The PR talks about living accor - choosing to spend 100 nights a year in an accor is more loyal, and living the brand, than one week a year in an expensive market.

Dav77

FrequentSherm

I understand this business rationale - but why not set a target number of nights for those that are not staying at Raffles for a week? Its always been obvious with hotel and airline schemes that monetary spend = quick status, yet there is a 'hook' for those at the lower end of the hotel range to do it by sheer commitment by segments or stays.

Its an accor wide loyalty scheme, not just rewards for the top 5 brands. For example Bonvoy ambassador has a 100 night target.

Dav77

gilbertaue

I fully agree.
Though I don't think nights should be a qualification factor in access of Platinum - but enough to show loyalty.

Hence my suggestion that it should be 26,000 points AND a min of 30 nights.

CanadaDH

You have to be careful setting an additional minimum number of nights requirement, because then you can end up excluding some very lucrative leisure travellers entirely. They might only be spending a few weeks per year in a hotel at all, based on limited time available, but spending bucket loads of money when they do. Many properties depend heavily on leisure travellers for their customer base.

But it doesn't matter what any of us think it should be. Accor, or any other business, decides what is important to them, and then sets the target. In this case, it appears Accor cares more about the revenue. I don't know how their margins work. Does Accor earn a higher or lower percentage return off of an expensive stay vs. a cheap stay? I have no idea what their commercial agreements with the property owners look like. But if Accor earns X% from low end property stays and 2X% from luxury property stays, then that would explain why they would prefer high spend with low nights. If Accor makes the exact same % return from all properties and room types, regardless of the brand or value of the stay, then shouldn't care how many nights someone stays, as long as they spend the money. If Accor earns a higher % return from the lower end properties, then including a minimum number of nights makes sense.

But until they actually say what the benefits of this new tier are, it's a worthless target as far as I'm concerned.