Traveler2017

I was MPC Gold in 2016 and dropped to Silver in Feb 2017. CX gave me an extension of 4 months until June 2017 to accumulate enough points to requalify again for Gold, which I am now. I suspect the reason why CX was willing to give me this extension was to compensate for the adverse change in MPC policies in 2016. My current Gold membership will expire in June 2018. How likely will I be able to request an extension of a few months again to requalify for Gold again next year?

QRC3288

a lot less likely the second time around. my guess is you already suspect this!

JeCCo

No harm in trying - it'll be a good gauge of exactly how desperate CX really is!

Traveler2017

Thank you. That's what I thought too. But again it probably also depends on their member acquisition vs churning vs usage of MPC by then. Just wondering how CX's performance has been so far as regards their user base in mainland China.

cxfan1960

4-month extension is uncommon. This is the first time I heard of that. It doesn't hurt asking again, but it may be a little more difficult for two consecutive years. They may decline, or grant you a month or two.

Traveler2017

Actually, I did not ask for the extension. They voluntarily offered. Long story. I was calling MPC for a complaint about a defective product and customer experience. I just literally got home from Europe on CX. I was in PEY and the seat was totally defective and broken. A flight attendant and purser came and tried the seat and agreed it was defective. They tried to use "tapes" to tape things back together, etc. but to no avail. Then they first offered to move me to Y which I declined. Then the purser "promised" to move me to J. I repeatedly asked him if he was sure about that which he said yes. Then later he gave the J seat to someone else in PEY and moved me to take that open seat. I was a little annoyed about them not honoring the promise but thought it's still better to spend the whole flight in a mostly broken seat. Before I moved I asked them to double check if that new PEY seat is fine. They said they did. I moved there but of course it was not. It was not as bad as my first seat but still defective. I was upset and decided to just go back to my first seat. When I got home, I found a mail from CX MPC stating that because they appreciate my past patronage so they decided to comp me to Silver for the next year. I didn't need to go on that Europe trip. I paid it out my own pocket as a club points run to allow me to at least maintain Silver, otherwise I will drop to Green. I have been gradually dropping from Diamond down and down over the past 3 years.... When I saw the letter I was furious. I used my own dime to ensure at least I could maintain at Silver and ended up getting a totally defective product and customer experience and there they claimed they would comp me as Silver. That's why I called MPC for complaint. I didn't ask for extension because I would never have expected they would agree to it. She voluntarily offered 3 months extension. Then I asked for one more month and she got supervisor approval. Perhaps to a little extent, the granting of the extension was related to service recovery. But I doubt the extent of it because she didn't ask me much details about the incident. On the point about it's being uncommon for them to give out such long extension, I remember the MPC rep told me that they usually gave out 3 months extension and that's why she needed to go for supervisor's approval when I asked for one more month. Perhaps this is more an off-year for them in 2017 to sort of make up for the sins committed in 2016 when they revised MPC qualification policies.