vatali

I got it too.

15 nights in 2015 already, no CC, and redeemed abotu half a million last year, as well as the last several years. (points and points are good for me)

I am diamond 3 years in a row (5 overall)

MissJ

Well, I'm Diamond right now. I don't know the logic. I do have a ton of stays already booked for this year so maybe it just knows I'm still extremely active. Who knows.

MissJ

And I agree with this sentiment as well. My email just came this morning. If you are complaining and haven't received your status email for the year, it very well may be coming your way.

arlflyer

No, I agree, and while I'm personally indeed feeling a bit offended by this, I'm sure there was some thought, at least on paper, put into determining who gets what.

However, that said, my larger gripe is simply with the fact that this is being done opaquely. The whole point of a loyalty/reward program is to reward...something. Time spent, money spent, referrals, whatever. Doing this without explaining why it's being done does nothing. It reinforces no message. The people who get it are happy, but don't know why they got it, and the people who don't are steamed because they've just been stiffed in return for their loyalty.

Rewards are supposed to reinforce a behavior. If you do X, you get Y, therefore customer will be inclined to try to do X (and thus get Y) again. But this has no such marketing value because no one knows what they are being rewarded for.

If there is a challenge or whatever that only some people can earn, fine. But just make it clear and tied to something so that a big chunk of your loyal customers don't just feel neglected for their business. It's one thing to not qualify and think "Ok, well, next time". It's another to just feel like you were abandoned or forgotten, and while I'm a few years removed from marketing class, I don't that recall that being a desirable customer sentiment.


But this has been repeatedly demonstrated to not be tied to any email. People are getting this through the deep link, which anyone can access and try to log into.

Also, my status email for 2015 came in December. Are some people just getting them now?

poker9ite

Did anybody who got the email and the 2x and 3x offer notice they say to contact the hotel to see if they are part of the offer. No list, not that I could find.

kahuna1993

got 100 000 but no 2/3 , EU based; happy with wathever I get so thx HH !

MissJ

Yes and my offer was in that email.

WelshGirl

UK based . Diamond for 8 years.
Last year 30 stays 50 nights 70 k base points.
A lovely surprise, thank you Hilton

BotB

Completely understand and agree with that sentiment. ^

I find increasingly though that such 'targeted offers' are opaque unfortunately, only hope is to share data points and see if some common ground can be found but again only if the metric is a simple one...multi-parameter conditional triggers will be too hard to determine I fear.

Also, for what its worth...the points credit to the account but no record of it in the history for points. (so can't say what they call it or how they credit it).

RunningGuy

This offer was way to lucrative not to upset those left out. But the one thing I learned from the whole devaluation is that Hilton doesn't really care about upsetting their loyal customer base.

lincolnjkc

It appears they credit to the balance immediately but don't show up in the transaction history until the next day. I saw nothing hut the total last night; today it was my most recent activity I'm on my phone now but it was something like "100k 2015 diamond requal gift"

BotB

Interesting, thanks, good to know. ^

CFFrost

I think opaque offers can be largely successful in helping the organization (in this case Hilton) determine how different classes of customers respond to particular promotions. In this case, maybe they are considering bonuses for obtaining or retaining status, increased multipliers, etc - they can take a few different demographics (those that only make status through spend, those that just barely qualify, those that just fell a tier, etc) and select a subset of them to "experiment" with how that promotion may impact their stay patterns. Do those people stay more after receiving a bonus? Or, do you need a bonus and a multiplier to increase number of stays? By only "targeting" specific people, they can determine the merit of the promotion without incurring the cost of rolling it out to everyone. Also, not rolling it out to everyone allows for a "control" group of sorts - the folks that did not receive the promotion.

Of course, I'm in the camp of folks that views unpublished benefits or promotions as always a net positive. While I'm somewhat quick to "demand" what I am "entitled" to - and hate when an individual property fails to meet basic brand requirements - I never feel "entitled" to an unpublished benefit. It's just a freebie! Great to those that get it - why the jealousy, resentment, and sense of entitlement? It wasn't something that anyone earned, it was gratuitous.

Tomphot

Just checked into my hotel this evening- as I was headed toward the lift, I hear the next guy checking in telling the desk shaft - "hey this is great, hilton just gave every Diamond 100,000 points."
Not me.

One other thought - I did qualify for Diamond again for the 19th year in a row. However, I had already been given Diamond status into 2017. Maybe in the system I am not shown as a 2015 Diamond.

indufan

My goodness, we are going to have to agree to disagree with this.
YES, this is absolutely correct. It is an incredibly small percentage. I will concede that it is more than it has ever been.

500,000 FT is a joke. Tell me how many of those have been active in the past month? People don't stumble into high-tier elite status, they number of nights required. For many of them, anything they get for free about it is great. You don't know how many times I have seen a coworker drop 120,000 SkyMiles for a couple of $200 tickets. I have a bunch of coworkers and some of them lurk here but I am not sure any of them have account. Mostly, they rely on me to keep on it for them.

Since this is a pretty big deal, there might be enough word get around to cause them some backlash but I am pretty confident they thought about that and have a plan. Remember, it was just a few days ago that people were all up in arms about no 1Q promo and now look at it.

IHG has done heavy promo targeting for years.