hailstorm

If it's not true, I imagine we'll hear a public denial from Hyatt today.

nineworldseries

First of all, this was an awful wake-up this morning after rolling over and seeing this thread on my phone!

I'm one of these "squeakers" that requalifies based on stays; I did something like 29 stays/38 nights in 2015 and will be at around 26/28 this year. I also stay at a lot of Hyatt Places (roughly 50% of my Hyatt stays), mostly because I'm in places where there is no better option (Portland ME, Portland OR, Boise, etc.).

So, it appears as if I'm exactly the kind of customer that gets the shaft here. I can no longer qualify on stays, and I don't really have a prayer of hitting 60 revenue nights in a year.

After more consideration (and coffee) this morning, I'm really not all that worked up anymore. I'll probably be able to do 30 nights, and that will get me 4 club access upgrades a year. If I'm strategic with those and burn them on 2-3 night stays, that will give me lounge access for like 8-10 nights a year, so I'm still getting it for ~33% of my nights, which is where I'm at now (50% of stays at HR, GH, Andaz, many of which don't have lounges anyway).

I'd also be getting an (extra) Cat. 1-4 certificate per year, which takes -some- of the sting away from losing lounge/breakfast privileges and DSUs.

The Diamond amenity bonus points would be the biggest blow to me personally, although I see no mention of that in the new chart. Do we speculate that Globalists will get this moving forward?

I'm also assuming that my requalification this year would mean Globalist status until Feb. 28/March 17, 2018. If not, and my 26 stays this year mean almost nothing, I'm 100% done with Hyatt and will be cancelling my 20 or so upcoming 2017 stays. I'm pretty confident that will not happen, so at least I'll be getting Globalist benefits through March 2018 and can reassess the benefits of staying with Hyatt at that time or moving somewhere else.

I'm not as soul-crushed as I was a couple hours ago.

lotrbfme

I actually like the current state of benefits of best room available except suites and confirmed suites 4 times a year. I am also SPG platinum and you are supposed to get best available room including suites. Out of 97 nights last year I got 1 suite! It was very very upsetting and looking online they always had inventory. With hyatt I had my 4/4 confirmed suites, and when I dont use them I get a better room but I am not expecting a suite... and actually I have gotten 5 Suite upgrades on hyatt without it being officially a benefit.

nineworldseries

From the OP's blog link. The bolded part is mine, and is obviously completely wrong. We all know Diamond bonus points are not base points and would not count. Does this give us any hope that he's wrong about a lot of other things, too?

solewalker

+1.

60 nights revenue seems a bit much. While Hyatt Diamond is > than Hilton Diamond, surely Hyatt knows that Hilton's 60 nights include non-rev stays, right? (not to mention number of properties available)

howtofreetravel

Wait no more free breakfast?

craz

From the link in post #1;

The new program rules will be announced November 1st officially, with a program start date of March 17, 2017. Loyalty programs have traditionally given their members access to the previous year’s status through the end of February of the following year: Hyatt will give 17 days beyond that in 2017.

So does Hyatt plan to award Elite status for '17 using the new chart but retro to ones # of nights in '16. If yes then a person who had 25 Stays but < 60 nights wont be top level after 3/17/17. which will mean no top status until one has 60 nights in "17 or $20k in spend

bigguyinpasadena

Matthew is a blogger both in his own blog and others. He is also an occasional poster on FT.

AAerSTL

Hyatt really is the NWA among hotel chains. Very limited network of properties, large concentrations in a few places (Chicago, Dubai, Shanghai), antiquated processes and procedures (remember the scheduled outage for FIVE FULL DAYS last year)? Even had more than their share of visible labor strife for a small chain. Most of their properties are dumpy but a few gems like PH Sydney or Andaz 5th Avenue.

What reason is left to stay at Hyatt? Guess if Chicago or Dubai is mecca (no pun intended) for your travels..

craz

??? I tried to figure out how to do this but even 50 nights paid (10 from spend on the Hyatt CC) @ a Cat1 using C&P = $50 x 50 = $2500 plus the taxes probably means a min Spend of just over $3k and not < $2k (feel free to PM how you got it for < $2k if U dont want to post it on the boards).

EWR764

It seems to me the only equitable way to do it would be a 'best of both' approach by allowing members to qualify for the roughly equivalent 2017 tier based on the higher of their 2016 metric (stays) OR the new metric (nights/base points). In practice, this would mean grandfathering in requalifying Diamonds (>25 stays in 2016) with Globalist status for the 2017 program year, as that tier most closely approximates the benefits Hyatt held out as a carrot for activity during the 2016 calendar year. Without more information on late checkout, it's hard for me to tell whether Platinum projects more to Discoverist or Explorist status, as the current Plat status seems to be somewhere in the middle.

Duke787

If it's coming from Matthew, I'd count it as more or less fact. Matthew is also known as MatthewLAX on FT. The Pen & Passport appears to be a new project and by the looks of it the website is a work in progress but he was previously (or still is?) at Upgrd.com and is usually reliable when it comes to this type of news - he's active on the UA board and is a reliable source there.

The CC status will be interesting and I think depends on the annual fee. For $95, Hilton gives out the equivalent of "Explorist" and gives away the equivalent of "Discoverist" for free with a no-fee AMEX/Citi card.

Marriott on the other hands gives away nothing but they do give 15 free nights towards the nights-only requirements. If Chase/Hyatt did something similar, that would be reasonable approach as well since it could knock the 60 required for "Globalist" back to 45-50 (depending on # of free nights), in line with current requirements.

Either way, 60 nights with no stays is a surprising number from a chain with such a small footprint. Marriott can get away with it because they have hotels literally everywhere but as much as I've tried over the years to be loyal to Hyatt, 75-80% of cities I travel to have no Hyatt (and most aren't small cities / towns) or if they have a Hyatt it's an inconvenient Hyatt Place or Hyatt House versus the FS Marriott/Ren/Hilton/Westin that's well located downtown.

sfozrhfco

I was matched last year and already did my 25+stays by June and haven't stayed much since. If this goes into effect, I will cancel my Hyatt CC and just concentrate on using up the ton of points I earned this year. With the combined Marriott/SPG program, the number of earning/redemption possibilities is just too great to ignore. Hyatt can give some great experiences but often at a higher price point. Free breakfast and a suite upgrade was a way to justify the extra expense. Now I can not see any reason at all to continue with Hyatt.

Will see what comes next week and figure out what to do with all my points if this pans out as reported.

ERQTraveler

Gosh...this is disappointing if accurate.

So many thoughts going through my head right now!

ERQ

Oxon Flyer

How cools is that, to name a status level after a FT member.