Colonel Heero

Say if I earn a status, does it reset at the end of current membership year? or reset at the end of next membership year? e.g. say I join in May 2012 and become level 2 and June, do I keep level 2 through May 2013 or May 2014?

In most frequent guest program once a status is earned it is valid for the remaining membership year and the next full membership year. In my past experience it is also true for HHonor Dinning, but I cannot find any such reference for iDine.

A response for my Facebook message suggests otherwise. I wonder if anyone has the experience yet?

Open Jaw

If you earn VIP dining status today (6/12/12), you'll be VIP for the dining program until 12/31/13. Each January every dining program resets to 0. That means that you will have to dine 11 times in 2013 to keep your VIP status for 2014.

Just dine 11 times each year and your VIP status will never end. I have been a VIP for 5 years straight years in all my dining programs.

sdsearch

Just to be clear, iDine right now is the name of the cashback program. (It used to be the name of the umbrella of all these dining programs, but several years ago they changed that to Rewards Network.) Very few people here use the cashback program (since we're on a forum called FlyerTalk and thus most like miles/points junkies!), and I don't know if it's different for the cashback program than the others.

In all the others: The official documentation is all wrong. It always claims you need 12 dines, but in fact you always need just 11 dines. I have no idea what it claims about expiration, but my experience in all the miles/points programs has always been, the moment I (re)qualify with 11 dines that year, it tells me I'm VIP through the end of the following year. As the year rolls over, it keeps me in the status I (re)qualified for last year, but says I now need 11 more dines to get that status. That simply means I now need 11 more dines to requalify for that status for the next year.

So if you have no status, the 11 dine qualify you for this year and next year. If you do have status, only after the turn of the year do you have to do an other 11 dines to requalify for yet another year after that.

Colonel Heero

Yup. I am pretty sure for non-cash back RN programs the status cover thru the next Dec 31. But for the cash back (iDine) program I have yet been able to confirm...

[Updated] Here is the response I've got on Facebook. I think I need to think twice if I should continue in this program...

Me: If I earn a status, does it reset at the end of current membership year? or reset at the end of next membership year? e.g. say I join in May 2012 and become level 2 and June, do I keep level 2 through May 2013 or May 2014?

iDine:The program resets based on the enrollment month annually. So if you join May 2012, become level two in June 2012, you keep it until the end of the following May 2013.

Me: If that is that case I think this is a major issue. For airline, hotel status etc (even Rewards Network's own HHonor Dinner and Skymiles Dinning), a status is carried over the remaining year and then the next full membership year. This allow an uninterrupted status.
But in the example earlier, even if I spend $10,000 in the next 11 months and earning top rewards, I am still reset to the lowest status in June 1. So regardless of how much I spend every year, I still have to go through the 5% and 10% period every year before I start earning 15% again. This does not sound right. Please confirm if this is indeed true, as this will greatly influence my program choice and spending habit. Thanks a lot.

iDine: iDine is a free program and we really appreciate member input. If you are not finding what you want from the iDine program, there are other programs to choose from with varying reward structures. You can find those here: https://www.facebook.com/rewardsnetwork/app_4949752878

sdsearch

Since when? Last I heard (here on FT), I thought it had an annual fee (unlike the airline programs).

Apparently they keep changing the cashback version of the program (iDine) constantly. It is such a moving target, with so few users on FT, that every time (very occasionally) that someone posts here about it, it has completely changed since the last time someone else posted about it!

patrickATX

I have been with iDine since last year. I just prefer the 15% rebate over the miles, I think it is a better deal. I have never been charged a fee. Not sure what it used to be, but currently there is no fee for the program.

From the iDine site:
Q. How much does it cost to join iDine?
A. Membership is 100% free. There are no enrollment fees or extra charges. To join, simply create an account, register your debit and/or credit cards and dine at program restaurants.

patrickATX

The answer was right and wrong. You would keep that level until May 2013 if you do not ever dine again. However, if you continue dining, you keep that level at the anniversary month. But I am not sure how far back they look when you hit the anniversary month.

When I hit my anniversary in April, I did not drop down to level 1. I stayed level 3. I also spend about $500 a month through the program since I travel about 100% of the time.

sdsearch

I think it's a better deal to simply eat at cheaper restaurants! There are oodles of ways to save money on eating out, but a very limited number of ways to get miles for something you do anyway, even if you go somewhere else and pay a bit more to do it, it's still way less expensive than buying miles.

So that's why I personally don't see the value of the cashback program, though if it's free now I guess it can't hurt if you don't want any of the airline/hotel programs.

Because they give me miles I can't easily get elsewhere, I go out of my way to mostly eat at participating restaurants. But if I didn't earn miles, I'd simply eat at cheaper restaurants. Why worry about saving 15% at restaurants that are 20% more expensive, when you can just eat anywhere the prices look good and you're actually more likely to save more money that way?

(Now, if one or two of the restaurants that you'd eat at anyway, even if they're not in the program, are in the program, well, then, that's the one case where I guess I'd see how it's worth it, if you have no interest in points/miles.)

But if you have no interest in points/miles, may I ask why you're on a forum called FlyerTalk?

Colonel Heero

Well not if you are dining on someone else's dime.....

That is good news. Perhaps (I hope) it looks back the entire membership year. I would love to hear more from others. If not I guess I will just have to wait and see next year.

patrickATX

EXACTLY!!!

If it were on my dime, I would never be eating out at most of these places.

Oh, I love points and miles and work hard to get many. But the cash back I get pays for all the random expenses that points and miles don't cover on my adventures.

Colonel Heero

Same here. Nice to have some pocket money

It also comes down to how much you value points/miles. But I think 15% (even 10%) is hard to beat!

patrickATX

Yep, the extra $100-$150 a month in gift cards is worth more to me than the miles. I get plenty of them flying crazy routes. Plus I get the miles and points from the credit cards I use at the restaurants.

JDiver

That is all correct; I have experienced it all exactly as you say. Do 11 "dines", the remainder of the current calendar year and the following you have "VIP" status and earn 5 miles.

Of course, if one has no status, one could go to a RN restaurant, order drinks, pay the bill, go on and eat, pay the bill, remember one wants coffee and dessert, pay the bill, buy a to go or tee shirt on the way out and pay the bill. (When Lady JDiver decided to get onboard for lifetime status, we visited a shopping center that had THREE RN participants - I think it took two lunch visits to that center for her to earn "VIP" status.)

And we note the AAdvantage Dining site address is now aa.rewardsnetwork.com.

STS-134

Do dines count to VIP status when the transaction date is done, or when the miles are paid out? Late last year (on New Year's Eve), I saw that I needed 4 more to get VIP status. I made 4 transactions before midnight. However, I still show up as Online Member and my # of dines to VIP status counter for this year is as these dines post.

sdsearch

It's seems to be a day or so before they post (but that's a day or two after the dine itself). I had at least one dine so far post after 1/1/13 in UA Dining, and it decreased the number of dines I needed to VIP in that program this year (2013).

(But, I, too, did not realize this until now. But then, I never considered trying to get to VIP status anywhere close to 12/31 before. I either earn status earlier in the year, or just wait until after the start of the new year so that it's valid for two years instead just one. The only reason I had dines up through 12/31 this year was because UA targeted me with a double miles on dines through 12/31. I never had a non-threshold promo going through 12/31 before, and so never had a big reason to do a dine on that day before.)

But, come to think of it, it's been long noted that the counter for the number of dines you still need is the first indicator that a dine's about to post. Years ago people in this ofrum noticed that it went down the day before the dine posts. (So if I had remembered that, I could have guessed that dines on 12/30 or 12/31 would counto toward 2013 rather than 2012 status.)