vsevolod4

I do not believe it is "3 months early" ... if it is 3 months before your membership expires, that is EXACTLY when it should be renewed.
The AMB/RA program does not work on a calendar year (like the PC program does); it works on 12 month periods from your joining date. And it has a 3-month "tail" (just as most frequent flyer programs use a calendar year for qualification, but membership expires end of February or end of March, to provide time for processing of unposted points, mailing out stuff, etc.).

So your qualification period is NOT a calendar year, rather it is the 9 months to which you refer, PLUS the last 3 months of the previous period.

Banie

Seems strange. All paid stays? Re the 5 IC stays, how many nights? And how many different ICs?

vsevolod4

My qualification period is 1 October 2008 - 30 September 2009.
(my RA membership expiration is 31 December 2009, with the 3 month "tail).

I was requalified on 3 October 2009, which is the earliest it's been (I suspect there is a "sweep" the first weekend of every month).
At that time, during my qualification period, I had:
55 total nights
32 total stays
45 nights in ICs
20 different IC hotels
10 nights in CP, HI, HX

Two hours after seeing "ROYAL AMBASSADOR RENEWAL," my last stay posted for 5 nights in an IC, so total 60 nights, 33 stays, 50 nights in 21 different ICs, 10 nights elsewhere. Not sure if that last stay was included or not in my renewal calculation.

I think this makes it 12 years in a row as an SCCA or RA, and I've spent over 2 full years in IC hotels enjoying minibars.

GordonGordon

Out of my expecation, my RA status was renewed yesterday for another year until December 2010!^^^

Original RA expiry date: 31 Dec 2009
RA renewal date: 3 Oct 2009
New RA expiry date: 31 Dec 2010
Qualifying Nights Towards Elite Status in 2009: 38 nights only
Total number of nights between 1 Oct 08 and 30 Sep 09 (12 months period before renewal): 51 nights
Total number of IC nights between 1 Oct 08 and 30 Sep 09 (12 months period before renewal): 11 nights
Total number of IC stays between 1 Oct 08 and 30 Sep 09 (12 months period before renewal): 3 stays
Total number of ICs between 1 Oct 08 and 30 Sep 09 (12 months period before renewal): only 2 different IC hotels (1 in Asia and 1 in Europe)

The rest of 40 nights are CP, HI & HIX. I guess I'm the lucky one.

martyYYZ

I'm surprised they renewed you with just 2 different ICs. Did you have a reservation for a third IC coming up? Usually they require 3 different ICs

GordonGordon

No, I don't have any IC reservations coming up. I had only 3 qualifying stays at 2 different IC hotels (1 stay at IC SIN and 2 stays at IC Athens). However, I had many non-qualifying stays (Friends and Family rate) also at IC Athens, IC Rome, IC NYC ...etc, so I don't know if they are also counted although they are non-qualifying stays.

darius13

My Platinum RA Status was also renewed on 3rd October until December 2010. At the time of renewal I had 76 qualifying nights over the whole range of IC, CP, HI and HIE but only 2 stays at different IC's.
I guess the whole thing depends on whether or not you qualify on nights/points in the top 1% range and the actual brand you stay at is less important.

dgwright99

It is starting to seem to me that non-qualifying and even award stays may be included in the total.

For this also and further evidence that the magic 1% number is 55 nights - see here http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/inter...-1-letter.html

gregorygrady

With the exception of posters such as GordonGordon above who seem to fully understand RA and post their exact stays during the exact proper timeframes, I unfortunately don't have too much faith in several of the posts in this thread. A good amount of people don't seem to understand the RA qualifying periods. If they just post that they had 36 nights and were upgraded to RA, then I'm guessing that they are only counting 2009 stays YTD. So it's hard to figure out what's what since there's really not much uniformity in people's postings and experiences in this thread.

That said, I haven't posted in this thread for awhile as I've been sitting back and observing it instead. From my observations, the trend I'm seeing is that people SEEM to be requalifying for RA with 50 nights IF THEY REQUALIFY at 2.5-3 months before their RA expiration. If they don't have enough nights at that time, then it SEEMS that 55 nights are required if it comes down to the wire and you requalify right before your RA year ends.

I think I'm also seeing a trend that award nights and/or other non-qualifying nights (Friends&Family) count towards your 3 required nights at 3 different IC hotels.

Of course these are just my observations, they could be completely wrong, but from everybody's postings this is what I am seeing.

gregorygrady

Bolding mine. You need to get yourself to 2 quick mattress run reservations at cheap ICs ASAP so you can get your 3 different IC criteria met and you can become RA!!

gregorygrady

I'm guessing you had a non-qualifying stay at an IC sometime in the past 12 months that IC counted as your 3rd distinctive IC stay. Possibly an award stay at a nice IC somewhere? Please report back and let me know if this is the case........

EdV

In another (probably useless) data point from AMB desk I got this last week. After fighting with them to renew me and finally getting them to do so their last email where they tell me they're making a one time exception for me states this little nugget:

"On behalf of our colleagues, we wish to inform you that the qualification for Royal Ambassador status is based on the stay activities for the past year and not within the term of your membership."

Now, that's a little confusing because what if I renew in Feb. Does that mean that they only look from Jan - Feb? Or do they mean from Feb -> Feb (which is kind of what we think here)? What is the difference between within past year and within the term of your membership.

Oh, data points have: 57 night YTD, 3 IC stays - 8 nights in ICs

dizrythmia

Oh, I should've clarified, I've stayed at two ICs this year. Though if me staying at another would get me an upgrade, I just might consider it. Now where's the closest one to me...shame the one in Nashville isn't open yet! (If it ever does open, last time I was there they've barely broken ground!)

marko4ever29

gosh im confused!!!! i only ever stay in holidays inn (about 18 nights a year) but occasinally crowne plaza. I stay in IC Park lane last weekend though using free nights and have booked another 2 free nights there for a few weeks time. can i get RA for 150 USD or do i have to be the top 1 %.

martyYYZ

They look back 365 days from the date of the review.

So if your renewal date is 31 Dec 2009, on Sept 30 they will look back 365 days (to October 1, 2008) to count your stays. If you fall short but have upcoming stays, you can call them back after the stays post. For example, if you have more stays in October, 2009, you can call back after these stays post and they will look back 365 days from the date you call. This is the way it worked when I was renewed a couple of years ago. The reps had 2 numbers they looked at:

1) number of nights in past 365 days
2) number of different IC's

At that time 1) needed to be at least 50 nights and 2) needed to be at least 3 different ICs