Platinum Plus
 

Hi Everyone,

My first post :)

I received the following email yesterday which confirms what was discussed a little while back on the ROP Platinum rumours:

As a valued member of Royal Orchid Plus, we couldn't wait to bring you the good news.

This message is to congratulate you on being selected as one of Royal Orchid Plus Platinum Plus members with extended benefits and privileges commencing on 15th September 2010.

Your Platinum Plus card package has been prepared and posted to your address......

Will be interesting to see exactly what the extended benefits and privileges are.

Welcome to FT Marah!!! Well, your first post at least, sounds like you've been watching for a bit.

Please do keep us informed as to how things evolve...

Cheers, TK

PS - are you able to say if you are Thai, Thai resident, Expat, or ....? Just curious to see who/where this Platinum offer goes out to.

Good one, Marah, your future insight will be valued and welcome to the Thai board.

Thanks TK & BKKROP,

I'm a long-term, BKK-based expat clocking in around 100,000 miles a year (primarily on TG).

Will let you know as soon as the PP package arrives!

Cheers.

If only this had happened in 2004/5 when I too was a long(-ish) term expat clocking up....

....oh well, I had my time.

It is awesome Marah, will work brilliantly for the First class travel, this could change how many think of the TG program, very much SQ and QF/BA inspired. (they just about get you to swear on a bible:))

Oh poor TK, they may do a retrospective 2005 memorial card

From TTR Weekly…

BANGKOK, 30 July 2010 ― Thai Airways International’s royalty programme, Royal Orchid Plus, is being revamped with a new Platinum tier added on top of the current Gold category.

All the status cards in ROP will be renamed and the new look and features will be unveiled 3 September at Pullman Bangkok King Power Hotel. The changes were announced during the 17th Anniversary celebrations for Royal Orchid Plus held, 29 July.
THAI director loyalty marketing department, Aran Apichari, said said member cards will be renamed Basic Plus, Gold Plus and Platinum Plus.

As for the new top tier, ROP members entitled to gain that status are Gold members who have flown at least 100,000 miles a year and 80% of their travel must be in first or business class.

“From the current gold members, we have 3,500 members who can switch to platinum status. We will review the members list every six months to see if there are others who qualifiy for the platinum card,” said Mr Aran.

TG executives claim Platinum member privileges will be a strict secret between members and ROP , but that situation is not likely to stay that way once the cards are activated.
The new version of ROP cards will have microchip and THAI is currently discussing with Central department stores on ways to allow ROP members to convert their mileage points into cash for shopping.

Mr Aran said that there would be other benefits added to the revamped ROP cards, but they will not be announced until 3 September.

Welcome to FT kiwidoc, from another kiwi :D

Interesting news, and I went googling for any more info, but drew a blank (although it was a cursory search...).

Cheers, Thai-Kiwi

Well that just dashed all my hopes of getting one of those cards. A huge boo to TG for making this a totally ridiculous requirement. I guess it's time for me to stop putting any miles into ROP as absolutely nothing for me to look forward to.

As an example of how silly this one requirement is, let's say I were to fly 100,000 miles a year on TG for business, in business class, but also flew 50,000 miles a year on TG in economy for leisure which I pay out of my own pocket. In exchange for flying an additional 50K miles with them, they're going to disqualify me from the new Platinum. Somebody at TG didn't give this more than a few seconds of thought. Either that or they are incredibly short-sighted. Of course if I was in that position and really wanted Platinum I suppose I could simply credit my economy miles to a different FFP. The point though is that the 80% rule is idiotic in that it will cause TG to lose business rather than gain business.

Another point is that some people fly in economy but in a Y booking class. Compared to a discounted business class such as J, TG likely makes more money on the Y passengers, yet no allowance is made for that.

What's the deal with trying to keep the benefits a secret? Is that screwed up or what? Oh, let's see, you're going to offer me something, but not tell me what, and expect me to fly 100,000 miles just to find out? How completely ridiculous!

The TG president seems to be a very level-headed guy. Maybe someone needs to write him a letter and explain to him how much the ROP crew screwed up this one.

I guess I was expecting too much from TG. The new president seemed to be doing so many right things and getting them going on the right track. Now this. I'm simply baffled.

ROP is not making easy to earnings miles. As most of the Thai Airways fare in Y is booking in NON earning miles fare. And the fare that you get miles is so high that the competitive airlines gives you a better value. So when I can book C or F class I rather collect the miles with Miles & More program where it gives me a better value for the earnings miles. But I hope in September ROP will makes there program attractive for all their travel class, not only C and F pax .

calm down A_Lee. The requirement will more likely be 80% of the 100,000 qualifying miles must be in premium travel, im sure any excess miles in other classes will be on top of that. Wait for the full announcement in September.

Sounds a bit like SQ's PPS club, where one must travel in paid premium classes to qualify.

I would hope that flights bought/upgraded with points would count towards the 80%.

If I was planning this, I would ditch the premium requirement but insist the the qualifying miles had to be on TG flights/codeshares as the other *A partners won't recognise this as other than gold status.

I would highly doubt that upgraded or redemption tickets would count for anything.

I agree that we do need to wait till the actual announcement is made. As you mention, it sounds a lot like SQ's PPS, which unfortunately doesn't surprise me being TG seems to like to look to SQ to imitate. Why though they do so with their FFP is beyond me. IMHO, SQ's FFP is one of the worst in the industry and should be the very last they should try to imitate.

Regardless of whether they do as you say and make the 80% of the 100K miles, it's still completely worthless to me. Reason being as I think you and others have pointed out so often in the past, premium travel is much better suited to bank with BD, LH, or a FFP where you can earn a decent premium.

Taking a look back at the thread where the rumors of this new tier were first reported, Joy16 mentioned the following benefits were being discussed:
- + 40 kg baggage allowance
- 5 years *A Gold
- 1 nominee ROP/*A Gold
- main card and nominee card can invite 1 guest/card.
- upgrade 2 times/year and nominee card holder can upgrade 1 time/year
etc.

The 40kg baggage allowance is worthless to me. I never need more than what I'm already given. I can see that it would be an advantage to some, but most seasoned travelers without special needs are accustomed to the limits and pack accordingly.

5 years *G is probably worthless to most all if they're flying enough to put 100K into ROP, they can probably easily get *G with any FFP they want year after year. It would only be an advantage to someone who flies a lot in one year, then very little for the next 5 years. Probably very few of us are in that position.

All the nominee features are also worthless to me. I travel alone almost all the time. It might be worth something to a couple where one of them flies a lot to qualify but the other doesn't fly much. Even then though how much would this be worth?

The upgrade twice a year is nice, but by just banking my miles with BMI, I can easily get much more than that in premium award tickets.

If that is all that's offered, I cannot see this program being of very much interest to the majority of TG flyers. At least those well informed of how much more value they can get for banking their premium travel with a different FFP.

So again we need to wait to see what features are offered. Unfortunately TG seem to be taking the absolutely asinine approach that they don't want to tell us what they're going to offer. This above all leaves me shaking my head in disbelief. If they don't publish the exact benefits I'm going to get, how can I have any guarantee that they'll give me the same as what other people are reporting they got? This one point alone ought to be a death sentence for this doing anything whatsoever to encourage people to fly TG more.

So yes, I'll wait till the official announcement. Hopefully level heads will prevail in the meantime and they will modify the Platinum level to be of some value. If not, I'll be lodging my complaint and saying goodbye to ROP.

Edit to add, the review every six months to add new members is also completely ridiculous. Why can't they add you as soon as you qualify? Haven't they ever heard of running a computer program regularly to check for new members? If I fly the required 100K, then I might have to wait six months before I can get any benefits? Absolutely ridiculous.

It's not for the majority, its for a tiny minority. As stated by them, 3500 of there current customers.

Why you even bother with ROP in the first place I don't know, and SQ Krisflyer is not as bad as you think. I would put my miles in SQ before ROP every time!