Points and Memberships

[Senselessticker]

I'm hoping that someone is working on this idea...

It seems there are rewards for "members" for just about anywhere you are able to spend money (at least in the US).

Rewards such as: hotel points, credit card point, grocery store points, sporting goods points, rental car points, airline points, you name it....

I get tired of signing up for the rewards, but it seems foolish to not take the time to do so.

What if the memberships were managed through a 3rd party? Say, a company which keeps track of all of your rewards such that you don't have to log in to delta, or avis, discover card, or wherever just to see your rewards for THAT company. It would be nice to log on to one website to see all your rewards.

Anyone know of webbased type company that does this?


This may not be the right place to post this question...but I figured I'd give it a shot...

Thanks,

Sense

 

[jmw]

Interesting idea.
I'm not wholly in favour of these "loyalty points" systems because it seems to me that their benefits are largely illusory and at best, there is no such thing as a free lunch.
The two excpetions I make are air miles and hotel points.
The trouble is that I now have about a doxen air mile club memberships and no matter how much I fly I just don't seem to get enough points with any one (even with the partners) to progress. However, I have had some "free" flights and some "free" hotel accomodation. For the rest, life is too short to worry.

Of course, there are some charities that will collect your points from you but basically these schemes are all part of the "confusopoly" (Scott Adams) and in the end, I just worry about getting through the day and getting what I need.
Life is too short to spend too much time worrying about "points" when I can be doing other things.

In terms of "free" the biggest spectactular was when the company held a sales meet in one of the US Casino/ski resorts at an Intercontinental. The guy organising it got the company to foot the hotel bill from the marketing budget rather than have everyone pay their own bills and submit expenses i.e. he would pay and submit his own expenses.
He put it all on his Credit card (which drew him some bonuses) but he also got club points on the whole bill.... I guess he got free accomodation for some significant time after that. Plus he was treated like a hollywood start during the conference.


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[electricpete]

Interesting idea.

But.... are you willing to pay them for this service?

Seems to me that the best benefit comes when you manage your own spending in a direction to get the points you want (all other things being equal) to get the rewards you want.

If you're not paying attention to it, you probably won't accumulate the right points during the right time period to get anything of value to you.

Not trying to be a parade-rainer. Just pointing out my opinion which could be totally wrong (maybe someone is already out there with a profitable business managing rewards points?)

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[SnTMan]

jmw, we had a guy in city government that kind of did the same thing, he required that all travel in his department be booked on HIS card so he got ALL the points. There was some trouble about it and he had to cease and desist.

Regards,

Mike

 

[jmw]

SnTman,
I guess if my colleague did this as a regular thing then there would have been some similar gripes.
Of course, he thought it up, did it and organised it all very well so no one minded a bit, as a one off (that I know of, though I suspect management didn't realise that he would benefit this way or they'd have vetoed it on general principles).

More to the point of Senslessticker's post, if such a service existed I would guess the first consequence would be a change in the rewards system.

I kind of sense that when they set these things up they count on most people not managing there points efficiently enough to gain the full benefit.

For most people I suggest that the realisable benefits are illusory or of no financial value.

For example, club membership of British Airways lets you pre book your seat online (within 24hrs of travel). No cost to them but some value to you. The real financial benefits are harder to acquire.

Here is another example of what I mean:
I was in an Office Depot (or whatever they're called) in November last year looking at a Filofax system and was staggered by the prices.
I then saw they had some of the 2005 issue on offer, i.e. the fillers had only December 2005 of any use.
So I priced up a new refill and discovered I'd be better off to buy a new 2006 system.

The Office Depot Manager didn't seem to understand why I didn't think much of their promotion. Of course, come December 31st when theyhave to either return them or sit and change the refills themselves, they'd realise the problem.
Except: I would guess that their strategy was a cynical exploitation of the fact that most of their customers would quite happily take up their offer and worry about the refill costs in January.

Of course, it now being Nov 2006, it might be interesting to check out the prices again and see how widespread this is.. is it a general policy or a local store initiative?

"All that glisters is not gold"

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[SnTMan]

jmw, I doubt anyone would have cared if the guy had done it only once, but it was all the time.

I never had to travel much for business until recently, and I always viewed the point systems as rewarding people whose travel was paid for by their company. So they got free stuff for doing their job, at company expense. At that time I flew maybe once or twice a year at my expense, and you can't add up anything meaningful that way. I guess I see it a little differently now, travelling in general is a PTA, although it is still going to take a long time to "earn" anything.

A friend has, if I understand correctly, some credit card that will allow use of miles, points, whatever from many sources, so it's kind of like what Senselessticker proposes. I'm sure they get a cut or someting, but it would allow you to lump together all those scraps and make something out of it.

Regards,

MIke

 

[SomptingGuy]

I just finished a book describing the bad things in modern life and loyalty cards get quite a mention. I can't quote it exactly, but something like:

"So you spend £10000 in one shop to get enough points for a free hat with the shop's logo on it (excludes postage and packing)."

 

[GTstartup]

I travel a lot for work and every year accumulate enough points to take my family on vacation with hotel, car and flights with no cost to me. I guess technically my company pays for it, but it doesn't keep me up at nights. There was once some talk about pooling all the points to use for business travel but there was such an uproar that it quickly got dropped from the radar.

I don't really see a point in a 3rd party managing all my points, it only takes a few minutes to check them on line and they are also emailed and/or regular mailed. Personally, I wouldn't pay for it.

 

[moltenmetal]

I have a no fees credit card which gives me a 1% discount on everything I buy. Why would I pay cash under those circumstances, unless the vendor offers me a more significant cash disount?

I have another that gives me 3.8% off my gasoline purchases.

I routinely get airline tickets every few years for my whole family.

I pay no fees for any of this.

Yes, there are some points/loyalty programs that are worthless- except to the vendor. Remember- these loyalty programs exist to bring in repeat customers and to obtain marketing information. I don't participate in those. If they want my marketing data, they need to give me something meaningful in return. And my loyalty is based on price and service, nothing else.

 

[COEngineeer]

Just sign up, they usually can access your account with yoru phone number so you dont have to carry the cards arround.

 

[HgTX]

One of my random memberships lands me on a concierge floor every once in a while. That's $$ in free food. I figure that's worth a little marketing info to the hotel chain. It's not like they can't track me through my credit card number anyway.

After realizing several trips later that I really *should* have signed on to XYZ loyalty program, I just sign up for them all now just in case my future travel happens to take me frequently to a particular hotel chain or airline.

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376

 

[controlnovice]

Many US airlines have partners where you can earn points on your choice of a few airlines. So...for example:

If you fly Delta, Northwest or Continental, you can receive all points on Continental. So, you don't need the Delta or Northwest cards at all. You get more points on Continental allowing you to achieve the higher status sooner. But, these Continental points don't allow you the same service upgrades on the other two airlines. Still, by having all points on Continental, you can reach the milestone required to receive a 'free' flight sooner (on Continental) than if you had separate airline points.

Similar applies between US Air and United, and I'm sure some others as well.

______________________________________________________________________________
This is normally the space where people post something insightful.

 

[jmw]

Didn't I say it's another "confusopoly"?

Anyway, I'm busy collecting points at the moment and to maximise the value I am transferringn fom my current Holiday Inn to another down the road mid week. Actually, I lie, I am changing because I couldn't get a booking for the whole period at a single hotel.... but I like the idea of playing the game after all.

On the plus side, I have benefitted greatly from airline points clubs on the last two sets of flights:
Coming back from Monte Carlo last month I arrived at the airport to discovere they'd oversold the seats. Now when they starting bumping people of the flights or playing first come first served, they start with the non-points club members so while they told a couple of women they'd have to take the plane the next day, they bumped me to first class and I then volunteered to stand down of the flight in favour of other passengers. So I not only got some cash for the m mess they made of my booking (and an upgrade) I also collected the cash for volunteering to step down and when they re-booked me on the enxt days flight they rebooked me first class. (that was BA)

This week Qatar had the same problem when I arrived in Doha on my way to Singapore and they upgraded me to first for the next long leg....

I don't guess the other benefits are that rewarding since I never get to fly the same airline often enough and never often enough to worry too much about the actual points, but the preferential treatment when things go wrong is a great comfort....

These days, getting free upgrades is more difficult; once upon a time travelling dressed smartly would give you an edge, but many of those who book first dress like bums. Being polite and understanding doesn't cut it either, the usual drill is to keep the noisy abusive ones happy, not the soft touches. The next option is to know one of the crew (that worlked for me once) or, last option is be a club member when they overbook. I suppose I could just pay for it but that goes against the grain.

By the way, Singapore Changi is one of my favourite airports and especially Harry's bar on the roof among the cacti and water misters.


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[SomptingGuy]

These days, getting free upgrades is more difficult; once upon a time travelling dressed smartly would give you an edge, but many of those who book first dress like bums. Being polite and understanding doesn't cut it either, the usual drill is to keep the noisy abusive ones happy, not the soft touches. The next option is to know one of the crew (that worlked for me once) or, last option is be a club member when they overbook. I suppose I could just pay for it but that goes against the grain.

Probably an urban legend, but...

I recall reading about a frequent flier who owned a set of airline ties and would choose the appropriate tie for each flight. Mistaking him as an employee (or worse, shareholder) he'd often get upgraded.

 

[GregLocock]

Airline shareholder? That'd be the guy with holes in his shoes and a long-suffering expression.

Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[zuccus]

Ok let me throw this case at you.

Long story short a coworker of mine and I made a bet with our boss that we were going to get this big job that he wasn't involved in so he didn't think we were going to get it. We bid the job after hours on our own time. If we got it he had to pay for us to go play a poker tournament at a nearby casino.

Well we got the job, the boss who was devout baptist was mad because he was contributing to our deliquincy(sp). I know he was gambling in the first place which we let him know of course.

So my coworker and I went and played and both did very well. I won $2,000ish and he won $1,500ish. The following Monday we told our boss how we had done and for a couple of days he expected us to pay him the winnings since he paid our entry fee.

This was a great joke for many months afterwards.

 

[rbulsara]

This is an idea that I myself have not acted upon, (as I also belieive life is too short to worry about points but jmw's issue is common) but one of ways to keep all or most points in one place to sign up for a credit card that offers you points for airlines, hotels etc and use that card all the time.

The reason I did not follow my own advise, because I am too cheap to pay annual fees.

I am content with using 1% cash back off Discover and using them on Blockbuster or some sneakers.