Lifetime Platinum status for $2,000 and a free night in the SF Fairmont Prez suite

Nah, I'll just let it expire unused.

Okay, during this idle time until west coast wakes up, let me offer some random thoughts to calm ourselves down.

1. LS has been top notch so far. Great service over the phone, with voucher sent out overnight. I have to pay more attention to them regardless of the results.
2. I expect we will get something good out of this, no matter whether the permanent plat part is honored, which i still have high hope they will. We just need some patience, which we don't usually possess as a group.
3. If this comes through, wouldn't it be fun for us to all agree on a 'secret' place in this 'presidential' suite to keep a message bottle or something like that? In it we can all write down a few things one by one as the year goes by... I know we can all actually do that here. But feels more fun that way...
4. Should we do a count to see how many of the 112 are MPer/Flyertalkers?

#3 is an awesome idea & agree w/ #4.

I'm perfectly calm. If they don't come through on all points before the 5 days are up, it's a cancel while I can still get my money and not have to fight for it.

I agree with you Lance, that they're behaving now, but then again this is the "collect the money" phase and no one is disagreeable at this juncture. (and it's a good chunk of change -at least $224K)

Let's see how well they behave coming through with delivery and/or beyond the 5 day cash back time frame.
I, for one, am not waiting to find out what I can do with $2000 of LS coupons.

I think most of us are calm about this, first, if you are not familiar with hotel elite programs, you wouldn't just jump in and throw $2,000 in the pot. It is a bit of a gamble, but we all know what we are getting (or we are supposed to) in return.

I expect at least three quarter of these 112 are MPers/FTers.

Would be a great idea to make a DO out of this.

I see no evidence of them not honoring it. I just see some paranoid conjecture here and on DansDeals. If there were 75,000 with the deal, I might lean towards the paranoia, but 112 with the status, please. I carried Premier status for 3 years anyway, so they still make money off us.

I will def play the hidden bottle message game.

My main question, how can we activate the Plat status now, I have some fairmont stays shortly.

Just got off the phone with Ben at the local property. They didn't intend it to be lifetime, just 1 year. LS will send out refund notices. He offered an additional $250 coupon if we still chose to stay. I guess not many of us would.

This does sound like a locally initiated promotion. So it will be hard for them to swallow. It would be a different matter if the company would step in - it's a different matter there. I pointed out to Ben that this has generated great publicity for Fairmont as a chain, and the incremental revenue it will bring in shouldn't be overlooked. I rarely stay anywhere for 1 night. To use the 1 free night or the upgrade certificates, it's likely that I'll spend at least $2,000 every year on Fairmont that is going to Hilton/Marriott/Intercontinental right now. Is it really a bad deal for them?

Not sure how much of this got crossed though, or how much power they have to make the right call here.

Crooks!
Let's get the press on this ASAP! Think WSJ or USAToday would have any interest? The Consumerist will definitely run it.

At least 30 buyers were from DansDeals. I'd guess that a majority of the rest were from FT/MP.

Yeah, uh huh. 250? I think not.
Let's give California a chance to truly open, and all the bosses are there. Then we'll see what they decide to do.

I am with you.

This is an amazingly lame and incompetent response by both Living Social and the Fairmont. Both of their national offices were approached by many people and they reaffirmed the deal. To have "Ben of SF" answer the phone with an OOOPS and this lame offer just worsens both their images.

War mode all hands on deck bloggers to the ready. Do we have any lawyers I see a 112 person class action as it said not once but twice platinum for life on a website known for special deals and experiences. They got tremendous PR and for them not to honor is a significant breach.

Well, I nabbed one of these in time - saw it as a Living Social subscriber on Wednesday night. I am pretty excited for the suite (I got married in the penthouse - so returning to the hotel will be a nice treat), and moreover, for the lifetime status. Excellent promotion, very great value!

I am excited to learn more about some of the Fairmont properties, especially the Hawaii ones.

Front desk transferred me to this person who they said is in charge. Left her a voicemail.
Michal Gordon
Director of Travel Industry Sales
Tel: +1 (415) 772-5212
E-mail: michal.gordon@fairmont.com

My sense is the resolution needs to come from higher up than anyone local at SF. Anyone with direct contact into the corporate office that can actually make decisions?

Here are more sales contacts:
http://www.fairmontmeetings.com/sanfrancisco/property_01.html

I recognize another name from the sales team on there, Benjamin Shih. That was the person a DansDeals commenter wrote yesterday that he spoke to who told him that the deal was an error and that "they were in a frenzy dealing with this"
http://www.dansdeals.com/archives/12825/comment-page-2#comment-77625

Get ready to be even more frenzied!!!

I fully agree. It should be escalated up the ladder at both the Fairmont and Living Social-- it was their national offices that reaffirmed the deal. They would like nothing more than to localize this. Ironically LivingSocial's deal today is for "house cleaning"-- I suggest they start in their own organization.

To make a productive discussion with Fairmont, we need some insight in terms of what the actual cost is for a plat membership on an annual basis. I see $100 for the food and drinks. Everything else is sort of soft, isn't it? The free night and upgrade certificates are funny money, as if they are not offered, it's not necessarily incremental revenue for them anyway. As I stated before, I fully expect myself spending at least $2,000 on them annually which I wasn't thinking of at all until yesterday.

Other than some local employees getting embarassed about it, and maybe got their jobs put on the line, which is not a small matter for them personally i have to admit, for Fairmont as a company, I'm having a hard time seeing how they don't win by honoring this... What am I missing?

I'm sure Fairmont has to reimburse the hotel where you use the free night certificate.

Let's say they reimburse $300 for the free night then, how about the money they make in the process? Granted, there will be people that choose to stay for only 1 night at the most expensive place on the most expensive date. But on the balance when all things and staying pattern are considered, really?

I would not leave Steve Case's Living Social out of this. Groupon has a multibillion dollar valuation and was pressuring their vendors to honor $25 deals. For Living Social, their main competitor, this was a $2,000 deal and you think would have merited their significant attention and concern for their members.

Ben Shih was actually trying to put it on LS. He insisted that it was LS that failed to put out the full fine print. I suspect they both got a hand in it. I would be surprised that it wasn't approved by someone at both companies before it came out.

I think we should:
-Blog about it.
-Send Executive Email Carpet Bombs to the sales staff at Fairmont SF, the Fairmont PC Headquarters, and to Living Social.
-Contact the media. WSJ, USAToday, Consumerist, etc.
Let's raise such a ruckus it will be worth their while to honor the deal as written instead of shafting us.

Let's send this to the groupon pr team to make hay with about the incompetence of their main competitor.

Dan, you think it's better to do that pre-emptively, or wait until they formally decline to honor it?

I live a few blocks from the hotel.. I'll lead the picket line...