New Terms & Conditions (increased elite qualification requirements)

New T&C as of December 3rd for the 2013 year, tons of fine print, but hidden in the details:

http://hhonors3.hilton.com/en/terms/index.html#hilton_hhonors_membership_tiers

Silver no changes

Gold now requires 4 nights, 4 stays or 15,000 more bonus points.

Diamond now requires same amount of nights, 2 more stays, or 20,000 more bonus points.

At first glance no changes in the benefits, but I'm a little cross eyed from the fine print. As someone who qualifies on base points, and extra $2000 a year doesn't impress me.

That's stinks for gold but I generally have more nights/stays then required anyway.

Given my business requirements I actually am on the road many more nights but often my company or customers specify specific hotels I need to stay at.

That really stinks... US folks can get credit card with 95$ annual fee and get gold... What can we Europeans get? 4 more expensive stays? Hilton this REALLY sucks!!!

The stealth changes to the program really get old.

Anything that thins the ranks of the " Gold same as Diamond crowd" is fine by me

+1

Jett Rink may worry about it in '14.

They have at least stater it a little clearer now without having to go through the T&C:

http://hhonors3.hilton.com/en/explore/benefits/upcoming-changes.html

Still no email though.

But if there was one, I would expect it to look like this:

'Hilton is listening. A lot of our members have mentioned how it was becoming easy to obtain status, especially through credit card offers. This in turn increased the amount of our members competing for limited resources. For 2013 we are happy to announce changes to our top tier program. These improvements will address your main concern about the dilution of elite benefits and reduce the number of people competing for them. With less elite members, we should receive less complaints. And with less legitimate elite members, those remaining from credit card signups shouldn't have the nerve to complain, and if they do, we don't have to listen.'

It's pretty ridiculous that they would roll out a change like this with little or no warning... I guess they just expect everyone that already qualified through 2013 to pay attention to the meter next year to know how many nights they have left.

But I tend to agree with some of the views on the blogs and elsewhere... it's becoming almost too easy to earn elite status with some of these chains by simply getting a branded credit card (that you never use) rather than actually working for it. But that begs the question... are they going to make changes at some point to that as well?

There's obviously more revenue for the chains when people earn the status via stays rather than just a CC sign-up, so I would figure if anything would change first it would be elite status via credit cards rather than requiring more actual stays. I think if nothing else these changes would prompt people to concentrate their stays on a single OTHER chain (say SPG) and just apply for a credit card halfway through the year to get status for the remainder of the year and next with Hilton or IHG.

How is this stealth? You have all of next year to obtain status elsewhere if you desire, 13months advance notice is more then sufficient.

I'll end up with 47 nights and 23 stays this year (enough for the Gold requirements next year), so I'm sure I can make this again next year.

But I have to say, for me, I stay at hotels on average 75 nights a year. It's becoming harder to stay brand loyal because my company and customers often dictate specific brands (and some non affiliated hotels). I've mixed the rest of the nights this year at Marriott, Hyatt, Starwood and un-affiliated "boutique" hotels -- and not enough to get any status's (other than the fact I got the MilePoint comp'd Plat status at Hyatt which is really nice).

Point is I guess, the increase in night requirements will make it harder for me to maintain status next year, probably will be able to, but just another pain...

I personally think if they don't put some kind of announcement on their site or send out an email to their existing members, then it's sort of surreptitious.

I think quite a few people here (including myself) are well into the planning stages for their Q1 travel and beyond, and knowing that they will further devaluate elite status for those that earn it (rather than purchase it), it will definitely affect my booking decisions.

If I know now that I'm going to just buy status with them for 2014, I'll just earn status with someone else and not stay with them at all this year, but obviously you have to know this change is happening before you start banking your nights with them.

Have you seen any official announcement? The only reason we know is because someone read the fine print and told us. Hilton has shown a pattern of rolling out changes (whether negative or occasionally positive) unannounced, and then not always announcing them afterwards either. Short of active participation here or on other frequent flyer hangouts, or randomly rereading the T&C of the program we would not know this was coming.

Stealth in the sense that you only know about it if you have a google alert setup on the T&C page, or you read the blogs. As a diamond member, Hilton still hasn't 'officially told me'. And I bet a lot of the elite members don't read the blogs or milepoint.

As mentioned above, most of my Q1 travel is also booked. Although this would unlikely have had me change it either way, I just think that a company should be announcing changes to its best customers themselves, and not something I should be reading on a blog.

For better or worse, I'm sure you can expect the same from Hilton in the future.

Gold via stays/nights is starting to approach the requirements for SPG Plat or Hyatt Diamond!

Its official today..

I got an email this afternoon. I would guess all should have gotten.



Dear Dave,

Thank you for making Hilton HHonors™ your guest loyalty program. With ten distinct hotel brands, you have endless ways to experience the benefits of being an HHonors member.

Over the past few years, we have expanded the benefits for our guests with Gold and Diamond status. They can now enjoy benefits such as complimentary space-available room upgrades, high-speed Internet access, breakfast, and up to a 50% bonus on all Base Points earned on every stay.

Periodically, we need to adapt our program based on industry trends. For the past ten years, we have not changed the qualifications for Gold and Diamond status. As of January 1, 2013, we will adjust the requirements to qualify for elite status in 2014. To qualify for Gold status, HHonors members must complete 20 stays, 40 nights, or attain 75,000 Base Points within the calendar year. To qualify for Diamond status in 2014, members must complete 30 stays, 60 nights, or attain 120,000 Base Points in 2013. All other tier level qualifications, as well as elite status received through Hilton HHonors credit cards and partners, will remain the same.

We thank you for your loyalty, and we look forward to seeing you at one of our 3,900 hotels and resorts in 2013.

Sincerely,



Jeffrey Diskin
Executive Vice President, Commercial Services
Hilton Worldwide

Just a thought it prob was to be official Dec 1 but it was a weekend so they pushed site changes in but delayed emails till a business day.

I thought those emails are supposed to go out on Friday afternoons

Not I...

I haven't seen anything yet either.

Give the Hilton Honors Hamsters some time, folks. They are cranking the wheels that power the email server as fast as they can

Got mine early this morning.

Abandoning HH two years ago is starting to seem like a good idea.

The hamsters just got to my wife's account.

Yep, just got mine at 10AM