Rewards Points Go up :(

[Diegosmom]

I have a rewards program that I do at work from one of our suppliers. I usually use it for giftcards to Chillis or bath and body (for xmas gifts) but in Jan (after I maxed out on xmas gifts) I realized they had a $500 disney giftcard so I havent bought anything and have been saving for it...it is 53,000 points. Last month I checked and I had 43,000 wooohoooo only 10,000 more to go. I logged in today to see if I had earned enough points (they post previous months sales on the 12th of the month)...to my surprise my $500 gift card is now 67,000 points...WHAT!!!!!!!! it went up 15,000 points from last month.

I also checked the $50 gift cards...they used to be 5,000 points now they are 7,500.

I am so bummed. We are going in Jan and I was really counting on this giftcard. Each point is a dollar spent so now we have to spend $25,000 more for me to earn enough for this card... It is possible but who knows...the problem is we buy from 3 different suppliers and this is not our main supplier. I buy from whoever gives me the best price and on certain things this company does do good but I have no jobs slated to use this company...of course I could decide to pay more just to use them but I would never do that.

I understand needing to adjust points but that just seems like a big increase...

And I know dont count your chicken before they hatch...my other options is they have a $100 vacation cert. for 13,000 points so I have enough for (3) but not sure of the fine print and if I could apply 3 to my vacation. A giftcard was just so much easier...fingers crossed we get another job that they will suppply.

 

[Sagginit]

i understand the feeling. i got the disney visa and have not looked back b/c i know what im getting. my old bank CC i was using did the same thing. they changed their point program and said the points would still be worth the same thing, but in reality they weren't because you needed more points to buy things. its frustrating beacuse you are so invested with points you do not want to close it and walk away, but you feel like you are not getting the rewards you thought you would be able to get.

 

[Karenj2]

And I know dont count your chicken before they hatch...my other options is they have a $100 vacation cert. for 13,000 points so I have enough for (3) but not sure of the fine print and if I could apply 3 to my vacation. A giftcard was just so much easier...fingers crossed we get another job that they will suppply.

I'm sorry to hear that - DH also gets rewards points at work, and recently found out that they were changing the program and there wouldn't be any more GCs offered at all. Which bums us out because we'd easily get anywhere from $500 - $1000 in Disney GCs for our vacations... (Even though we don't have a trip planned, we went ahead and got the GCs to use up the rewards before the program changed.)

As for your $100 vacation certs - are they Disney certs, or through something else? If you can apply one, you should be able to apply all three to your vacation. That's what we did the last time (we had 5 $100 disney GCs). Hopefully you can get more points to get the Disney GC you originally wanted...

 

[Diegosmom]

It is a vacation cert. It says it has to be used toward a vacation package (room plus tix) and it might even list the days but it is not a gift card...there was better point value in the $500 gift card...

I know this is something I am getting for "Free" but still stinks...

I wish I would have know they were going up I might have decided on something else...

 

[bpesch]

Unfortunately it's a sign of the times. EVERYTHING is going up!

 

[Mrs. Bradbury]

Are you saying that you use your employer's money to buy work supplies, and then use the rewards points for your own personal use? With your company's knowledge & blessing? That would never fly where I work.

 

[ValpoCory]

Are you saying that you use your employer's money to buy work supplies, and then use the rewards points for your own personal use? With your company's knowledge & blessing? That would never fly where I work.

That's pretty standard practice in the business world. My Dad traveled on business for years and earned Lifetime Status for a frequent flyer program. He is since retired but still enjoys all the benefits he accrued on the company dollar.

 

[csharpwv]

I travel a lot for work, so I earn rewards points for all of my hotel stays.
During the depth of the recession, Hilton had the most competitive pricing trying to fill hotel rooms - so I stayed exclusively with Hilton for 3 1/2 years.
However this spring, as thing were looking better financially - Hilton was the first to hit hard on price increases. That left me either wasting more of my budget to stay with the same hotel chain, or branching out and looking for more hotels - and earning fewer of one specific brand's rewards points. So I now have 4 rewards memberships with 4 different hotel chains - and I am spending less than what I did last year.

To quote one of my favorite lines from a movie Up in the Air "Loyalty is expensive"

SO TRUE!

So now, I don't have as many points as I used to - BUT I'm saving money, and learning that it's no so scary outside of the Hilton Family of Hotels.

I've had great luck with Starwood Hotels, Wyndham Hotels, Best Western, and I'm staying in a Marriott this weekend - so let's see how that goes!

I feel your pain on rewards points - because even in the middle of my long term relationship with HHonors (Hilton's rewards program) they changes the rewards structure.

Even Southwest has changed their rewards program - which I understand, because you used to get the same amount of points regardless of how much your flight was, now its tied to how much your ticket price was - but still - another example of expensive loyalty!

Rewards program are a bit of a joke - you actually get nothing for free, you pay for it somewhere in hidden costs!

 

[drgnfly30]

That's pretty standard practice in the business world. My Dad traveled on business for years and earned Lifetime Status for a frequent flyer program. He is since retired but still enjoys all the benefits he accrued on the company dollar.

^^ This.. in fact they encourage us to put our reward #'s on file so it's easier when we book the travel.. I've accured several thousand USAir points this month alone for work travel...

 

[OrangeCountyCommuter]

I had to shut this down where I work and they were all rather hysterical, but the 'spending' was being abused to get "reward" points. Just
(And the vendor actually gave us a better rate when purchasing called and say "no go" on the rewards. So the company was paying for it!)

OP is doing this right, but sadly others can't pass up the temptation to "send the money to the company that gives me the deal even if it costs my employer money"


We do allow travel awards, but you have to book via our online travel agent system that tells us when you picked "Marriott" or "Delta" and the others were cheaper.... So there's a control With some of the others we just had no control to make sure the primary motivator wasn't "reward points" (And we added the travel portal after seeing how much the "I only fly United" etc was costing us.. more whining has occured LOL!)

 

[Mrs. Bradbury]

That's pretty standard practice in the business world. My Dad traveled on business for years and earned Lifetime Status for a frequent flyer program. He is since retired but still enjoys all the benefits he accrued on the company dollar.

For travel points/rewards, most definitely - and it should be when you consider the inconvenience for employees being away from their home & family. Getting rewards for office supplies, for example, and keeping the points for personal use is another matter - they could better be used to reward employees of the month or for some other purpose for the company, from my point of view. That and $7 will get you a Frappucino.

 

[bumbershoot]

^^ This.. in fact they encourage us to put our reward #'s on file so it's easier when we book the travel.. I've accured several thousand USAir points this month alone for work travel...

It also helps the business travel, or at the very least can help the traveller be more comfortable, which helps the traveler be more rested and therefore possibly more productive. DH's FF status has kept him on flights that were overbooked in coach (b/c he's bumped up to the next level). And when he gets those bumps he's able to rest more easily and can get going with his testing as soon as he gets to the hotel, instead of needing a nap first.

We do allow travel awards, but you have to book via our online travel agent system that tells us when you picked "Marriott" or "Delta" and the others were cheaper.... So there's a control With some of the others we just had no control to make sure the primary motivator wasn't "reward points" (And we added the travel portal after seeing how much the "I only fly United" etc was costing us.. more whining has occured LOL!)

I'm sure you know this, but make sure the others do... DH discovered that most of his coworkers were getting the FF miles for each and every airline they used. So they had a smattering of United, Delta, Alaska, Continental, Air Canada, etc etc etc... When they should have chosen just a couple (hubby mainly uses Alaska and United as the "catchall") and then if they are flying on Delta, put the Alaska # in and earn those miles. If on a carrier linked with United, use the United # and get those miles. etc etc.

He couldn't believe that his coworkers didn't know to do that, and they couldn't believe how much they'd been missing out on by not doing that!

Of course it requires some research. DH was on a flight on Copa air, and they woudln't take his United number. Turns out they WILL take Continental, but hubby didn't realize he had a C account, so he just flew without putting a # in. Now he needs to send everything into them, see if they'll put in the C FF# retroactively, and then of course that will ultimately get switched to United, once the merger is done. Know your carriers!

 

[Diegosmom]

I can understand how employees would abuse this type of program...

I am an estimator and Project Manager of the jobs I win. We have 3 suppliers that we buy from. Lets call them A, B and C. A and B are the main ones we use and in the past there was always some sort of trip rewards...we had to spend a certain amount of money over 1 or 2 years and we could earn so many trips (and could buy in for another one). We have 4 owners (but one that doesnt travel) so the owners would always go and if we spend enough money there wives would go too. I have never been given one of these trips (and honestly I understand the owners using them thereselves). Company C has this rewards program that I was talking about. It started small but as evolved into more. No one else at my company (the owners) could be bothered to set up the account and enter an invoice (or photocopy and mail like we used to) so they told me I could do it and get the rewards. I think they felt bad cause they were going on these great trips and I was left at the office to hold down the fort. The trips have since ended but they havent "taken" away this rewards program from me...of course I havent brought it up either lol and honestly I think they have forgotten about it since the other companies ended there programs.

As a project manager I get to decide which company I could use and believe me I would love to use company C all the time and get my rewards. But my bosses know that I am honest and would never do that. Plus I like to see that I made the most money on my job and this would cut into the profit (even know I dont get a cut in the profit). We are also a small company, kind of like family so they know I wont do something to hurt the company...

I always price out all three companies and take the lowest bid...fingers crossed that company C will be low bid on a job soon so I can get my Disney card.

Oh also no one wants to deal with our salesman...nothing wrong with him but owners just want to deal with how they have always done business with so I always "deal" with him...so its my perk for doing all the legwork with this company...