You leave without a word, no message, no number
And now my head is pounding like rolling thunder
You left me with a heartache deep inside
Girl you should see me cry all night, and I wonder
Everybody says, what a shame, what is wrong
They don’t like the game we play
Heard you’re hanging round every night until dawn
I’m waiting for you night and day
Where do you go, my lovely
Where do you go
I wanna know, my lovely, I wanna know
Like a scene from Christmas Vacation where Sparky’s boss suspends Christmas bonuses (‘of all the cheap lousy ways to save a buck’), Club Carlson in one fell swoop has ruined its loyalty program for US Bank cardholders. Starting at the end of May, the free night when booking two nights with points is over. Now, it will cost 50k points per night to stay in the prison sized cells on the ‘business class’ floors at top Radisson Blu properties.
If you do want a free night at Radisson Blu then break out the RedBird because it is going to cost you 10k in MS per card for the annual bonus. Whether I keep or cancel these cards is still being debated by my accounting department, but I don’t think I’d waste 20k in MS (one for personal, one for business) and deal with the fraud department when I can be focusing on other programs.
I don’t get the logic behind this devaluation: There aren’t a lot of desirable Club Carlson hotels worth staying at throughout the world and there isn’t an overabundance of US Bank cardholders who enjoy this benefit. (US Bank frowns upon churning and is stingy with approvals.)
Rather than focus on the negative, I’ve put together a scrapbook of the good times shared with Club Carlson at some of their best properties worldwide. We had a good time while it lasted.
1. Radisson Blu Hotel Waterfront, Cape Town (January 2014)
2. Radisson Blu Bosphorus Hotel Istanbul (March 2013)
3. Radisson Blu Strand Hotel, Stockholm (July 2014)
4. Radisson Blu Elizabete Hotel, Riga (July 2014)
5. Radisson on Flagstaff Gardens Melbourne (December 2013)
6. Radisson Martinique on Broadway (September 2013)
What two other aspirational properties cities should I visit before the Club Carlson devaluation goes into effect?
