Club Eurostar status downgrade after loyalty programme changes

[FrenchLondoner]

My status was downgraded from Carte Blanche to Avantage today.
This may be in their right and T&Cs but I find it poor form really: I had a third of the points required to renew Carte Blanche but I had 2 months to go and I could have done this with 3 returns in Business. At the very least they could have granted an extension till the end of my previous membership year.
Rant over. Was anybody else impacted by the change?

[executiveclubber]

MR exchanging to Eurostar has never felt a good deal to me. I’ve always found Eurostar a bit mean-spirited in their approach — bad food, coffee and wine in Premier, (when I visited) weak food offering in lounge, totally disempowered customer service and overall it’s cheaper to fly, which is frustrating.

They just don’t care

[FrenchLondoner]

And… it seems it’s getting even worse !!!
Value of redemptions just doubled ?
Business Premier return 6k points…

The gift which doesn’t stop giving…

[katef]

Luckily for me I’ve gone from Carte Blanche to Étoile, but if I had lost Carte Blanche I would have been super frustrated too @FrenchLondoner.

I like the ability to bring two guests as if I’m not alone, I’m with my disabled dad and his partner. I’ve told Eurostar before that if I can’t keep them with me in fast track then we have to use their disability assistance, so it takes more staff time up to use the help in London. But they’ve never had a way for me to use my fast track with 2 weekday guests as a disability accommodation.

Not having to book my Thalys through that account and separate out trips is an administrative improvement as it annoyed me that before, if you did a trip that changed in Brussels, booking it all with Eurostar meant you got no points for the Thalys travel.

I’ve just done a few redemption trips, sounds like I should have been maxing out the value of them if they’ve done a big devaluation:(

Overall I much prefer trains to flying and I like many of the Eurostar staff, so this doesn’t put me off, but it does seem less generous than airline loyalty schemes.

[Mainline421]

Same happened to me, really hoping they offer an extension some sort of goodwill gesture at least

[meta]

Check your accounts again, they were still updating accounts yesterday. Mine now shows correct status and expiry date is now 1 Oct 2024. I also seemed to have gained extra 500 points, it’s a random number, but might be because of some conversion of previous points.

[FrenchLondoner]

Thanks @meta, unfortunately still showing as Advantage.. Will keep an eye just in case
Were you on track to renew your status?

[Rob]

meta wrote:

Check your accounts again, they were still updating accounts yesterday. Mine now shows correct status and expiry date is now 1 Oct 2024. I also seemed to have gained extra 500 points, it’s a random number, but might be because of some conversion of previous points.

Everyone got a 20% uplift on their existing balance.

[max2808]

Re: Eurostar, that’s a massive devaluation. One of the biggest ever seen, roughly 80%. Last week I had enough for 5 return trips in Standard after transferring some MR points earlier this year. Now I only have enough for 3.

Wish there would be a competitor to Eurostar on the LDN to Paris route as they sue their monopoly to do pretty much what they want price – wise…

[meta]

FrenchLondoner wrote:

Thanks @meta, unfortunately still showing as Advantage.. Will keep an eye just in case
Were you on track to renew your status?

I already renewed Avantage in August, but yesterday I was showing as basic member and today it’s showing Avantage with expiry next year.

[meta]

max2808 wrote:

Re: Eurostar, that’s a massive devaluation. One of the biggest ever seen, roughly 80%. Last week I had enough for 5 return trips in Standard after transferring some MR points earlier this year. Now I only have enough for 3.

Wish there would be a competitor to Eurostar on the LDN to Paris route as they sue their monopoly to do pretty much what they want price – wise…

There are flights or just not bother collecting points. You shouldn’t transfer any MR points unless you actually need them straight away. That’s hopefully a lesson learned.

[ZamaGelu]

On my end I had reached Carte Blanche 15 days ago.
Just logged in today and saw I was downgraded to Avantage which makes no sense (apart from the fact they seem to have lifted the requirements but very poor).

I will wait a couple of days to see if things iron out otherwise will complain to their customer service.

[Chas]

This is a known issue according to the Eurostar customer services agent I have just spoken with. All current statuses were meant to transfer over to the new scheme on a like-for-like basis, and everyone’s membership date re-set to 1 October, with current progress towards the new status wiped to zero. Apparently about 20% of members statuses haven’t transferred correctly, and they think it will take 2-3 days to resolve.

I was Avantage, with my membership year finishing at end-Nov. I currently haven’t met the limit to retain my status, but would have done so with a trip I am doing in 5 weeks time. Today my status is showing as Classique.

The agent I spoke with said that going forward membership years will adjust to whenever you gain the next level up; I can’t recall how the old scheme treated increases in status, but it seems that you’ll only get a max of 12 months in a new status, rather than all of the remaining membership year, plus one full year as is common with airline and hotel schemes.

[JLFletcher]

max2808 wrote:

Re: Eurostar, that’s a massive devaluation. One of the biggest ever seen, roughly 80%. Last week I had enough for 5 return trips in Standard after transferring some MR points earlier this year. Now I only have enough for 3.

Wish there would be a competitor to Eurostar on the LDN to Paris route as they sue their monopoly to do pretty much what they want price – wise…

The devaluation is a big pain- would also have made Carte Blanche in the next few months, but unlikely to now which is frustrating. I would say that the Eurostar price rises are due mainly to the fact that they have been forced to significantly reduce capacity due to brexit and the additional security checks, but still have the same or higher running costs.

[marcb86]

I had Carte Blanche, and when I initially opened the app it said I still had Carte Blanche – it was all beige in colour when I tapped the link to show my card. Then the moment I went into my account it suddenly showed me as having Avantage and everything changed to red/purple. Hoping it is as everyone says above just an issue with transferring over accounts, but I don’t hold my hopes up too much!

Also just made a booking and it looks like you can no longer pick the seats you want to sit in, which is extremely annoying.

[Alex1904]

I should have Avantage but it just says I have Classique with “Invalid date” expiry

[Chas]

I’ve just noticed that whilst I’m still showing as Classique on the website, on the app I’m correctly showing as Avantage.

[Blair Waldorf Salad]

Alex1904 wrote:

I should have Avantage but it just says I have Classique with “Invalid date” expiry

Same. I’m not travelling imminently so will give it a few days

[marcb86]

marcb86 wrote:

I had Carte Blanche, and when I initially opened the app it said I still had Carte Blanche – it was all beige in colour when I tapped the link to show my card. Then the moment I went into my account it suddenly showed me as having Avantage and everything changed to red/purple. Hoping it is as everyone says above just an issue with transferring over accounts, but I don’t hold my hopes up too much!

Also just made a booking and it looks like you can no longer pick the seats you want to sit in, which is extremely annoying.

Update on my status – I called them up this morning and they just updated my account and gave me Carte Blanche for a year. They called it a “commercial compensation” I think, which the phone operator basically explained as they couldn’t be bothered to investigate it (not in that language) so gave me Carte Blanche.

[ZamaGelu]

marcb86 wrote:

Update on my status – I called them up this morning and they just updated my account and gave me Carte Blanche for a year. They called it a “commercial compensation” I think, which the phone operator basically explained as they couldn’t be bothered to investigate it (not in that language) so gave me Carte Blanche.

Which number did you call? I went through X/Twitter DM route and the operator told me they were reviewing my case and passed it to the Carte Blanche team but with no promises of status update.

[marcb86]

ZamaGelu wrote:

marcb86 wrote:

Update on my status – I called them up this morning and they just updated my account and gave me Carte Blanche for a year. They called it a “commercial compensation” I think, which the phone operator basically explained as they couldn’t be bothered to investigate it (not in that language) so gave me Carte Blanche.

Which number did you call? I went through X/Twitter DM route and the operator told me they were reviewing my case and passed it to the Carte Blanche team but with no promises of status update.

I just called the number on this page – https://www.eurostar.com/uk-en/contact-us/eurostar-contact-details – under Club Eurostar – +44 (0)3432 186 186

I’m wary that I was very fortunate with the call operator that I had, and that your mileage may vary.

[FrenchLondoner]

You have been lucky, or maybe it was good timing, just called and was told multiple times the same script from the agent: ‘ as an agent there is nothing I can do about it. This is all done by an algorithm.’ And then when arguing about the shortening of two months ‘this is an advantage we are giving and nothing commercial’, so in other words they don’t owe anything…

I mean, honestly, I can’t find an excuse really for this mess… What was the issue at a very minimum to leave the carte blanche status for two more months for the people who had it…

Some people will arrive at the station today and just realise they can’t access fast track and potentially miss their train.

A good example of what not to do for sure…

[ZamaGelu]

ZamaGelu wrote:

marcb86 wrote:

Update on my status – I called them up this morning and they just updated my account and gave me Carte Blanche for a year. They called it a “commercial compensation” I think, which the phone operator basically explained as they couldn’t be bothered to investigate it (not in that language) so gave me Carte Blanche.

Which number did you call? I went through X/Twitter DM route and the operator told me they were reviewing my case and passed it to the Carte Blanche team but with no promises of status update.

Update on my end: Eurostar returned my Tier level to Carte Blanche 🙂 This was done via X/Twitter DM but like marcb86, looks like this was done on an individual basis and they didn’t provide rationale or criteria for making this decision. So suggest to anyone having lost status to reach out via this route or call center since I don’t see them making any global changes for all folks who lost status.