Wyndham Cancels 4:1 SPG Promo Before it Begins!

Wow, that was fast! Before the promo even started (at noon EST today), Wyndham has already cancelled it.

We reported earlier on the one-day Wyndham offer to get 4 points per each SPG point donated to charity.

If you go to the promo page, there’s now a note that:

Today’s Wyndham Rewards trade up was offered in the spirit of generosity. Before the offer even began, there were obvious and significant examples of fraud. Much to our dismay and disappointment, we have to cancel this promotion.  We will, however, make a donation of 5 million Wyndham Rewards points to charity as the work they do on behalf of others is real magic.

screen-shot-2016-10-11-at-11-32-54-am

Thanks to readers for pointing this out

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17 Comments
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Gary
Gary (@guest_305669)
October 11, 2016 20:10

I actually did the promo at 12:15. I had read about it earlier and at noon donated points made screen shots and sent got an auto reply back with the message it was cancelled. I sent Wyndham a message asking for the credit as I did it in good faith and can send them more verifiable data if needed. Will c what they said. I had checked at 10:30am it was still there should have looked again at noon

William Charles
Admin
October 11, 2016 20:41

Let us know how it goes!

gary
gary (@guest_307264)
October 17, 2016 21:55

got an email today congratulating stating they gave me the 4x and did the status match. I probably sent 4 messages between the email on the original message to their main customer service message. The main customer service never responded, the reply i got was from the fulfillment email address on the original t&C. It is showing on my wyndham account.

They may have given it to me with no real hassle since i sent it 15 mintues after it was supposed to have started. did the transaction at 12:05pm.
The number of points weren’t too many. but more than 1 free night anywhere at Wyndham. My status match was from gold with spg to platinum with wyndham. They probably realized if it was not fraud he since i wouldnt do it for a low amount like that fraudulently.

William Charles
Admin
October 17, 2016 22:01

Glad to hear you got it honored.

rb
rb (@guest_307141)
October 17, 2016 14:44

GAry, did you get a response? i also did this but no response yet.

Leana
Leana (@guest_305592)
October 11, 2016 15:35

I was actually going to do this promo, but then my internet died. Was planning on taking care of it in the evening, alas, it’s not meant to be. This was a fantastic offer, but Wyndham really didn’t think this one through. So easy to game,it’s not even funny. No surprise there, Wyndham is a nightmare of a program if you need to make any changes or cancellations. Once I redeemed the points, but it registered as a paid reservation.
I still think you can get great value out of Wyndham points, but I wouldn’t hoard them and wouldn’t accumulate them via everyday spending. I hope they honor this promo for everyone who have already donated the points and sent a screenshot. They really shouldn’t have pulled this so abruptly because many will donate the points later today not knowing the deal is toast. If only Wyndham had a brain…

stvr
stvr (@guest_305577)
October 11, 2016 14:44

“Today’s Wyndham Rewards trade up was offered in the spirit of generosity.”

May be one of the most cynical statements in loyalty marketing I’ve ever seen

jnrfalcon
jnrfalcon (@guest_305571)
October 11, 2016 14:34

Easy fraud really… I can book up all my points and donate what’s left. Per the term it still count. Then cancel those rooms to get most of my points back.

chasejuggler
chasejuggler (@guest_305606)
October 11, 2016 16:26

Oh shit…. that angle never even occurred to me!

Ryan
Ryan (@guest_305538)
October 11, 2016 12:38

Well that stinks. I was only going to gain 4k in points but I was still going to do this. I hope they offer something in the future, at the absolute least they should offer a status match of some type. I’m not sure what they saw that shut this down so quickly, but it must have been pretty bad.

Dear Wyndham – Status match please other please, I am top tier at three separate programs and have little incentive to stay at your locations now. A simple status match would at least get me looking at your properties more when I travel. I default to Hyatt and IHG with Hilton as backup as it stands today.

stvr
stvr (@guest_305537)
October 11, 2016 12:36

How could they possibly have seen fraud before they started?

Ryan
Ryan (@guest_305540)
October 11, 2016 12:40

Just means people were photoshopping and sending in stuff before it even started. Smart enough for photoshop but not smart enough to read rules and starting times I guess?

Sa
Sa (@guest_305559)
October 11, 2016 13:59

but aren’t the points awarded to accounts with real names /addresses attached to them? I would assume there would exist a simple way of verifying who did what because of that.

stvr
stvr (@guest_305576)
October 11, 2016 14:43

I’m sorry my friend this doesn’t pass the sniff test. They should have required that accounts cannot be newly opened to combat fraud.

Curtis
Curtis (@guest_305532)
October 11, 2016 12:23

While their offer was certainly not just in the effort of generosity, this is really bad. Fraudsters ruining many things these days. Just play the game and you’re still ahead without having to screw over these companies to the point that they will never come up with any offers at all in the future.

Gman
Gman (@guest_305517)
October 11, 2016 11:39

Things are changing in the internents world .. back in the day it would have taken them 3 weeks and they would have been negative 17 millions points…

Mike
Mike (@guest_305551)
October 11, 2016 13:20

They are changing for the better dont you think ? The photoshop fraudsters where lined up today, and it’s good to see that they cancelled the promotion before the bleeding even started.