Earlier this year, both my husband and I applied for the InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG) credit card offer. I personally did it for the current bonus offer at the time plus the annual free night I’ll receive to use at any IHG hotel.
Now, if you are a loyal IHG member or keep up in the points and miles world, you are probably aware that IHG just added a new status level to their program, called Spire. To obtain this status you must stay 75 nights in the year or earn 75,000 points. On top of the benefits one already received from Platinum status, this Spire status status gives you 100% bonus on all points earned and an exclusive choice benefit. A few nice perks for those looking to reach top tier status!
I personally do not stay at IHG hotels nearly enough to earn any status solely based on stays, but I did receive an email yesterday letting me know that I achieved this Spire status! The interesting thing about IHG is that they include all points earned from the credit card bonus when calculating this status. This has always been the case and it seems as though nothing has changed with the introduction of this new status. So for those that have received a sign up bonus starting in 2015, those points will help you achieve the status!
While I do not really care about having this Spire status overall, I thoroughly enjoy the “Exclusive Choice” option I received! With this benefit, you are able to select one of the two choices: 1) 25,000 points or 2) Gifting Platinum status to a friend. I personally believe the 25,000 point option wins hands down and that is the option I selected.
To select your choice benefit, once you sign into your account, click the “Choice Benefit” option on the left-hand column (all the way at the bottom). Then select your desired option. Your points will be credited to your account immediately as well!
Since I received Spire status solely on my credit card sign up, I ultimately ended up with 105,000 points which is amazing (70,000 from the sign up + 10,000 from customer service matching another sign up bonus + 25,000 from the elite choice benefit). Currently, the best publicly available offer is 60,000 points, but there are some targeted offers out there for 80,000 points. Some have been able to see these offers when signing into their IHG account. So if you apply for the card now, there is a very good change that you’ll be eligible for Spire status (assuming you earn a total of 75,000 points) and be eligible for the 25,000 bonus points! Of course, IHG could change at anytime and no longer count points earned from the credit. UPDATE: Some reports are showing that they did not receive Spire status from the credit card sign up. I personally signed up for the card and April and the 70,000 points hit my account on May 10. The extra 10,000 points from customer service hit my account on June 9.
Enjoy those extra points everyone!
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Supposedly IHG has tweaked their coding so that the credit card sign up bonuses no longer post as elite qualifying points. People who applied for the card earlier this year got in before the change, but anyone applying now will not.
I have had the card for more than a year so those sign up points wouldn’t count towards the status. I did buy the 100000 points during the daily giveaways. Those do not appear to count towards the status. Bummer!
I applied for the IHG card earlier this year (the 72k offer) – my points posted in June and it’s not indicating those points as counting for me (i.e. it still says “You’re 7x,xxx points away from Spire Status”)
Sign up bonus was not supposed to count. Feel good it did for you.
What I have been seeing from blogs and on flyertalk is that if you applied before the 80,000 public offer was pulled, the points from credit card will be elite qualifying. If you applied after (i.e. the 70,000/60,000/Targeted 80,000+$50), the points won’t be elite qualifying.
I applied in January for the 80,000 public offer and currently have Spire status and was able to get 25,000 additional bonus points. My wife applied in May for the 80,000 +$50 offer (the one where you have to book a dummy reservation) and she didn’t get the status or the bonus.
I’m not 100% sure about this but I would NOT apply for the card thinking you will get the additional status and 25K points.
Worked like a charm for me!!
70k sign up, plus 10k from customer service to 25k spire bonus
I am just over 100 points short of the 75,000 needed for Aspire status. If I had done my sums better I would have bought another drink for a few bucks last time I stayed in an IC last month! I have two IHG stays coming up in the next month and would like the 100% point bonus. How can I get 113 elite points almost immediately? I have an IHG card but the statement date is after the time I am staying so that will not help.
This isn’t working anymore. I got my 70k signup bonus and they are not elite qualifying points, however the 5.2k in spend last month gave me that many elite qualifying points.
@Christopher – Thanks for letting me know.