Best Buy employee and CG reader Lance writes:
I am actually a BestBuy employee and have too received this e-mail.
This e-mail is legitimate and was a [spoof] [mistake? - ed.] on Best Buy’s part. I understand that many of you see this as a fault of technology and stupidity on Best Buy’s part but think about it, a multi-billion dollar technology conglomerate needs many employees to work for them. There are various development teams that go into developing the program to creating the e-mail that all members see. It is difficult to get all the systems to merge without fault, trust me, store teams see it ALL THE TIME.
Many store teams haven’t even heard of Premier Black but fortunately I have several co-workers that work for corporate with the development teams and they have explained me that it is a program in the works but is not slated to be released/piloted until right before Holidays or a little after.
There was an earlier post explaining the benefits of Premier Silver, everything he mentioned was correct. Premier Black is supposed to have additional benefits to Silver but Silver must be reached first in order to even qualify.
Unfortunately I am not a spokesperson for Best Buy but I do understand everyone’s frustration. Trust me though, corporate is aware of the fault and the miscommunication and there is to be an e-mail coming soon explaining the mishap and they should provide as much information as they can at this point in that follow-up e-mail.
So that settles it, right?
Silver members though like myself are left on the fence, because I have no clue if I qualify now or not. Ive spent well over 5k this year and would like to know where I stand. Regular members should know that they would need to get into the silver program before even being considered, its just common sense. You dont just jump from regular membership to elite, w/o at least getting into the silver program. At any rate though fellas, you are not missing much. lol.
I got the email too, but I was a regular member until I spent over $3,000 on my reward zone mastercard, which you get more points and perks. I understand spending $2,500 gets you premier silver I don’t care for black unless I get even more points back.
the qualification for rwz silver is spending over $2000 per rolling year on your rwz-branded mastercard
benefits:
45 return policy
no restocking fees (laptops, cameras, etc)
separate pick-up/return line in certain stores
specific mail marketing incentives (coupons) targeted every 3 months or so
likely exceptions/exclusions from certain bby policies if you’re nice to a manager & simply ask kindly for them to treat you differently from everybody else
I also received not one, but several “We’d like to welcome you to the Best Buy® Reward Zone® program at our most elite membership level – Premier Black.”
Been a Premier member for years now. I usually spend about 15K per year at Best Buy, so let´s say I kind of qualify for Premier Black too, right?
I´ve received at least one invitation/congratularion per month for the last 3 months. So, for me, it´s not “just a mistake”. It´s happening over and over.
First time I called, answering the e-m, on August, I was told it was a pilot program that´d start on September, 1st. So, I patientlly waited ´till mid September and called again, just to be told they had technical issues, so I was to call first week of October.
I just called, the operator seemed VERY confused and, trying to give a URL related to this, asked me to open a blog site, where everyone was complaining about this. Finally, asked me to call again in November.
What kind of joke is this? This lack of respect, organization, and communication even makes me think about doing my bussiness with another store…