Sorry, just got back home after a three day staycation at.....(drum roll please)......MGM! LOL
First, a few comments to the responses:
jjjj21: I think most people who experienced life with MGM-Mirage pre-mLife recognized and accepted that their online offer "system" sucked. However, mLife was their opportunity to make it right and thus far, that's failed IMO.
I understand your comment that you rely on snail and email but what then is the advantage of having an online repository where the reasonable presumption is that all offers should reside? I also accept that our situation is unique. We have to "pick" an address....we chose FL as we weren't getting many offers as locals. As a result, our snail mail to include this slot tournament offer and the Billboard Music Awards was sent. Unfortunately, I didn't see these for two weeks and by that time, the Billboards were sold out. My only point is what's the use of having an online site that they're now actively promoting if they don't put ALL of your offers on there and on the ones they do, why not put a thorough description of what the offer includes?
My Amazon analogy was probably confusing. My point is that Amazon is a recognized ONLINE site. Being online means that you can order online. The model works well in my experience. mLife is an online site but in the vast majority of cases, you can't "order" online because 1) the offer details aren't spelled out and/or 2) you can't book the offer online like I seem to recall you can from my HET days.
Sandy83: I was told that there are approximately 100 hosts in the MRI system. Would it not have made more sense to let the host establish the pecking order and offer them to a good customer who could either take them or pass and then it's on to the next customer? They literally sent out thousands of these offers for 200 seats. It wasn't like I dragged my ass on this.....within 4 hours they were toast. I should also let you know that my host wasn't even aware of the offer......they sent them to customers without telling them about it. I heard this from two different hosts at two different properties. This all just reeks of poor communication which ties back to the online site.
CLV & O2bnVegas: I'm from the "math" camp, remember? LOL Nothing playable at CE for me for less than $5. Even people who are 7 star mostly indicate that they earned that elsewhere outside of Vegas and don't even play here. They clearly had (have?) a better online site.....they wrote the original book on this and the point is that all MRI had to do was copy it and obviously they failed. Sorry but not likely you'll see me doing to CE happy dance but I'm glad they're looking after you and I hope you're jacking the for $$$.
Just a point of clarification on the Express Comps.....it's doesn't always play out as indicated. I know quite a few people who had their Express Comp accounts raided by hosts to clear off F & B charges. I'm not going to argue whether not this was warranted or if their play should have carried these charges....I don't know the details that closely. I do know that these are fair game and I would suggest that a player monitors this before and after a stay to see if their account got "raided".
Now, to give credit where credit is due, we did both just receive offers for May-July called "The Buzz". Not sure if this is a local or out of town offer as we recently decided to become "local" in their system. Found this last Friday A.M. and it includes 3 nights in a suite, $300 in F & B, and two tickets to any show system-wide. A separate offer also called The Buzz included monthly free play from May thru July. In all fairness, these offers were clearly spelled out but did require a call to book. I found it a little odd that we only received this on May 20 when most of the month was behind us. Perhaps it was because we just turned "local"? We booked this one in Barb's name but both got our monthly free play and both gave about 150x the amount of play relatively to our free play. We're hoping that this keeps these offers coming. We did exceed the $300 in F & B but the balance was picked up without using our express comps.
For now, we're slightly encourage but at the same time confused. I'm happy that we're getting this but not sure what prompted it and more importantly, what it's going to take to keep it coming. It seems that our MGM host still has discretion but at the same time, we try to give a level of play that warrants and justifies this. It seems that this varies by property and even individual hosts.
There is also not a lot of consistency in what they're doing. Excal rescinds a slot tournament offer but MGM rolls out the red carpet. Doesn't make a lot of sense......
Anyway, I still think that "proceed with caution" is sound advice. I also believe that it doesn't hurt to use a host to see if they can better what you're being offered online.
Dan
