The IHG Priceless Surprises contest has been a great one – originally intended as a promotion to reward actual hotel stays, some enterprising folks found a loophole in the terms and conditions. Â You could enter the contest 94 times via MAIL, with each entry guaranteeing you at least 500 IHG hotel points.
(SEE ALSO: 100,000 hotel points for a few hours work)
Since IHG hotel nights can go as low as 5,000 points / night on Point Breaks, this promotion could be worth up to 10 free nights!
Entering the Priceless Surprises promotion
With 8 people in our family, we were able to bang out the 188 index cards and envelopes (for my account and my wife’s) in a few hours time
We sent our envelopes in 2 batches in mid-December, and then it was time to wait…. and wait… and wait.
Last week I started to wonder when should I be worried about my 94 envelopes? Others also wrote in to share their experiences – it seemed like many others were in the same predicament of not having received any emails.
Thankfully no sooner did I write that post that I started getting the emails! Â I got 28 emails late Tuesday night, and another 62 emails Thursday afternoon. Â By that count, it still leaves me 4 short, but we’ll see what the next few days brings us!
Playing the IHG Priceless Surprises game
So of course I started playing! Â The kids have enjoyed picking various “floors”. Â Most of my entries have given me 500 points. Â I’ve won 1000 points once, and 2000 points one time as well
Most of the pictures have been that firework image, but, interestingly, one time I got a new image, of the Eiffel Tower. Â I thought the new image was going to be something exciting (could I be one of the million point winners!??!?!), but instead it was something bad different
Others have reported receiving similar messages of not winning, though thankfully it appears to be a glitch. Â I have not received the email saying “Psych! Actually you did win” but I figured I’d give them a few days and also I’ll wait until I do all my plays
My IHG Priceless Surprises results…. so far?
As others have mentioned, there doesn’t always appear to be a correlation between how many emails you get, and how many times you can play the game. Â The link in every email is exactly the same (and I assume tied to your account). Â Carolyn has actually only gotten 2 emails, but has successfully played the game at least 3 times.
So far I have played 42 of my entries, with 39 wins of 500, 1 for 1000, 1 for 2000 points and the one did not win – a total of 22,500 points so far. Â Why have I not played 90 times since I’ve gotten 90 emails? Â Well, my strategy, which is probably worthless, is that I read in the terms and conditions that all the big “grand” prizes were determined by selecting random times, and whoever plays the game first after that pre-selected time wins the prize. Â My strategy is that I’m more likely to win by spreading my 94 plays out over a few days / hours than playing all 94 at once.
Again, I have no clue if this improves my odds in anyway, or if it just makes me feel better đŸ™‚
If you haven’t entered the IHG Priceless Surprises promotion, you still have time – entries must be postmarked by February 15th. Â See all the details on my original post.
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
FYI. While it once looked like they were sending emails once a week (with the day varying) I got emails this week on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday.
Sent entries mid-December. No emails yet.
Received 54 response emails yesterday. Plan to play 15-20 times per day. I don’t have any justifiable reason. Just seems sensible. So far, mostly 500 points, but have hit (2) 1,000 points, (1) 2,000 points and (1) 5,000 points.
Nice, a 5000! I haven’t gotten one of those
I was starting to get worried too, but I got my first 31 emails tonight, out of the 40 index cards I mailed last month. I scored a 5,000 point, a 2,000 point and a 1,000 point (the rest were 500 each). It does say that it could take 2-3 weeks for the points to post to my account, but so far, so good!
I received 34 emails overnight (inbox was full!). I haven’t taken the time to get my results.
Datapoint – I won one of the Arnold Palmer golf trips & the notification of the win came through my email vs popping up as a game win when playing. Best use of a stamp yet :-).
Does the address on the envelope need to be handwritten as well? I sure hope not.
People have tried different things and it doesn’t APPEAR to matter what you put on the envelope (handwritten vs. typed). The rules do say that it needs to be handwritten and I (well, my minions and I) did hand write the envelopes as well
The rules say handwritten card in an envelope. Not handwritten card in a handwritten envelope. So to me it was unclear. Labels worked for me though, at least so far……
Sent 60 letters in the first week of January. Received all emails today. 2 for 2,000 and 2 for 1,000 and all the others were for 500. 2 emails did not win.
Sent all 94 handwritten entries and envelopes in the first three weeks of December. Over the past week I have received 40 emails (entry links). Primarily 500 points, but (1) 1000, (1) 2000, and (2) 5000. I have no interest in the grand prizes but I do like the smaller ones.
Hi again. One more question. Did you use two different phone numbers, the same number twice or just one number for day and evening phone numbers?
Thanks.
Just to be sure we put the same number down twice and wrote day by one and night by the other. You can never tell how picky someone on the other end will be.
So far I got a batch of 19, batch of 13, batch of 5, and now about 1 email a day. At first I won some nice 5000, 2000, prizes but that has since gone to just 500 each time lately. That’s OK, since that is what we all originally hope to get.
That’s right – I just put the same number down twice and I didn’t make any distinguishment like home, work, mobile
Dan:
I mailed off a small test batch of entries on December 9, 2015 and have yet to receive any emails back. I also logged in to my Priceless Surprises dashboard at IHG and all I see is the 1000 points I received from a hotel stay during the promotion time.
Two questions:
(1) Is it possible that my STAY at the hotel screwed up the mail in entries?
(2) I was going to send in the remainder of the entries in the next two weeks but use a different email address (in case they spelled my other email address incorrectly). Does the email address on the entry have to match the address on file with IHG Rewards?
Thanks,
J.
The Flying Dutch Girl RTW
Unfortunately I am not sure. My guesses would be 1) no – it hasn’t screwed it up and 2) I would guess not. You could always try changing your email address in your profile? I think I’d just use the same email address though
UPDATE:
On Feb 4th I sent an inquiry via the HelloWorld, Inc. website using their “contact” form. I received an automated email:
Good Afternoon,
Thank you for reaching out to The IHG and MasterCard® Priceless Surprises® Promotion. We are diligently looking into your account. Once we have detailed information to provide we will follow-up with you.
Sincerely,
Customer Care
HELLOWORLD.com
[You used to know us as ePrize.]
3000 Town Center | Suite 2100 Southfield, MI 48075
This afternoon I received a reply:
Good Afternoon,
Thank you for your patience. We show that you had one stay and received 1,000 points. We have also processed a total of 18 entries belonging to you. Please let us know if there is anything we can do to assist you further.
Sincerely,
Customer Care
HELLOWORLD.com
[You used to know us as ePrize.]
3000 Town Center | Suite 2100 Southfield, MI 48075
*DATAPOINTS:
*I mailed in my entries on 12/9/2015 (I could have sworn I only sent in 10 – but they processed 18 – so I could be wrong in how many I sent in)
*I received all 18 plays at once last night – leading me to believe that my inquiry prompted their processing of my entries.
*I opened all the game plays one after another and received a 2000 points prize and a 5000 prize, all the rest were 500. I played until I got the “Thanks for your enthusiasm…” notice.
I now feel confident that the promotion is legit and was thrilled to get a quick response to my inquiry. I believe – as many others have stated – that they are just overwhelmed with the response. It is worth contacting them via the portal or customer care email IMO.
– J
The Flying Dutch Girl RTW
My wife and I both sent in 94 entries several months ago. She received 44 emails and I received not a single one. We sent them all in on the same day. The people from IHG appear to be of highly dubious competence. Do you have any suggestions about what to do so that the hours writing out cards and the money spent on stamps, envelopes, and cards is not a waste?
Thanks.
I would try contacting them at the email address on the bottom of the Priceless Surprises page. My wife had only had 14 emails and 2-3 days after I emailed, magically all the rest of them showed up
Thanks for the reply. Are you talking about support@ihg.com? I e-mailed that address–which is on the Priceless Surprises page–and received a reply stating that it was an e-mail address that does not exist.
I emailed them through the FAQ link on the main Priceless Surprises page. That opens up a window that gives a contact form. They replied back that they had received the email and didn’t really do anything else, but “magically” 3 days later all my pent-up entries showed up
I tried emailing to the same address weeks ago, so they clearly disabled that email address. I am still missing quite a few entries for my dad, but then today I did get quite a few. Not all, but some. I hope you and your wife listed different email addresses as the rules do state an email address can not be used for more than one person’s entries. Hopefully your email will start to arrive soon.
Yes, we used two e-mail addresses.
Could I get the link for that FAQ page? Thanks!
It’s on the bottom of the main Priceless Surprises page – http://ihg.promo.eprize.com/pricelesssurprises//
Thank you very much.
See my post above – I used the contact form on the HelloWorld, Inc. website and received an immediate reply. I also appear to have received extra game plays! đŸ™‚
I also have seen my points post already to my IHG account. Try: questions@helloworldfulfillment.com and see if that helps.
– J
The Flying Dutch Girl RTW
Thanks again, Flying Dutch Girl!
So I got into this very late and only sent out 20 or so entries by Feb. 12th and yet to receive any email.
Once you win do you have to do anything to get the points or do they automatically post to your account?
I finally got a response from IHG. I should be getting 500 points for each submission in 2-Ur welcome weeks.