Not mad (yet), but am a bit frustrated with poor communication and lacking proactive expectation management that started with the sales rep and has continued.
I went to the fan photo day in Nov, but was told no for autograph day at winterfest in Dec, then i was sold a 1015 autograph session for day two though my Nats account...which requires early admission so it would have been a waste with the standard entry admission ticket (1130 I think) she sold me. The autograph ticket would have been a complete waste if I didn't get a Nats Ticket guy on Saturday to look into the disagreeing tickets and exchanged my entry ticket for an early entry one. I'm confused when the 2017 events end and when 2018 ones start and it seems like my rep knows as much as me, plus isn't the one trying to get value from the huge chunk of change drop on a full season package so it's been a little frustrating as a new guy.
On a positive note, can't wait for opening day!!
The Nats’ IT systems are pretty inflexible. It sounds like you were unable to purchase early entry tickets because your Access account isn’t set up yet and/or because the early entry presale was ended, and the reps are not in the habit of monitoring/managing those sales because no one ever asks. If you’d shown up at 10:00 with a normal entry ticket and your plan purchase paperwork, the ushers would have let you in (my first year, I think I used the envelope that the Nats used to send me my contract). This is a benefit for all SPH, so as long as you can show you have some sort of season plan, you’re in. The SPH autograph session is only for full plan holders and it’s ticketed so if you don’t have a ticket before the ticketing deadline, you can’t go. Even if you’re a full multi year SPH who just dawdles getting the rsvp done, no session for you.
In general, the Red Carpet staff is very helpful with the super routine stuff and the super extreme situations, and really lost at anything in between. The bad news is that they’re more problem-fixers than proactive “member experience managers” and most of the benefit management is self-service, with events announced by email. The good news is, once you get through a half season or so, you’ll be a pro and you won’t need help. It’s all very straightforward once you’ve been through it once, but the first time you try to set up a plan partner or transfer tickets, you’ll want to smash your monitor.
I genuinely don’t know if the SplitSeasonTickets site is coming back; I heard it wasn’t, but in all fairness I heard that from a grumbly guy in a Facebook group, so who knows.
My advice for maximizing rewards: if you want experience-type stuff like watching BP from the field, get it early in the season; these are usually auctions and the prices go up later in the season as people start trying to dump their points (they don’t roll over).
My other advice: get to know your fellow SPH. A great way to bypass the Nats blackouts on game trade-ins is to just work it out with the folks who sit next to you. If memory serves me, the only series that was 100% blacked out last year was the Cubs; I’d expect the Yankees and Red Sox this year to be blacked out, plus any Saturday games with giants or dodgers, but I don’t remember Labor Day or Memorial Day to be big blackout dates (everyone leaves dc anyway).