Ok - so those interested in my Disney trip and what we're doing here goes...(and a comparison to if I could use URs)...
- Travel Dates 1/26 through 2/2
- 4 nights at Beach Club // 3 nights at Polynesian
- Both in Standard View Rooms
- Rack Rate + Standard Ticket Price = $5,340 (I could assume a Disney discount here...but that would probably apply to a more expensive room category - essentially eating up my savings).
So if I
could use URs this would cost
356,133 UR points through my CSR.
(You could potentially assume that through some Disney discount I could save 25k-35k URs by applying the discount AND upgrading my room category - so best case scenario I spent 320k+ URs for the trip).
- My all in booked cost through TA = $4,500 (for rooms + tickets). Right here I've now saved $840
- I can pay for this with Disney Gift Cards.
- I usually can procure those with a 12% discount through my grocery store so that's a savings of $540 on the full $4,500 worth of GCs.
- I will take the upgrade offer on the AMEX BCE to an AMEX BCP - that will clear $155 an upgrade bonus + 6% on gift cards purchased at the grocery store on $2,000 in purchases. That's a savings of $275.
I still have $2,500 worth of gift cards to purchase...we'll hit on that one in a minute...
This brings my NET trip cost down to $3,685
- I could cash our 368,500 URs to totally offset that cost.
- Now let's talk about the last $2,500 in GCs. I can apply for a CIU card which has an MSR of $3,000. I can use that card on the $2,500 remaining GCsa and that is 83.33% of my MSR Sooooo let's attribute 83.33% of that bonus value to this trip. 50k URs + 4,500 URs (base) = 54,500 URs...83.33% of that is 45,417 URs I will replenish as a direct result of purchasing those GCs.
So I cashed out 368,500 URs...I earned back 45,417 URs...I NET used ~323k URs which BEATS the 356k URs in my "no discount" scenario AND comes VERY close to my "best case discount" scenario which cost approx 320k URs.
Even if I didn't go for the CIU card and put all $4,500 on the BCP @ 6% cash back, I could still get my NET cost down to $3,535 and only use 353k URs to offset the cash cost.
Obviously my big benefit here is the ability to acquire Disney GCs at a 12% discount through our fuel perks program.
Hopefully somebody finds this exercise to be remotely worthwhile...if not, I enjoy math so no worries, LOL!