I love credit cards so much! v3.0 (see first page for add'l details)

[*WDW*Groupie*]

It's after statement closing. You can also check on your Ultimate Rewards Dashboard.

Thank you! I checked the dashboard and it says the travel credit resets after my December, 2020 statement.

Which brings me to my dilemma. I was planning on doing the MDD on December 15th, which means I need to cancel my CSR around November 14th. I haven't applied for any new cards since February, so I don't foresee any issues with the MDD. But I'd lose the travel credit.

Should I keep the CSR open and just apply for the CSP? Or cancel the CSR in a few weeks and do the MDD?

 

[palhockeymomof2]

Thank you! I checked the dashboard and it says the travel credit resets after my December, 2020 statement.

Which brings me to my dilemma. I was planning on doing the MDD on December 15th, which means I need to cancel my CSR around November 14th. I haven't applied for any new cards since February, so I don't foresee any issues with the MDD. But I'd lose the travel credit.

Should I keep the CSR open and just apply for the CSP? Or cancel the CSR in a few weeks and do the MDD?

Unfortunately you can’t have the CSR open when you apply for the CSP

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

I have a few AA points hanging around doing nothing..... is there anything at all they're useful for beyond flights?

I used my AA miles to get gift cards since we don’t fly AA

FYI: American Airlines completely removed gift cards as a redemption option (which processed through points.com) early on in the pandemic. FWIW, when it was possible, to redeem AA miles for gift cards you had to have at least 25,000 miles so that probably wouldn't have applied in this situation anyways.

@hsmamato2 - you can easily see what your options are right here: https://www.aa.com/i18n/aadvantage-program/miles/redeem/redeem-miles.jsp (spoiler alert, there isn't a good option).

 

[StephPlum]

I have a few AA points hanging around doing nothing..... is there anything at all they're useful for beyond flights?

I used a few last year to book Universal Studios hotels.

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

I used a few last year to book Universal Studios hotels.

You both used the words "a few". I'd be very interested to see if you're using similar definitions of this term.

My initial guess is that we could be off by magnitudes of tens of thousands here LOL!

 

[Alexle2007]

I have a few AA points hanging around doing nothing..... is there anything at all they're useful for beyond flights?

Hotel stays? I used mine for USO and the Swan at Disney.

 

[Alexle2007]

Thank you! I checked the dashboard and it says the travel credit resets after my December, 2020 statement.

Which brings me to my dilemma. I was planning on doing the MDD on December 15th, which means I need to cancel my CSR around November 14th. I haven't applied for any new cards since February, so I don't foresee any issues with the MDD. But I'd lose the travel credit.

Should I keep the CSR open and just apply for the CSP? Or cancel the CSR in a few weeks and do the MDD?

You need to either PC or close since you can’t hold a CSP or CSR to apply. I would personally PC to some sort of no AF Freedom and then you can just lower your CL. That’s my plan in Dec when I can apply.

 

[becauseimnew]

Thank you! I checked the dashboard and it says the travel credit resets after my December, 2020 statement.

Which brings me to my dilemma. I was planning on doing the MDD on December 15th, which means I need to cancel my CSR around November 14th. I haven't applied for any new cards since February, so I don't foresee any issues with the MDD. But I'd lose the travel credit.

Should I keep the CSR open and just apply for the CSP? Or cancel the CSR in a few weeks and do the MDD?

If you PC it to a Freedom you only need to wait 5 days before applying for another sapphire, that should allow you to use the credit and also do a MDD.

 

[afan]

Safeway has 10/15 off 50/100 visas good through Nov 7. Surprised since the MC q's are still active. I do enjoy watching my total go from 145 to 113 after coupons/sales but I only buy sale stuff there since they are so $$$$.

 

[ctinct]

Has anyone else noticed their cash access lines for Chase being drastically cut? I just got a bunch of statements, and noticed that on two of my cards that have only a $2000 charge limit, the cash advance amount was cut to $100. It had been only $400, which was an amount they had lowered it to from $1000 when I requested to lower my credit limit. That first decrease, I understood. Also, it was pre Covid when I lowered my limits and they first cut the cash access line.

Then, on a Reserve and a Freedom with limits of $12300 and $13000, the lines were cut to $615 and $650. Haven’t checked my two SW cards yet.

Credit limits haven’t been cut (yet). I don’t carry a balance and credit score is over 800. I have no intention of using the cash advance feature, but it was still pretty shocking to see $100 on two of my cards. And once again, no notice from Chase that I could see.

This is probably just a general tightening of credit, but ouch! Even though it was not something I ever planned on using, it was nice to see it there. Just wondering if anyone else has noticed this on their Chase cards.

 

[afan]

My third day of calling Virgin Atlantic trying to get my return flight and it's still not released to them, today he even tried a new booking to make sure. So instead of coming home on Sat the 18th I'm coming home on Sun the 19th because that was good to go in biz They couldn't even get the 18th in economy. The nice thing was he didn't charge me change fee because the return flight hadn't been available when I booked the outbound. This surprised me but I'll take it!

So now I have another night, but I think what I'll do is still fly back to Tokyo on the 18th and then stay 1 more night at the Tokyo Station Hotel because then I could leave my bag there instead of using luggage storage at the airport. And then I wouldn't have to worry about which airport I flew in or out of for any of my flights. Plus extra time in Tokyo since the flight home isn't until 9pm on the 19th.

Not going to book the extra night yet, I think I'm going to try for the Hilton biz next month since I'm $300 from hitting my gold spend that I got in mid August. I think just over 2 months is a bit close for trying again, right? Better to wait a few more weeks? I'm still using all of my amex cards except for my DL biz because I don't have a need for those miles at the moment and most of my spend is on groceries so that's going on asipre or gold, and then my recurring or flight stuff has been on my plat, plus some chase stuff. Not getting the chase biz has made me rethink pouring all my MR's into hilton for that as I could use them for other parts of the trip.

 

[Judique]

Has anyone else noticed their cash access lines for Chase being drastically cut? I just got a bunch of statements, and noticed that on two of my cards that have only a $2000 charge limit, the cash advance amount was cut to $100. It had been only $400, which was an amount they had lowered it to from $1000 when I requested to lower my credit limit. That first decrease, I understood. Also, it was pre Covid when I lowered my limits and they first cut the cash access line.

Then, on a Reserve and a Freedom with limits of $12300 and $13000, the lines were cut to $615 and $650. Haven’t checked my two SW cards yet.

Credit limits haven’t been cut (yet). I don’t carry a balance and credit score is over 800. I have no intention of using the cash advance feature, but it was still pretty shocking to see $100 on two of my cards. And once again, no notice from Chase that I could see.

This is probably just a general tightening of credit, but ouch! Even though it was not something I ever planned on using, it was nice to see it there. Just wondering if anyone else has noticed this on their Chase cards.

I looked at my 5 personal Chase cards and no credit limits were cut. Had to search to even find a cash advance limit and they are all at 5% of the credit limit. The highest limit I have on a Chase card is only $15k, so that is a $750 cash advance if I ever needed one.

So, I checked some other cards. Navy Federal is willing to give me 50% of my credit limit, so I could pay my way quite easily there.

I could get a cash advance on my Amex Marriott cards also, but only up to 20% of the credit limit - on a card I've had for 20 years. Still better than Chase.

On my MR cards it was peculiar - they had cash advance/pay over time - sort of lumped together for a fairly large amount - 15K. And at a high rate which I would expect. .

Like you, taking a cash advance is not on the horizon. And, until just now, I had vague memories of seeing cash advance limits on the papers that the card is stuck to when you get it.

 

[wanderlust7]

My third day of calling Virgin Atlantic trying to get my return flight and it's still not released to them, today he even tried a new booking to make sure. So instead of coming home on Sat the 18th I'm coming home on Sun the 19th because that was good to go in biz They couldn't even get the 18th in economy. The nice thing was he didn't charge me change fee because the return flight hadn't been available when I booked the outbound. This surprised me but I'll take it!

So now I have another night, but I think what I'll do is still fly back to Tokyo on the 18th and then stay 1 more night at the Tokyo Station Hotel because then I could leave my bag there instead of using luggage storage at the airport. And then I wouldn't have to worry about which airport I flew in or out of for any of my flights. Plus extra time in Tokyo since the flight home isn't until 9pm on the 19th.

Not going to book the extra night yet, I think I'm going to try for the Hilton biz next month since I'm $300 from hitting my gold spend that I got in mid August. I think just over 2 months is a bit close for trying again, right? Better to wait a few more weeks? I'm still using all of my amex cards except for my DL biz because I don't have a need for those miles at the moment and most of my spend is on groceries so that's going on asipre or gold, and then my recurring or flight stuff has been on my plat, plus some chase stuff. Not getting the chase biz has made me rethink pouring all my MR's into hilton for that as I could use them for other parts of the trip.

You can go for the Hilton biz now. Amex isn't as sensitive to velocity as Chase is. By the time you get it, you might be done with the Gold MSR.

 

[Judique]

And, I managed to spend $1469.02 that I didn't account for. Fortunately my accounting system is very generous as far as mistakes go and there was plenty of available funds in my bank accounts so nothing got overdrawn or anything like that. But I sat down to do an account reconciliation and found 3 bill payments that subtracted themselves from a .checking account that was not the intended source for the bill payments. Nothing got below zero thankfully, but I wasn't paying enough attention. This happened in January, February and March and then in April it happened again, but I caught that error. Problem is I didn't look backwards at the time to find the other 3 errors.

There have certainly been times in my life where this would have been a major issue and I would have ended up overdrawn for sure.

As far as I can determine my error occurred because I used the account intentionally in early January. Then the next 3 subtractions automatically came from there because I didn't reset the drop down choices - such a simple thing! So, I didn't actually spend money I wouldn't have spent - it is just that I was sailing along merrily thinking I had more money than I actually had. Maybe I should create a spreadsheet.

Nah - I don't think so. Too much work! I'm retired.

 

[afan]

You can go for the Hilton biz now. Amex isn't as sensitive to velocity as Chase is. By the time you get it, you might be done with the Gold MSR.

Approved, thanks for the push

 

[IFlossU]

This is interesting

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/targ...-offer-with-550-annual-fee-waived-first-year/

 

[Alexle2007]

This is interesting

https://www.doctorofcredit.com/targ...-offer-with-550-annual-fee-waived-first-year/

Wow, now that is a nice offer.

 

[IFlossU]

Wow, now that is a nice offer.

Yeah, if this becomes a public offer I’m going to be seriously tempted.

 

[ctinct]

I looked at my 5 personal Chase cards and no credit limits were cut. Had to search to even find a cash advance limit and they are all at 5% off the credit limit. The highest limit I have on a Chase card is only $15k, so that is a $750 cash advance if I ever needed one.

So, I checked some other cards. Navy Federal is willing to give me 50% of my credit limit, so I could pay my way quite easily there.

I could get a cash advance on my Amex Marriott cards also, but only up to 20% of the credit limit - on a card I've had for 20 years. Still better than Chase.

On my MR cards it was peculiar - they had cash advance/pay over time - sort of lumped together for a fairly large amount - 15K. And at a high rate which I would expect. .

Like you, taking a cash advance is not on the horizon. And, until just now, I had vague memories of seeing cash advance limits on the papers that the card is stuck to when you get it.

I wonder if your cash advance lines with Chase were larger a few months ago. Your $750 on a $15000 credit line roughly correlates to my $600ish on $13000, and the cash advance limit was just cut to that this month. I only noticed it when I scanned my statements and saw the tiny $100 ones on my two cards with $2000 limits.

I’m not concerned about it, really, but just thought it was an interesting data point and might be indicative of Chase tightening credit. (And I’m contemplating what my next card should be.)

 

[Judique]

I wonder if your cash advance lines with Chase were larger a few months ago. Your $750 on a $15000 credit line roughly correlates to my $600ish on $13000, and the cash advance limit was just cut to that this month. I only noticed it when I scanned my statements and saw the tiny $100 ones on my two cards with $2000 limits.

I’m not concerned about it, really, but just thought it was an interesting data point and might be indicative of Chase tightening credit. (And I’m contemplating what my next card should be.)

They could definitely have been adjusted without me noticing, as I've had most of those cards for longer then 2 years - one for 8 years. I had to search out the cash advance limits as they are not front and center. Not that hard to find once I clicked a bunch of links.

I agree it's probably credit tightening.