I love credit cards so much! v6.0 - 2023 (see first page for add'l details)

[MsOnceUponATime]

I know you got some great advice already. Just adding my own DPs. We are also staying in London this year and we were booking for 3 adults. All the rooms we looked at were for two. However, we were able to book a suite that would accommodate 3 through Hyatt at the Churchill on points and with a suite night upgrade. I did a quick check on saw that there is availability at the Hyatt London Blackfriars for your night on points. Granted I am not sure if that works for you geographically but thought I’d share.

@calypso726 -- or anyone who wants to respond:
I'm getting a quote for 35,000 points for a suite at Hyatt London Blackfriars (June 18-19). Doesn't that sound incredibly low??

 

[disneyfan551]

I was comparing the two airlines programs. It was 12k AAdvantage points RT vs SW 14k RR points each way.
I don't book anything through a portal unless it's a one off single hotel night. Airline tickets using a portal puts additional restrictions and complicates any issues that come up. Hotels you don't earn points or get any status benefits if you book through the portals. I book direct with the airlines and pay the taxes and fees with the CSP. I haven't paid cash for a flight for me in 6 years. I get enough points and fly enough for my jobs that I use points.
I will always choose a Hyatt over a Marriott property. The only status I have is with Hilton but I would still choose a Hyatt. As a general member you can get a free night at a decent property after $1,000 spend with Hyatt. With Marriott it's going to take $3,000 at least, and pretty much the same with Hilton.

So very helpful! Thanks!

 

[wanderlust7]

@calypso726 -- or anyone who wants to respond:
I'm getting a quote for 35,000 points for a suite at Hyatt London Blackfriars (June 18-19). Doesn't that sound incredibly low??
View attachment 837316

That's actually peak rate for a Category 5. You can see the chart here.

 

[LilSweetPeaPhoto]

Okay just 14 pages behind...but a quick question for my Maldives travelers. I just got the alert about unicorn fares. They actually line up w/ the week my BF bid off next year in Feb. So I went to look for flights. I see that it takes "2 days" to get there. So with that said, how long do most of you plan for a trip there? Like how long are you actually staying in the Maldives? We're not normally people who travel for longer stretches. But 2 days of travel to get there makes me feel like we need a larger chunk of days off than the 8 he got.

HELP!

 

[wanderlust7]

I do typically stay 35-50 nights a year at Marriotts. Would it be beneficial to start focusing on stays at Hyatt hotels since their redemption value seems better?

If you can shift your stays over to Hyatts and get to 60 nights, you would get Globalist status, which is very valuable. You'd also earn Milestone Awards along the way. With suite night awards, you can confirm an upgrade into a suite ahead of time as long as there is a standard suite available. The breakfast benefit is way better than Marriott or Hilton, especially domestically. I have had breakfast charges over $250 (for 4 people) wiped off at the Park Hyatt New York.

If you need a few extra nights to make it to 60, the personal Hyatt card gets you 5 elite nights every year. Also comes with a Category 1-4 free night. The bonus isn't great, but can be a good long term card.

 

[WinterSolider]

With Amex I'd be careful of loading up on anything. I would however, buy a store giftcard with my regular food purchases.

I have literally bought $7,000 worth of Disney gift cards in a single trip, multiple times. It has never been an issue.

(It was an issue with BJ's, who seemed convinced I was a drug dealer and/or human trafficker doing money laundering. But Amex didn't care.)

 

[Judique]

I have literally bought $7,000 worth of Disney gift cards in a single trip, multiple times. It has never been an issue.

(It was an issue with BJ's, who seemed convinced I was a drug dealer and/or human trafficker doing money laundering. But Amex didn't care.)

I believe you have and that as you say, it's never been an issue for you.

Hopefully it continues not being an issue.

Beware the RAT.

 

[disneyfan551]

I was comparing the two airlines programs. It was 12k AAdvantage points RT vs SW 14k RR points each way.
I don't book anything through a portal unless it's a one off single hotel night. Airline tickets using a portal puts additional restrictions and complicates any issues that come up. Hotels you don't earn points or get any status benefits if you book through the portals. I book direct with the airlines and pay the taxes and fees with the CSP. I haven't paid cash for a flight for me in 6 years. I get enough points and fly enough for my jobs that I use points.
I will always choose a Hyatt over a Marriott property. The only status I have is with Hilton but I would still choose a Hyatt. As a general member you can get a free night at a decent property after $1,000 spend with Hyatt. With Marriott it's going to take $3,000 at least, and pretty much the same with Hilton.

So, to start with, I'm hoping to apply for the CSR today. Checked my credit score and it was 753, very good. Does anyone know if this score is good enough for CSR acceptance? And if I get rejected, will that rejection hurt my ability to apply for the CSP? Thanks!

 

[LilSweetPeaPhoto]

Okay read the 14 pages. Updates to Ireland. I found a biz class seat for my mom on BA (for our flight). I told her about it, but she said she really doesn't like how short we are going. So she cancelled her seat. With her dropping out, I asked my daughter if she'd mind if her brother went, since everything I booked was for 3 people. She said sure. So I think the plan is to non-rev him out there if the loads look good. I did book him a ticket from PHL to DTW on our return since we have to take AA home. But Ireland is still very much up in the air. My daughter is still a mess, and is failing another college class (she failed math last semester). She says she's only in school because of me. She's only taking 2 classes, that meet for 1 hour twice a week. Her life isn't hard. She has no ambition. I told her she doesn't have to go to school, but she DOES have to find a full time job that could support her. She's been spending money like crazy! $400 last month on food alone. Spending between $800-1200 a month on JUNK! I also have been having issues w/ my hip and threw out my back Sunday. So we'll have to see. I do feel like if I cancel this year, the trip is over. My BF points out that my daughter has done nothing to "earn" this trip other than a promise I made back when she was 5 and being born on SPD. He's right. She doesn't help around the house. She doesn't do good in school. She sleeps all day, etc. I feel bad cancelling, but it would be her lack of actions that caused it (or my leg/hip, LOL).

Last week we were supposed to head to Punta Cana. The flight Monday was overbooked and had like 7 people on standby. It left w/ 29 open seats. We couldn't fly out Monday as my BF had a meeting at work. And I had appts planned. Our flight was looking good, we had 11 open. Then it swapped to NONE open. But often times there are no shows. Well wasn't our luck We got left at the gate. Luckily Marriott cancelled and refunded our FNCs and points! I quickly looked at Mexico, I managed to find rooms via Hyatt. I listed us on the Cancun flight, we even got assigned seats. But my son called me crying because he missed the bus and his dad made him walk a mile to my house (knowing I was on my way out of the country). The weather in Cancun was going to be high 70's and they don't heat the pools. So considering all going on, we cancelled the Cancun flight. On a whim I saw my Caesar's Diamond was matched. So we decided to head back to my house, repack, check on my son, and then head to Vegas. I used the 2 free nights we had at Caesars/Nobu thanks to the meth pool incident. We used the $100 celebration dinner, and matched at Fountain Blue to get $150 food/bev credit there and $150 spa credit. So if we don't get back to Vegas again this year (I'm sure we will) I used my credits.

I tentatively have rooms on hold for Punta Cana in April. We'll see if we go then or do something else. I also have 87 hyatt points now, that I'll have to use at some point. GRRRR, LOL.

Wanted to share a CSP rental car insurance success story I saw on r/churning, specifically about Ireland:

https://www.reddit.com/r/churning/comments/1atqq0u/_/kr1yf6m

Thank you for posting this! You just reminded me I need to get a new rental letter!

 

[FreeDiningFanatic]

Okay just 14 pages behind...but a quick question for my Maldives travelers. I just got the alert about unicorn fares. They actually line up w/ the week my BF bid off next year in Feb. So I went to look for flights. I see that it takes "2 days" to get there. So with that said, how long do most of you plan for a trip there? Like how long are you actually staying in the Maldives? We're not normally people who travel for longer stretches. But 2 days of travel to get there makes me feel like we need a larger chunk of days off than the 8 he got.

HELP!

I'm going to say something very few people would be in agreement of. You're a seasoned traveler and your BF is a pilot- so flying isn't difficult for either of you. Biz or first class makes it actually enjoyable. We did Maldives for just 5 days, 4 nts and it worked out great for us. But most people would gawk hard at that little amount of time. Remember on the way back you gain a day back, so it's almost like time travel.

 

[FreeDiningFanatic]

Okay read the 14 pages. Updates to Ireland. I found a biz class seat for my mom on BA (for our flight). I told her about it, but she said she really doesn't like how short we are going. So she cancelled her seat. With her dropping out, I asked my daughter if she'd mind if her brother went, since everything I booked was for 3 people. She said sure. So I think the plan is to non-rev him out there if the loads look good. I did book him a ticket from PHL to DTW on our return since we have to take AA home. But Ireland is still very much up in the air. My daughter is still a mess, and is failing another college class (she failed math last semester). She says she's only in school because of me. She's only taking 2 classes, that meet for 1 hour twice a week. Her life isn't hard. She has no ambition. I told her she doesn't have to go to school, but she DOES have to find a full time job that could support her. She's been spending money like crazy! $400 last month on food alone. Spending between $800-1200 a month on JUNK! I also have been having issues w/ my hip and threw out my back Sunday. So we'll have to see. I do feel like if I cancel this year, the trip is over. My BF points out that my daughter has done nothing to "earn" this trip other than a promise I made back when she was 5 and being born on SPD. He's right. She doesn't help around the house. She doesn't do good in school. She sleeps all day, etc. I feel bad cancelling, but it would be her lack of actions that caused it (or my leg/hip, LOL).

Just wanted to mention that I do understand these feelings of frustration with your DD. In my experience and after a lot of studying, I came to understand what looks like anger and lack of ambition are classic signs of depression and anxiety in young adults. And young adults can tend to self medicate rather than regularly take their prescriptions. It's part of the illness. At the peak of my frustration, a conversation that went something like "I see that you're really struggling..." went far better than one of judgement. It probably won't be your last conversation or the end of this cycle, but I hope that she'll get the help she needs.

 

[Duckbug.Ducktales]

I'm going to say something very few people would be in agreement of. You're a seasoned traveler and your BF is a pilot- so flying isn't difficult for either of you. Biz or first class makes it actually enjoyable. We did Maldives for just 5 days, 4 nts and it worked out great for us. But most people would gawk hard at that little amount of time. Remember on the way back you gain a day back, so it's almost like time travel.

I agree with your sentiment. We do a lot of short trips. DH gets 20 vacation days per year and there are a lot of places we want to see. So we do some longer, 2-week trips (like Japan this November) but also many short spurts domestically and internationally when there are holiday weekends and we just have to tack on a day or two of PTO--the points hobby enables this! We've been to Iceland for a short 4-day trip over a holiday weekend, but it was awesome. We've done NYE fireworks in Paris and then back to work on Jan 2, lol.

 

[*WDW*Groupie*]

@LilSweetPeaPhoto I think that 5 or 6 nights in the Maldives is fine. You are on a island (albeit a gorgeous island surrounded by crystal clear waters) with nothing much to do but go to the gym, sleep, read and eat. For me, 5 nights is plenty and that's all I've done both times I've been. I say go for it!

 

[leeniewdw]

Just wanted to mention that I do understand these feelings of frustration with your DD. In my experience and after a lot of studying, I came to understand what looks like anger and lack of ambition are classic signs of depression and anxiety in young adults. And young adults can tend to self medicate rather than regularly take their prescriptions. It's part of the illness. At the peak of my frustration, a conversation that went something like "I see that you're really struggling..." went far better than one of judgement. It probably won't be your last conversation or the end of this cycle, but I hope that she'll get the help she needs.

This is a great reply.

When we had an intense period with one of our kids after HS and struggling in college, we went to a family counselor for a bit. One of the first things he said (when DH and I met with him w/o kid for a session) is that with a kid who is moving into young adulthood but still living at home and having some issues, that you should decide what your top 3 things that are 'house rules' that are most important to you. This means you'll have to ignore the other things that drive you crazy, but hopefully you get them to agree on 3 things that are non-negotiable. Of course, you have to decide what happens if they don't even do that..but perhaps it's a starting point and hopefully seen as a compromise.

 

[CyndiLouWho]

I have literally bought $7,000 worth of Disney gift cards in a single trip, multiple times. It has never been an issue.

(It was an issue with BJ's, who seemed convinced I was a drug dealer and/or human trafficker doing money laundering. But Amex didn't care.)

While meeting a SUB?

 

[WinterSolider]

While meeting a SUB?

Yep

The issues people run into are with the cash-equivalent GCs like Visa and MasterCard.

 

[calypso726]

@calypso726 -- or anyone who wants to respond:
I'm getting a quote for 35,000 points for a suite at Hyatt London Blackfriars (June 18-19). Doesn't that sound incredibly low??
View attachment 837316

Now that seems about right for a peak rate night. I am also staying there in August for the Taylor Swift concert and the standard suite rate is 29,000.

 

[calypso726]

Okay just 14 pages behind...but a quick question for my Maldives travelers. I just got the alert about unicorn fares. They actually line up w/ the week my BF bid off next year in Feb. So I went to look for flights. I see that it takes "2 days" to get there. So with that said, how long do most of you plan for a trip there? Like how long are you actually staying in the Maldives? We're not normally people who travel for longer stretches. But 2 days of travel to get there makes me feel like we need a larger chunk of days off than the 8 he got.

HELP!

We did 4 nights in the Maldives and it was perfect. If I were to plan a trip there again with all the time in the world I'd probably still go with 4 nights. Your return gets you a day back due to the time change.

 

[wanderlust7]

Hyatt annual category changes coming. Link

Andaz Papagayo going up again to a cat 7. Book by March 25 to lock in the old rate.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

Hyatt annual category changes coming. Link

Andaz Papagayo going up again to a cat 7. Book by March 25 to lock in the old rate.

Thanks for posting! Looks like no changes to the Hyatt Place Moab, which I need to book soon for an October stay, so I'm happy about that at least.