I love credit cards so much!

[kayteekt]

Finished spend on the Citi Biz AA card. Statement just cut, points are in my AA acct.

I wanted the points to do a Disney anniversary trip for DH and I before our APs expire in April/May. Even though we're only 8hrs, flying would be easier for a 3 or 4 night trip.

I have never booked an award flight with AA (or anywhere else besides chase). I see a reasonable amount of availability, so I feel like I should go ahead and make decision. But I'm nervous about hotel rates with locking us into specific dates...
* AA Reward flights...refundable? transferable? As if, it's much cheaper/better value to do different dates, can I move the flights (based on avail. of course)

Just trying to wrap my ahead around this, we hardly ever fly. So I'm out my realm. Do you book the hotel or flights first?

Speaking of hotel....We've been doing UR points for Disney hotels but now that's not looking like a possibility. S&D (mariott/spg) I have points, but it seems like it's not a good value anymore? Speaking of S&D, since the merger can you use a Mariott GC to pay for a S&D stay? I feel like it's almost a better option to pay OOP than to use 50k points/night. What about S&D via UR?


Oh and inconclusive DP on UR for Disney. I had to make a name change on an existing reservation. The lady from Cruise & Tours, confirmed they can not book any new Disney right now. She said she's unsure if this is a permanent or temporary change. She said they had just gotten notice on Fri. 9/14 they couldn't book any Disney reservations. The way she was going on about they really weren't sure if this was just temporary, led me to believe it's not a hard no/never ever. So we will see.

 

[calypso726]

Finished spend on the Citi Biz AA card. Statement just cut, points are in my AA acct.

I wanted the points to do a Disney anniversary trip for DH and I before our APs expire in April/May. Even though we're only 8hrs, flying would be easier for a 3 or 4 night trip.

I have never booked an award flight with AA (or anywhere else besides chase). I see a reasonable amount of availability, so I feel like I should go ahead and make decision. But I'm nervous about hotel rates with locking us into specific dates...
* AA Reward flights...refundable? transferable? As if, it's much cheaper/better value to do different dates, can I move the flights (based on avail. of course)

Just trying to wrap my ahead around this, we hardly ever fly. So I'm out my realm. Do you book the hotel or flights first?

Speaking of hotel....We've been doing UR points for Disney hotels but now that's not looking like a possibility. S&D (mariott/spg) I have points, but it seems like it's not a good value anymore? Speaking of S&D, since the merger can you use a Mariott GC to pay for a S&D stay? I feel like it's almost a better option to pay OOP than to use 50k points/night. What about S&D via UR?


Oh and inconclusive DP on UR for Disney. I had to make a name change on an existing reservation. The lady from Cruise & Tours, confirmed they can not book any new Disney right now. She said she's unsure if this is a permanent or temporary change. She said they had just gotten notice on Fri. 9/14 they couldn't book any Disney reservations. The way she was going on about they really weren't sure if this was just temporary, led me to believe it's not a hard no/never ever. So we will see.

AA award flights can only be refunded by paying $150 to redeposit points. That said, you can change dates as long as the departure and arrival airports remain the same. But, if you booke dwith a saver award and there isn’t a saver award available for the new date you’d have to pony up the additional points. Conversely, if you booked an anytime award and a saver award becomes available you will not get points back by changing. Personally, I always pick the flights first for a saver award if I’m flexible. It is easier to find the hotel availability or a different than it is to get a saver award or use a different set of miles and program than I planned. The only time I have done it in reverse was just recently to book overwater bungalows in the Maldives and the Al Maha resort in Dubai. Finding that availability was harder than getting flights. Plus, I’d already had 3 different ways to plan the flights for that one.

 

[Calfan]

A handful of quick updates before I go back and catch up on the new posts since last night:

15,000 MR from my self-referral to the Biz Gold were in my account this morning! Very glad I didn't mess that up...

DP: I went ahead and subscribed to ExpertFlyer in the hopes it will be helpful with upgrading our return flights from Africa and in securing award flights to/from Japan for 2020. I used my CSR, and the first charge posted to my account. It did not code as travel, so I went ahead and switched it to my Amex Biz Gold while I am meeting MSR.

I bought a $25 GC at Walgreens yesterday. $10 is pending in my RMN account. I see that the charge has not yet posted to my Biz Gold, so cautiously optimistic the $10 will be moved to paid once the charge posts. So far I am 100% for RMN offers at Walgreens, with all but one purchase being GCs only. I plan to try Staples later this week.

 

[kayteekt]

AA award flights can only be refunded by paying $150 to redeposit points. That said, you can change dates as long as the departure and arrival airports remain the same. But, if you booke dwith a saver award and there isn’t a saver award available for the new date you’d have to pony up the additional points. Conversely, if you booked an anytime award and a saver award becomes available you will not get points back by changing. Personally, I always pick the flights first for a saver award if I’m flexible. It is easier to find the hotel availability or a different than it is to get a saver award or use a different set of miles and program than I planned. The only time I have done it in reverse was just recently to book overwater bungalows in the Maldives and the Al Maha resort in Dubai. Finding that availability was harder than getting flights. Plus, I’d already had 3 different ways to plan the flights for that one.

Thank you, that is very helpful!

 

[hurt817]

I feel like we need an "I love credit cards so much! FOOD edition" thread. So much to catch up on & so much food talk!

 

[afan]

So I have seen some Johnny Rocket's in our area. Thoughts on those? To make it CC related...I could use my Discover for 10% back.

I like them but they aren't alll the same. I prefer their regular fries but there's one by me that does crinkle and they aren't as good. The burgers are pretty standard but good diner burgers.

 

[Albort]

I've been playing around with awardhacker this morning when I'm supposed to be cleaning out the garage Are the SPG points listed Ye Olde Pointes or the new points? Not having any Marriott or SPG points either pre- or post-merger, I'm a bit confuddled about how the new card bonus amounts correspond to what I'm seeing on that site.

yeah, its pre merger. u have to multiple the amount by 3 if its SPG.

 

[DisneyMandC]

My $25 from my Fidelity account transferred into my new Chase account on Monday, but I'm still waiting on the bonus... Hope it shows up soon!

 

[SBWB48]

Don't need a VGC since I won't need to go to Costco again until after 5x UR on CF starts... hmm...

Thanks for reminding me that I don't need to hoard AS many VGCs for Costco since warehouse clubs are the Q4 categories...now I have to add VGCs to my box of GCs that I'm also swimming in . And here I am, wanting to get DH a Hilton Biz...so much for trying to get down on my GC stash

 

[SBWB48]

Did anyone else get an e-mail from RMN's "product team" re: requesting feedback about their cashback offers?

E-mail states "these sessions only take 30 minutes, and you'll received $20.00 as a thank you". The e-mail came from research@userinterviews.com. And I got two of them (for both my RMN accounts).

 

[miztressuz]

I've been playing around with awardhacker this morning when I'm supposed to be cleaning out the garage Are the SPG points listed Ye Olde Pointes or the new points? Not having any Marriott or SPG points either pre- or post-merger, I'm a bit confuddled about how the new card bonus amounts correspond to what I'm seeing on that site.

The award number listed is what airline points you need. In the new SPG world most airlines are 3:1 transfer rate, so if you see 20k miles needed, you'd need to transfer 60k SPG into that airline program to get the 20k.

SPG/Marriott continued the bonus miles program, so for every 60k Stariott points redeemed they'll add another 15k so you end up with 25k airline points.

This page has the full list of conversions: https://www.marriott.com/loyalty/redeem/travel/points-to-miles.mi

Depending on your redemption need, the bonuses could be worth one or two award tickets (or more if you don't mind economy saver spaces )

 

[hsmamato2]

@speedyfishy I made a non gc purchase at Kohl’s yesterday that didn’t go pending.

I made one (non gc) when the glitches happened the other day...nothing yet. On a stupd note of the day( I have at least one daily) yesterday I hot the 4 stores...got some lovely pending notes.... and stupidly bought a netflix gc for $100...not stupid bc I wont use it but stupid bc I could have gotten the min for the rebate and then bought another couple of smalle ones...(sigh) guess I'l have to get some other gc instead....

 

[hsmamato2]

on the PC front..... I need to have Dh call and PC his BCP down to the BCE(?)...should I expect any problems? I'm not paying the AF but I still like the card

 

[Calfan]

One more update. I made a purchase through the MileagePlus shopping portal last week and was only credited 316 miles when I should have been credited 416. At first I was just going to let it go for 100 miles, but then I decided I wanted every mile to which I was entitled, lol, so I contacted MP shopping. Got an email this morning that they agree I was shorted 100 miles and they are crediting those to my account. I've had to chase a few transactions through the MP portal to get my miles, but I've been successful in all but one case, so it is definitely worth it to follow up if you think you are missing miles or were shorted. And another reason I track all of these things down to the mile/point....

 

[MrPTato]

Thanks to this thread it is 9am and I am now patiently waiting for the burger joints to open at 11 so I can get lunch.

I did CFA for breakfast this morning...after the whataburger pic of the honey butter chicken biscuit, I figured this was a close second.

 

[platamama]

I've been playing around with awardhacker this morning when I'm supposed to be cleaning out the garage Are the SPG points listed Ye Olde Pointes or the new points? Not having any Marriott or SPG points either pre- or post-merger, I'm a bit confuddled about how the new card bonus amounts correspond to what I'm seeing on that site.

I find quite a bit of outdated information on that website. It's fine for a quick glance to give you ideas, but definitely requires much more research to find out what reality is.

You need to multiply the SPG miles by 3 because on the 8/18 merger date all SPG miles were tripled in number so that now 1 Marriott point is the same as 1 SPG point.

Now, with SPG points being treated as Marriott points, you can transfer 3000 Marriott points for 1000 airline miles, with a bonus for converting in 60,000 pt chunks. If you do that, you will receive an extra 5,000 airline miles. New system: Marriott 60K points gives you 25K airline miles (for the most part).

A confusing issue with awardhacker is that sometimes with these partner awards (e.g. redeeming BA Avios on AA award tickets) those awards are only available if the saver award is being offered. But awardhacker won't tell you that, it takes a lot more digging to find out.

 

[hsmamato2]

awesome.... I'm wondering, I saw on DoC that I can fund the first $100 with a cc, hoping to use my FU and it won't call it a cash advance....(?) but I can't lower the CA on that card lower than $100 so maybe not worth taking a chance on it. Anyway if I did cc fund that $100 would that count towards the DD,or would I still need the $500 for that?

 

[MrPTato]

on the PC front..... I need to have Dh call and PC his BCP down to the BCE(?)...should I expect any problems? I'm not paying the AF but I still like the card

That card will work until the new one arrives. Same account number but will have a different exp. date and security code. Still look the same as the preferred but will be missing the little "preferred" side bar on the side.

When is the AF due to hit? I don't think they do prorated refunds anymore so may we well keep until the AF comes up.

 

[Lain]

Did anyone else get an e-mail from RMN's "product team" re: requesting feedback about their cashback offers?

E-mail states "these sessions only take 30 minutes, and you'll received $20.00 as a thank you". The e-mail came from research@userinterviews.com. And I got two of them (for both my RMN accounts).

 

[Lain]

SPG/Marriott continued the bonus miles program, so for every 60k Stariott points redeemed they'll add another 15k so you end up with 25k airline points.

Now, with SPG points being treated as Marriott points, you can transfer 3000 Marriott points for 1000 airline miles, with a bonus for converting in 60,000 pt chunks. If you do that, you will receive an extra 5,000 airline miles. New system: Marriott 60K points gives you 25K airline miles (for the most part).

Isn’t it for every 60k Starriott points transferred, you get an extra 5k airline miles?

ETA: so yeah, like @platamama posted, for almost all the Starriott airline transfer partners, it’s 60k Starriott = 20k miles + 5k bonus miles.