I love credit cards so much!

[Lain]

But not his PP card, he likes to carry that all the time

Does he think, "oh, maybe I'll end up at the airport for a flight today"?

 

[palhockeymomof2]

I’m 1/24, but the 1 is dropping off in October (I think).
I got the CIP in May 2018 (already got the bonus) and want to get the SW companion pass for 2019/2020, so planning on going for the biz and personal November/December 2019.
Would it be pushing it to try a CSR/CSP double dip now? Would it hurt my chances with the SW cards?

I think you’d be fine with the double dip now and going for the CP in December

 

[amalone1013]

Does he think, "oh, maybe I'll end up at the airport for a flight today"?

Good thing he doesn't know about how some people book SW tickets on points just to get in a lounge... he'd be at Timberline every day!

I don't really know what his fascination with it is. Back in March he went to Ohio for two days for work and they had a lounge, so I sent it with him. Before that I always carried mine, because I have a specific travel wallet and only take a few cards. He always uses his normal wallet and it's not very big. He complains all the time about it not having much room but every time I bring up taking out the PP card... No! It's like a little kid

 

[DisneyMandC]

Sounds like a plan to me as long as you can do the 5k for the SPG Biz. It seems the best way to get lots of points and some free nights next year. With the AF's waived, it's hard to say no if you can make the spend

Yeah, I should be able to now that I'm not juggling a CIC and another CIP spend, along with the $5k Hilton Amex spend. I'm at $1000 on my $2500 Citi Biz MSR but I should have a $600 charge posting to that soon, so it shouldn't take me too much longer.

I'm glad I reread that chart again. I'd like accumulate some more Starriott points for transferability, so I'll plan on applying for the SPG biz this week!

 

[miztressuz]

True. It is per calendar year though, so some strategic planning could help with that. What I haven't found is anything regarding Marriott's pre-8/18 policy where they let you transfer more than the cap if it was to redeem an award. DH has transferred more than 50K to me in a calendar year before (back in Jan 2017), when I was redeeming for a travel package.



That's how I interpret it, but DH transferred points to me in 2015 and 2017 when he didn't have any status and didn't get charged $10 for it so YMMV I guess. Not very helpful I know, sorry.

It was tough for me to find info on the award transfers to begin with. I don't think they advertised it much before, at least not after they let you transfer to anyone for the fee. When I was researching it I found it on a few blogs and once maybe on the Marriott site itself (never to be found again ). My guess is they keep it and you'll only know about it if you call in to book the award. And if hard pressed I'm sure HUCA will find a rep who can figure out how to do it anyway. As long as they can still combine separate reservations, I'm sure one of the crafty reps can figure out how to use points from each account.

Unless MMS does an expose on how he got "household" members to transfer points above the limit and outs it....

 

[Lain]

I’m 1/24, but the 1 is dropping off in October (I think).
I got the CIP in May 2018 (already got the bonus) and want to get the SW companion pass for 2019/2020, so planning on going for the biz and personal November/December 2019.
Would it be pushing it to try a CSR/CSP double dip now? Would it hurt my chances with the SW cards?

I don’t think you’d be pushing it. I’d do a double dip now...Then SW biz in Dec and SW personal in January maybe just to stretch it out a bit.

I agree with @SouthFayetteFan. It's been 3 months since your CIP. If you do a CSR+CSP double dip now, late-November is 3 months later.

You won't be double dipping the SW Biz and SW Plus/Premier anyway because for the biz, remember the 0/30 rule; and for the personal, the one SW (personal) card rule doesn't apply to the SW Biz card, so you'd only double dip 2 personals to get around that rule. @SouthFayetteFan's suggestion to do the SW Biz in December and SW personal in January is sound, because for the CP it doesn't matter when you apply, you just need the bonuses from both cards to post in 2019.

 

[Lain]

Is there a delay in SPG Biz points posting in Aug? Amex says my points were sent to Starwood on 8/11 but I've yet to see them.

Yeah, I read that points from statements that closed 8/1-8/18 were being "held" until after the points merger/conversion. My SPG cards statements that closed in August haven't posted last I checked either.

 

[striker1064]

Not entirely churning related, but just got a call that the air conditioning went out at our rental house. Sigh.

It's August. It's almost fall. You don't need AC in Mississippi in August, right? No? Crap.

Good thing I recently got the bonus on a couple cash back cards. Might start perusing a couple more now...

 

[3 DD love princesses]

Head is spinning.

Starting travel hacking. Signing DH up for a card. CSR or CSP? No business. Can hit min spend in 4-6 weeks, then I'll get a new card, and keep alternating. We got Amazon Prime Card a year or so ago, I got a Wells card last year, He got added to my Nordstrom card last month. Nothing open prior to that. Both have 800+ scores and pay everything off. I do have a medical card that has a balance currently 0% until December, and then I need to roll it to another 0% card.

Planning a trip 1st week of June next year. Want to stay at the Polynesian due to daughter's disability (monorail & large base rooms + POG Juice & Dole Whip). ETA, we don't fly much at all. We're driving to WDW. Looking at flying just the two of us June 2020, but nothing until then really.

What should we do? How should we alternate & use referrals best? DD freaks me out like they'll shut me down for breaking rules or something. Too nervous.

I know you are nervous about doing both csr and Csp but if you can afford the spend its the only way around getting the two sapphires without waiting 2 years

 

[DisneyMandC]

Ha, just got an email from Citi that they accidentally sent out an email last week indicating that the AA biz gave 2 miles/$1 on restaurant charges when it should only be 1/$1. They said that because of this error, they would be awarding 2/$1 for all restaurant charges between 8/13-8/21. Perfect for me since we we were eating out so much in Tulsa, including a $160 dinner one night after treating our trainers for all their hard work!

 

[3 DD love princesses]

bummed that the cip and plastiq is dead. I'll have to cancel my payments for now and send a check :-(

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

I called Chase travel this morning, and the agent was able to book my flights for me using URs valued at 1.5 cents each. She did not have an answer as to why the CSR UR online page gives an error message for bookings more than 270 days out but the UR pages for CF and CFU would allow a farther out booking. But there wasn't any issue with her doing the booking at the appropriate UR value for the CSR. It took a few minutes since there were four of us and I had to provide all of the relevant info such as full name, DOB, passport #, passport expiration date, but it probably didn't take much longer than it would have taken for me to enter all of the info on the booking site. For 253,120 UR, I got the return flights for the four of us on Emirates from JNB to SFO through Dubai. The United flights I was looking at with a similar total elapsed time and only 1 stop (through Zurich) were going to be 100,000 United miles each (unless savers miraculously popped up later, but I was too nervous to wait), so I feel ok with the number of UR used. Now my goal is to upgrade to business using MR transferred to Emirates. It looks like I can upgrade at 75,000 miles apiece. I am very close to having 150,000 MR, so once I get over that hump, I will see about upgrading two of us. I'll get the balance of the MR I need after meeting MSR on my new Biz Platinum card, so then I'll try to upgrade the other two. But it's nice to have the return flights in place, even if we end up in coach.

Thank you so much for sharing your experience. I won't have enough points to do all my flights (IAD to LHR to JNB to IAD), but you've given me hope that I can earn enough points for at least one leg and save myself some money!

 

[miztressuz]

So does this count as, well, cruddy churning? (hehe)

Managed to use up some VGC's this weekend. For one, we attended an event that hosts many small vendors, most that are small $ amounts are cash only. So the event venue sets up a booth where you can buy tokens with your CC's for no fee and use them as cash. Change is given in $$. Been sorta waiting for this trip as each token is $5, we can them on the $1 or $2 items and take the cash home - fee free MS
Well, pricing has gone up throughout the venue and pretty much the cheapest thing is now $3 and generally not a great value Walked out with $8 cash from a $50 VGC

 

[3 DD love princesses]

so if I used my CSR to book a hotel for next dec but cancel my card when the fee hits in Nov will I still have my reservation? Don't know if you have to have the card active to keep any reservations.

 

[AmyAnne]

View attachment 345398

New, raised limit to Marriott points transfers - 100,000 per year for $10 (free if higher than Silver status).

I'm thinking this could be useful for those random points my DH and kids got for tweeting football things last fall -- they could transfer those points to me? It's not a lot of points, but could be worth $10 to consolidate them and keep them from just expiring. I might even still have Gold status. (Although that might not help since it sounds like the transferor needs to have Gold status, not the transferee.)

 

[Lain]

So does this count as, well, cruddy churning? (hehe)

Managed to use up some VGC's this weekend. For one, we attended an event that hosts many small vendors, most that are small $ amounts are cash only. So the event venue sets up a booth where you can buy tokens with your CC's for no fee and use them as cash. Change is given in $$. Been sorta waiting for this trip as each token is $5, we can them on the $1 or $2 items and take the cash home - fee free MS
Well, pricing has gone up throughout the venue and pretty much the cheapest thing is now $3 and generally not a great value Walked out with $8 cash from a $50 VGC

You should’ve walked out of there with several referrals for biz cards!

 

[DisneyMandC]

Hmm ok so I've never created an SPG account because I've never stayed at an SPG property. Do I need to make myself an SPG account now that I'm applying for the card so I can put that number in, or have they merged to the point that one number controls both Marriott and SPG and I can use my Marriott number?

 

[AmyAnne]

Oh I’d want both!

Could you get the SPG Biz after the new rules go into effect on 8/26?

If you’re still eligible for the SPG Biz on and after 8/26, I’d get the BBP now because that targeted offer may not appear again, whereas the SPG Biz 100k offer is public and expires on 10/31/18.

Can someone catch me up on the SPG three-day window of opportunity that's about to happen? I have mostly been ignoring this because I don't have any definite plans for Marriott points, and I want to get the AmEx Platinum before the end of the year (and just got two AmEx biz cards this month, so trying to not to wear out my AmEx welcome) -- but I did get a Marriott biz card 5/17 (cancelled 5/18). Is the only harm in not applying for an SPG card now that I will be locked out until 5/19, or is there something else I will be missing, like an all-time-high bonus?

 

[Haley R]

I called chase just using the automated system and our next statement date is September 10. I messaged the person I’ve been talking with and asked if we could move it sooner.

 

[StacyLynn624]

Your charges to the room will actually code as travel so you will still want to use the CSR on the trip.

Can you reimburse yourself with UR points, or is it only to book things in advance? I don't know much about UR yet.