I love credit cards so much! v5.0 - 2022 (see first page for add'l details)

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

Anyone else hear about the rental car shortage, and how a reservation doesn’t guarantee anything? Saw a segment on the world news last night that has me concerned about our Yellowstone trip. If a reservation, even a prepaid one, doesn’t guarantee that a car will be available when you get to your destination, what are you supposed to do??? That would be the worst! Not to mention, youd have to likely get a car from whoever had one available and pay the highest rate… which right now is around double what we reserved for.

 

[CyndiLouWho]

Odd question, but anyone travel on SW with an injury like broken arm or leg? Trying to figure out if I will be allowed priority boarding since my arm is in a sling. I really need a window seat on port (L) side of the plane so no one can bump my arm. I do have a SW biz card with upgraded boarding I can also use.

 

[wweazel]

I'm sorry, you're right. There is information I failed to include. My apologies, and also my thanks for your nice reply and willingness to try to help. I'll include more info in my reply below. Thanks again.

This is great information, and I really appreciate it. I do not have a Sapphire product, so will definitely look into this. It would only be me getting a card. I was thinking of a basic cash back option, which I would direct to my ongoing travel savings, but it sounds like I may be missing out on some better usage of points that could be had via travel partners or the Chase travel portal. I need to dig into those, since I clearly have a lot to learn.

What got me wondering about a new CC option is the fact that I'm getting ready to sign up for a group trip to Israel that will cost about $4200 plus some possible upgrades I may add on. If I run the expense through my Discover card or Disney Visa, for example, I would only get 1% in earnings. My Sam's Club MC used to offer 3% cash back for travel, but that's now 1% as well. So I thought it would be great to earn a better return than 1% and maybe get in on a signup incentive. (I apologize for not including this info in my original question.)

Thanks so much for your reply. I'll look into the Chase Sapphire Preferred right away, since the SUB ends in a few days.

Mentioning also the Venture or Venture X, earns 2X on everything, with the ability to "erase" any travel expenses. There's no indication that the current SUB will end anytime soon, so maybe this is your second play after the Sapphire Preferred. If I understand your schedule, you could pay for your trip with the CSP, then add-ons with the Venture. Then erase the upgrades cost with points.

 

[EACarlson]

Anyone else hear about the rental car shortage, and how a reservation doesn’t guarantee anything? Saw a segment on the world news last night that has me concerned about our Yellowstone trip. If a reservation, even a prepaid one, doesn’t guarantee that a car will be available when you get to your destination, what are you supposed to do??? That would be the worst! Not to mention, youd have to likely get a car from whoever had one available and pay the highest rate… which right now is around double what we reserved for.

The rental car shortage has been around for about 18 months. And was much worse than it is now. With gas prices where they are many people are cancelling trips, especially to places like Yellowstone rather than deciding last minute to go and rent a car. You have two options if you find yourself in that scenario, wait until a car comes in and take whatever you can get, or try to rent elsewhere if anyone else has a vehicle to take.

 

[havaneselover]

Ok—be careful booking tours through chase. In Barcelona I booked Sagrada familia and park guell. The meeting point was almost impossible to find and the tour information said transportation between the two was provided but it wasn’t. Not a huge deal but just added some stress.

Today dd and I arrived at Victoria coach station for our 9 am London in a day tour at about 8:40. I checked with one of the station employees who looked at the schedule and said there weren’t any 9 am tours. Today is ride London 2022 and most of the city is shut down. I tried calling the tour company but no one answered. I emailed and they claim I was notified through the trip advisor portal (whatever that is) that it was cancelled on 5/20. I never got anything. Dd and I did a hop on bus diversion tour and were able to go to Kensington palace. Then we had lunch at Gordon ramsey’s street burgers, walked to harrod’s, then to Westminster abbey and Big Ben. Over 13 miles so far. Hoping to get to the Tower of London tomorrow.

 

[afan]

Mentioning also the Venture or Venture X, earns 2X on everything, with the ability to "erase" any travel expenses. There's no indication that the current SUB will end anytime soon, so maybe this is your second play after the Sapphire Preferred. If I understand your schedule, you could pay for your trip with the CSP, then add-ons with the Venture. Then erase the upgrades cost with points.

Isn't the min spend on this one bigger? And if the goal is helping the travel budget vs getting points I'd argue that thr venture x is a better card for the current goals. It would give time for research if doing more than supplementing cash is the way to go and high csp subs aren't unusual.

Tours, in some locations, are the way to go and that means paying cash. If cutting down on $ out of pocket for this is the goal then venture x may be a better and easier way. If the goal is to help with future travel using points and you have the cash to pay for this then a csp or another point earning card would be a better way to earn a lot.

It's still going to come down to @travelbug monthly spend and what they ultimately want to do. Future trips, needing to transfer points to airlines or hotels etc.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

The rental car shortage has been around for about 18 months. And was much worse than it is now. With gas prices where they are many people are cancelling trips, especially to places like Yellowstone rather than deciding last minute to go and rent a car. You have two options if you find yourself in that scenario, wait until a car comes in and take whatever you can get, or try to rent elsewhere if anyone else has a vehicle to take.

Yeah, I understand the rental car shortage has been around since most of Covid. This was the first time I heard of actual people prepaying reservations and not getting a car, however. Everything else I had heard in the past 2 years was just people not being able to find reservations at all, them being hard to come by. But to book a reservation, pay for it, and then there is no car when you arrive? That's like you booking a hotel and then when you get there, there is no room! They shouldn't be allowed to reserve out more cars than they have, in my opinion. Maybe there have been stories out there of the same thing happening in the past, not sure. This was the first time we've seen a segment on the news about not being able to get a car when it's paid for though, and we watch the news nightly, lol. Just shook us up a little!

 

[wweazel]

Isn't the min spend on this one bigger?

nope - 4K/3mo for CSP, Venture, or Venture X, The Venture X has a much higher Annual Fee.

 

[afan]

Yeah, I understand the rental car shortage has been around since most of Covid. This was the first time I heard of actual people prepaying reservations and not getting a car, however. Everything else I had heard in the past 2 years was just people not being able to find reservations at all, them being hard to come by. But to book a reservation, pay for it, and then there is no car when you arrive? That's like you booking a hotel and then when you get there, there is no room! They shouldn't be allowed to reserve out more cars than they have, in my opinion. Maybe there have been stories out there of the same thing happening in the past, not sure. This was the first time we've seen a segment on the news about not being able to get a car when it's paid for though, and we watch the news nightly, lol. Just shook us up a little!

Except people do get walked from hotels or airlines ask for volunteers to take another flight. It happens. It's also not necessarily that they are booking more than they have but people don't return on time, have an accident, car brraks down etc. Lots of reasons for a car not to be available. I'm sure some that got covid and then couldn't fly just drove the rental home if they were close enough.

This has been an issue though. I've read of people that got there and there were no cars during all of this. Though for the same reasons it can happen during normal times too. If you come in on a red eye you will probably have fewer choices than someone that arrives in the afternoon since most probably turn in for morning flights.

 

[wanderlust7]

Anyone else hear about the rental car shortage, and how a reservation doesn’t guarantee anything? Saw a segment on the world news last night that has me concerned about our Yellowstone trip. If a reservation, even a prepaid one, doesn’t guarantee that a car will be available when you get to your destination, what are you supposed to do??? That would be the worst! Not to mention, youd have to likely get a car from whoever had one available and pay the highest rate… which right now is around double what we reserved for.

It was a big problem when Hawaii first opened up. I was pretty worried about it since we weren't staying somewhere that we could get by without a car and taxis/Ubers aren't that readily available on Kauai. I had 2 backup reservations that were a lot more, though one was with the same parent company, so not sure if that would have helped. There were reports that people couldn't find a car at all, so they ended up coming back early the next morning to try again. Luckily, things were better by the time we went.

 

[becauseimnew]

Another vote for the later slot, 12:30-3. Everything does take longer than you think it will. It's nice that the window is so big though. If you haven't looked into the Shaka app, another vote for that. The Shaka app puts black sand beach as stop 21 out of 30, just before Hana Town. So if by chance you get to black sand beach early, you could always lunch in Hana Town and backtrack to black sand beach or do it on the way back. All of this assumes you are doing the class route and not the reverse route.

Thank you! That was DH’s suggestion. And we are buying the Shaka app. I’m so excited. Less than an month.

 

[*WDW*Groupie*]

In Edinburgh I hired a photographer for dd's 20th b-day pics. It was super windy, but our amazing photographer managed to get several good pics!

St. Giles Cathedral

Victoria Street


Edinburgh Castle

 

[*WDW*Groupie*]

As I may have mentioned dd is seriously thinking of becoming a vet. She knows that she needs to spend dozens of hours working with animals or at a vet clinic, so she has been sourcing a vet to shadow for the summer (this should help her decide if she really wants to pursue this career path -- she will enter her 3rd year of bio chem eng in the fall). She has been communicating with our vet and they have agreed to let her shadow as often as she wants over the summer! She's over-the-moon excited! She's going to spend as many hours as she can with the vet this week, then go directly after work when she starts at the Zoo next week! Finding a vet to shadow wasn't easy -- my good friend's daughter is a vet and they have so many requests that they have adopted a lottery system and they limit how much time you can spend shadowing the vet.

 

[reliev]

Anyone else hear about the rental car shortage, and how a reservation doesn’t guarantee anything? Saw a segment on the world news last night that has me concerned about our Yellowstone trip. If a reservation, even a prepaid one, doesn’t guarantee that a car will be available when you get to your destination, what are you supposed to do??? That would be the worst! Not to mention, youd have to likely get a car from whoever had one available and pay the highest rate… which right now is around double what we reserved for.

i have been doing turo lately its been cheaper, not to mention i feel in my head at least its reliable

 

[*WDW*Groupie*]

The highlight of our trip was by far Ashford Castle. It is beyond gorgeous and staying there was like living in a fairy tale. I thought this would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, but we are planning on going back next year for 5 or 6 nights!

Ashford Castle



Castle Wolfhounds




Ashford Falconry


Our room (to the right of the hydrant, second floor, curtains open)

 

[havaneselover]

Hallelujah—dd and I are negative. Too stressful!!!!

 

[MouseOfCards]

Good morning! Just booked Cabana Bay through the Chase Rewards portal (using points, or I would have booked direct). I have my reservation # through the portal, but this is obviously not a reservation number I can use to look up the res in Universal/Loews system. Am I able to call and get the actual reservation number? I basically just want to confirm the reservation went through, and add my kids to it. Thanks in advance!

If you don't see the reservation number (that can be looked up by the actual provider) on the original confirmation, you should be able to get it by calling Chase. We've had several instances of this and were always to get the usable number from Chase.

 

[MouseOfCards]

The highlight of our trip was by far Ashford Castle. It is beyond gorgeous and staying there was like living in a fairy tale. I thought this would be a once-in-a-lifetime experience, but we are planning on going back next year for 5 or 6 nights!

Ashford Castle

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Castle Wolfhounds
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Ashford Falconry
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Our room (to the right of the hydrant, second floor, curtains open)
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Great pics! How did you book this? Directly or through a portal or agency?

 

[MouseOfCards]

In Edinburgh I hired a photographer for dd's 20th b-day pics. It was super windy, but our amazing photographer managed to get several good pics!

St. Giles Cathedral
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Victoria Street
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Edinburgh Castle
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Very nice! Was the town deserted or was your photographer that good?

 

[Texans_loyal]

Y'all probably already know this but the Southwest priority card covers three boarding upgrades, even the $40 ones! I was under the impression it only covered the $25 early bird upgrade.

I got stuck In Nashville last weekend due to a storm. Changed my 9 hour delayed flight to the first one out the next day. There were 6 people on stand by and i was in C boarding. Upgraded at the airport using my SW card. To my surprise, it was immediately credited!