How Many Credit Cards Do You Have?

[puniraptor]

RIP POQ?

[Dr Rick Daris]

someone find out what SPG redemption tier it will be

gotta be cat2 don't you think.

[steve dave]

someone find out what SPG redemption tier it will be

gotta be cat2 don't you think.

if it is, and they make it not disgusting with the remodel, I would almost have to stay there despite the location.  I mean, 3k a night on weekends?  1,600 Starpoints + $30?  Meanwhile, the Hampton is charging me 25k, the new HGI is charging me 30k and the HI is charging 25k.  I bet it's a cat 3.  Has to be.  would be too good to be true combined with the reward stays count towards elite status. 

[EllToPay]

someone find out what SPG redemption tier it will be

gotta be cat2 don't you think.

if it is, and they make it not disgusting with the remodel, I would almost have to stay there despite the location.  I mean, 3k a night on weekends?  1,600 Starpoints + $30?  Meanwhile, the Hampton is charging me 25k, the new HGI is charging me 30k and the HI is charging 25k.  I bet it's a cat 3.  Has to be.  would be too good to be true combined with the reward stays count towards elite status.

agreed on location drawback, but unless you're at the HI everywhere else is pretty much equal distance from aggieville. maybe just wait until 3 am when d scott is done writing about the game and he'll give the SPG'ers a lift back to the hotel?

[Dr Rick Daris]

someone find out what SPG redemption tier it will be

gotta be cat2 don't you think.

if it is, and they make it not disgusting with the remodel, I would almost have to stay there despite the location.  I mean, 3k a night on weekends?  1,600 Starpoints + $30?  Meanwhile, the Hampton is charging me 25k, the new HGI is charging me 30k and the HI is charging 25k.  I bet it's a cat 3.  Has to be.  would be too good to be true combined with the reward stays count towards elite status.

yeah. if it's cat2 then i'll prob get the spg cards and just move in for the month of december or something. pool, hot tub, ping pong, etc.

also i mean it's a four points in manhattan freaking kansas. if they try to pass that off as a 3 i'll laugh in their faces. the god damn sheraton suites kc plaza is a 3. the crown center westin is a 3. i'm going 75% on it being 2 and 25% on it being 3.

[steve dave]

yeah, I mean, the OKC Sheraton we stayed at in bricktown was a 2.

[steve dave]

Just sent chase a message requesting my Sapphire annual $95 fee be waived.  I'll report back on their response.  I think this is one that normally won't waive it no matter what but we'll see.  I pointed out to them that I've had 66 transactions since my last statement date of 5/14 and noted that anything else that could be offered would be great so maybe they'll throw me some points or something. 

[steve dave]

Chase mushed me on the Sapphire annual fee.  Also, lucky has a good post about potential churnability changes to Amex cards:

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/onemileatatime/2012/06/04/is-american-express-changing-their-sign-up-bonus-terms/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+boardingarea%2Fonemileatatime+%28One+Mile+at+a+Time%29

[The Whale]

So I have to stay in a Holiday Inn for 4 days this month for work travel.  Went over to flyertalk and saw they have a crapload of promo codes, and it looks like a lot of them would stack.

How do you guys pick which ones to use to avoid getting mushed on redemption?

[steve dave]

Use all of them. Most will stack. Don't really understand the question though.

[The Whale]

Use all of them. Most will stack. Don't really understand the question though.

Signed up for all of them -- if all take, I'll wind up with 20k+ points for a 4 day stay.

Didn't want to get into a situation where they freak out and close the account for using "fake" codes.

[steve dave]

If I could work from home every day and was single I would definitely do this

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/onemileatatime/2012/06/13/so-who-else-wants-to-vacation-in-phoenix-this-summer/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+boardingarea%2Fonemileatatime+%28One+Mile+at+a+Time%29

[steve dave]

Hyatt invited me to a "Hyatt Innovation Session" yesterday afternoon.  I went down to a bar in downtown Omaha and there were about 40 Hyatt people there who had been in this big room all day with a thousand sticky notes all over the walls and stupid props and crap and they had been brainstorming for ideas to improve their hotels.  I was one of 6 Gold Passport members who came and they had us break up with each of us going to a group of about 6-8 Hyatt people.  They would then explain their ideas they came up with for the day which were things like improvements to the Hyatt app or ways to make the checkin and checkout process better and crap like that.  I spent about 10 minutes with each group telling them about what I liked about their idea and what some other improvements I could think of would be.  It was pretty fun.  Lasted about an hour.  They gave me 10k Gold Passport points for doing it.  They had done it in San Fran, Hong Kong, and somewhere in Europe but I forget where.  I was kind of, like, WTF are you doing in Omaha but they told me they had 600 employees in Omaha that run their call center, IT, Gold Passport program, social media and some executives.  Never knew that before.  Each employee gets 12 nights per year at any Hyatt in the world.  Such a rough ridin' boss perk. 

[steve dave]

Also, I kept catching myself overstepping what they wanted me there for.  Like, one group was, like "what if you could use your iphone and say 'Siri, check me into the hotel' and it would check you in and send you your room information?" and I was all, "yeah, apple isn't going to let you do that" and they were all, "would you like that though?" and I was all, "you think apple is going to integrate checking in to your hotel into Siri?" and they were all, "would you like it if they did?" and I was all "meh, not really". 

[raquetcat]

Hyatt invited me to a "Hyatt Innovation Session" yesterday afternoon.  I went down to a bar in downtown Omaha and there were about 40 Hyatt people there who had been in this big room all day with a thousand sticky notes all over the walls and stupid props and crap and they had been brainstorming for ideas to improve their hotels.  I was one of 6 Gold Passport members who came and they had us break up with each of us going to a group of about 6-8 Hyatt people.  They would then explain their ideas they came up with for the day which were things like improvements to the Hyatt app or ways to make the checkin and checkout process better and crap like that.  I spent about 10 minutes with each group telling them about what I liked about their idea and what some other improvements I could think of would be.  It was pretty fun.  Lasted about an hour.  They gave me 10k Gold Passport points for doing it.  They had done it in San Fran, Hong Kong, and somewhere in Europe but I forget where.  I was kind of, like, WTF are you doing in Omaha but they told me they had 600 employees in Omaha that run their call center, IT, Gold Passport program, social media and some executives.  Never knew that before.  Each employee gets 12 nights per year at any Hyatt in the world.  Such a rough ridin' boss perk.

sounds very elite

[raquetcat]

Got a call from Hilton today trying to get me to spend two nights at a Hilton vacation club time share place in Orlando or Vegas, for $150 for both nights, 15k Hilton points and a $200 credit for my next Hilton stay, and I have to take a 2 hour tour of the time share, I've never done a time share stay/they try to sell you a place, how are they?

[steve dave]

Got a call from Hilton today trying to get me to spend two nights at a Hilton vacation club time share place in Orlando or Vegas, for $150 for both nights, 15k Hilton points and a $200 credit for my next Hilton stay, and I have to take a 2 hour tour of the time share, I've never done a time share stay/they try to sell you a place, how are they?

I did one at the Hilton Hawaiin Village right out of college.  I was there for a conference and they offered us that stuff and two spa treatments instead of the room nights as we were there anyway.  told them sure, and then told the guy we weren't interested immediately but he could go through his deal if he wanted to.  he did for about 45 minutes and asked if I would like to see one of the rooms and i said no.  he said I still had to sit there for another 45 minutes to get the stuff and I said ok.  then I sat there and played on my phone and then I left.  it wasn't bad.  make sure you know which Hilton you are going to be staying at because sometimes they put you at a garbage one and not the one they are showing you. 

[Dr Rick Daris]

Hyatt invited me to a "Hyatt Innovation Session" yesterday afternoon.  I went down to a bar in downtown Omaha and there were about 40 Hyatt people there who had been in this big room all day with a thousand sticky notes all over the walls and stupid props and crap and they had been brainstorming for ideas to improve their hotels.  I was one of 6 Gold Passport members who came and they had us break up with each of us going to a group of about 6-8 Hyatt people.  They would then explain their ideas they came up with for the day which were things like improvements to the Hyatt app or ways to make the checkin and checkout process better and crap like that.  I spent about 10 minutes with each group telling them about what I liked about their idea and what some other improvements I could think of would be.  It was pretty fun.  Lasted about an hour.  They gave me 10k Gold Passport points for doing it.  They had done it in San Fran, Hong Kong, and somewhere in Europe but I forget where.  I was kind of, like, WTF are you doing in Omaha but they told me they had 600 employees in Omaha that run their call center, IT, Gold Passport program, social media and some executives.  Never knew that before.  Each employee gets 12 nights per year at any Hyatt in the world.  Such a rough ridin' boss perk.

please call your new hyatt contacts and tell them to get their freaking website up and running. it's been down for the last hour and is something i'd expect from ihg or accor or something. bush league.

[steve dave]

Just had mrs. dave sign up for both personal 50k AA cards and I got the business AA 50k card.  150k here we come.  going to try churning two more US Air cards in a month along with a few cards to get Hilton points. 

[Dr Rick Daris]

Just had mrs. dave sign up for both personal 50k AA cards and I got the business AA 50k card.  150k here we come.  going to try churning two more US Air cards in a month along with a few cards to get Hilton points.

that's great news. I was worried for a while that you wouldn't have enough AA to go to Tokyo with @Pete, @chicat and myself next spring. #sumo matches #high speed bullet trains #all of us drunk singing karaoke in a karaoke bar while wearing cowboy boots and cowboy hats and being really loud and obnoxious and calling everyone in site "pardner"

[Dr Rick Daris]

Just had mrs. dave sign up for both personal 50k AA cards and I got the business AA 50k card.  150k here we come.  going to try churning two more US Air cards in a month along with a few cards to get Hilton points.

also, my short, medium and long term goal is to be churning the ever loving crap out of every hhonor card possible for the forseeable future. have you looked at any of their all inclusives? they have a couple in costa rica that look pretty average that you can get for 50-70k per night but there is one in jamaica (rose hall) that is actually above average that you can get for 60k. if you are gold or have the amex card then you get like 20% of tha,t so the rose hall place would be like 50k or less i think. i think i could easily get to somewhere between 500k and 1mil hhonors within the year and then just go spend a couple of weeks there or whatever. was looking at the cost for two people to stay there over new years this year and it was like $600/night. also, did someone say lazy river?

[GoodForAnother]

lazy river!

[steve dave]

rick daris, your absolute favorite travel blogger is featuring Tokyo in your absolute favorite travel blog segment "Destination of the Week"!

[Dr Rick Daris]

god i hate those two. eric could've saved everybody a ton of time by simply writing "abnormally tall genetic freak w/ questionable ethics tours country of small people while staying at nice hotels and just generally freaking them out"  and then include links to a couple of major hotels in tokyo. it would've taken him 1/100th the time, and been more interesting as well as more entertaining.

[steve dave]

Lucky is my new favorite blogger.  I used to not like him just because he was pals with stupid Gary.  Now I don't care.