How Many Credit Cards Do You Have?

[steve dave]

hyatt announced cash and points rewards. that was gary's "good news coming" after the devaluation. pretty good deal, especially at the 2-5 redemptions. plus, you earn points on the cash side and the stays count towards elite status. note that stupid ass gary has an extra zero on the level one cash/point. should be .02.

[Tobias]

pretty much my favorite thing in this thread is the personalities (and subsequent mocking) of the bloggers

[Rams]

Hey Rams (et al)-

Any of you ever manufactured any spend on a card to get the bonus? I just got Mrs. WonderMeal into the game and want to show her that she just applies and then voila, SW Companion Passes for the whole family. Really feel like it will invest her for the long haul.

I have a Bluebird, but don't really know what to do with it. Can you help?

Not really interested in manufacturing spend for anything other than getting these bonuses pronto, btw.

I've done a little blue birding in my day. Basically I bought vanilla reload cards at CVS pharmacy with a credit card that earned more than 1 point per $1 (I think the max you can put on each vanilla reload card is $500 and there is a fee of about $5/vanilla reload card purchased) then you put that $500 into your bluebird account (I think it was as easy as entering the numbers on the back of the card or something). Then you use your bluebird account to send checks to whoever, I've paid my mortgage that way one month, I sent a check to my bro, pay utilities etc. I'm not familiar with the Wal-Mart part of it. I would check the blogs (http://boardingarea.com/frequentmiler/ and http://millionmilesecrets.com/ seem to keep up on the blue bird stuff pretty well)

Rick Daris has previously bought fully re-fundable SW tickets as far out as you can on a cc, then once you get the cc sign up bonus he cancelled the tickets and was refunded the money with out having to give the points back, I've never tried this though.

You can start working on the minimum spend for the SW cards now (get all you Christmas shopping on them), as long as you don't complete them until 2014 (and within the designated time frame) you will still be able to get the companion pass for all of 2014 and 2015, this is what I did (last year).

that basically sums up the bluebird/vanilla reload deal.  the fee for each card is only $3.95, so you really don't have to use a card that gets more than 1 point per dollar for it to make sense, but that's obviously a better deal.  essentially you just buy the cards, scratch off the number and log in to the vanilla reload site to load your bluebird.  then you just pay whoever you want.  you can get the vanilla reloads at walgreens and cvs.  I actually do this more than amazon payments just because it seems more risky to me since essentially I'm just paying into my wife's individual account.  seems like there's going to be some backlash with amazon payments at some point and I don't want to get mumped when that goes down.  you really don't even need to mess with wal-mart if you don't want to. you can now get a pin number on visa gift cards and load your bluebird at walmart, but the fee is usually $6.95 and you have the added hassle of having to call and set up a pin and then go into walmart.  I don't do it at all anymore since they stopped giving kroger gas points on variable load visa gift cards.  that's the only reason that made sense to me.

I've done the sw refundable thing a few times and it works great, but you obviously don't want to do that with a sw card.  you could risk them taking your points back.

one last point is that you might want to wait to do all of your required spend after your december closing date so that the points from your spend post to your rapid rewards account in january as well, which helps cover the additional 10k you need to get the companion pass.  i actually called and had my closing date moved to the 5th so I have most of january to complete my spend on the two cards.  then all of my points should hit on or shortly after january 5th.

[steve dave]

pretty much my favorite thing in this thread is the personalities (and subsequent mocking) of the bloggers

they are a very mockable group of people. some of them (lucky) are just adorable though.

[steve dave]

Sapphire sign up is now 55k.

50,000 points for new applicants after $3,000 spend within the first three months, plus the additional 5,000 points - this one has a $0 intro annual fee for the first year, then $125 annually after that.

$30 higher annual fee though. they still have the crappier bonus with the lower fee.

40,000 points for new new applicants after $3,000 spend within the first three months, plus the additional 5,000 points – this one has a $0 intro annual fee for the first year, then $95 annually after that

[wiley]

Sapphire sign up is now 55k.

50,000 points for new applicants after $3,000 spend within the first three months, plus the additional 5,000 points - this one has a $0 intro annual fee for the first year, then $125 annually after that.

$30 higher annual fee though. they still have the crappier bonus with the lower fee.

40,000 points for new new applicants after $3,000 spend within the first three months, plus the additional 5,000 points – this one has a $0 intro annual fee for the first year, then $95 annually after that

GD it, i got the crappy bonus.  Probably not able to get the better offer - jfc

[steve dave]

send them an email telling them you want the new better bonus applied. if you just got it recently they will probably give it to you. they have a message thing on their website.

[Boom Roasted]

send them an email telling them you want the new better bonus applied. if you just got it recently they will probably give it to you. they have a message thing on their website.

I will try this.  Just got my card last week

[michigancat]

Hmm, I was planning on using the sapphire for my primary spend after I do all my bonuses for my Hawaii trip. I guess the extra 15k are worth the extra $30 over several years?

[steve dave]

Hmm, I was planning on using the sapphire for my primary spend after I do all my bonuses for my Hawaii trip. I guess the extra 15k are worth the extra $30 over several years?

I use mine for primary spend. I can't imagine they will have two seperate annual fees on the same card long term. They are probably going to phase out the old one in favor of the new annual fee or hoping some people just don't care enough. Honestly, the best strategy is probably to sign up for the lower bonus card and then contact them and tell them you saw there is a higher bonus available and you want that and hope that they don't also make you take the larger annual fee. But, 10k UR points are probably worth about $200 depending on how you value them so it would take several years to make it not worth the extra annual fee.

[sys]

cancel before the fee comes up.

[michigancat]

cancel before the fee comes up.

I want it to be my primary spend

[sys]

cancel before the fee comes up.

I want it to be my primary spend

make it your primary spend for 11 months, then get a new primary spend and cancel.

[steve dave]

US leaving Star Alliance 3/1. Later than original estimates of sometime this month. Thanks Obama!

[Boom Roasted]

send them an email telling them you want the new better bonus applied. if you just got it recently they will probably give it to you. they have a message thing on their website.

I will try this.  Just got my card last week

They never answered...

[steve dave]

send them an email telling them you want the new better bonus applied. if you just got it recently they will probably give it to you. they have a message thing on their website.

I will try this.  Just got my card last week

They never answered...

they will. did you send it correctly? did you get an automated response that they received it? sometimes it takes a day or two longer than they tell you it will to get back to you but they always do.

[steve dave]

the chase freedom now has a 20k signup bonus. You have to have a Sapphire or Ink in order to transfer the points to UR though (otherwise it's just worth $200 in cashback). I may actually get it now for the 5x quarterly bonuses. no annual fee and only $500 spend to get the bonus. pretty nice.

[raquetcat]

the chase freedom now has a 20k signup bonus. You have to have a Sapphire or Ink in order to transfer the points to UR though (otherwise it's just worth $200 in cashback). I may actually get it now for the 5x quarterly bonuses. no annual fee and only $500 spend to get the bonus. pretty nice.

Nice, I may jump on this as well

[Boom Roasted]

send them an email telling them you want the new better bonus applied. if you just got it recently they will probably give it to you. they have a message thing on their website.

I will try this.  Just got my card last week

They never answered...

they will. did you send it correctly? did you get an automated response that they received it? sometimes it takes a day or two longer than they tell you it will to get back to you but they always do.

Just a bit of a delay.

Thank you for contacting Chase regarding your Sapphire
Preferred account ending in xxxx.

I regret that we are unable to upgrade or apply the 50,000
bonus points offer to your existing account. This offer
was for accounts with an annual fee of $125.00. Upon
review, I see that your account ending in xxxx has an
annual fee of $95.00. I apologize for any inconvenience
this may cause.

Although we appreciate your loyalty, we ask that you trust
that this decision is the same for all members. We feel
that adhering to the same policy for all members is the
best way to remain fair and consistent.

On the other hand, I understand that you are interested in
the 5,000 bonus points offer after adding the first
authorized user to your account. Please respond with the
name of the person you would like to add on the account as
Authorized user and we will be happy to apply the 5,000
points to the account.

[steve dave]

that sucks (5k, tho!)

[wiley]

Same thing happened to me.  I called and said my financial advisor steve dave thought they would make it right...thought you had more pull mr. dave

[steve dave]

Same thing happened to me.  I called and said my financial advisor steve dave thought they would make it right...thought you had more pull mr. dave

this new multiple annual fees thing is tricky. sorry guys.

[wiley]

No worries, I didnt try very hard to persuade them.  I dont know of it wouldve worked.  But between signup spending bonus, add authorized user and a large dining purchase, ill have about 52k ur.  So roughly 40k more is what im shooting for.  By end of april.

[F14ABE]

i only have one!

[michigancat]

No worries, I didnt try very hard to persuade them.  I dont know of it wouldve worked.  But between signup spending bonus, add authorized user and a large dining purchase, ill have about 52k ur.  So roughly 40k more is what im shooting for.  By end of april.

Do they have to be UR points? Seems like you'd be better off chasing a different bonus or two for whatever it is you're trying to book.  40k is a lot of points without a bonus.