Ok, can someone bring me up to speed? I am a regular traveler, and use my Amex SPG card for everything except for flights which I use my American Airlines Citi card. It seems everyone is getting the CSR card for the points. However the $450 fee is a little much for me, I mean I pay like $75 today. However I am also only getting 1 point per dollar except for hotels where I get 3. AA i Get two per dollar per flight. Can someone give me the cliff notes on why I would spend $450 for the 100k points?
You get a $300 travel credit annually so it's effectively $150. You'll get 3x points on travel and dining out which it sounds like you spend a lot on. The 100,000 points is $1,500 in travel if you book it through the Chase portal. There are a bunch of other perks and benefits but that's the meat of it. If you fly AA all the time I'm sure you have status and get almost all of the card perks anyway. I only keep my AA Aviator card because they keep waiving the annual fee.
At bare minimum, the sign up bonus points points are worth $1,000 cash. So if you do everything in the least efficient way possible, you will come out $550 ahead (actually more like $590). If at least $300 of your spend is on travel, then make that $850 and change. Then spend $300 on travel again after January first, and you are at over $1150 in net cash benefit before your second annual fee is incurred. The value only goes up from there when you redeem the points for travel instead of cash, and when you factor in the 3x points for dining and travel, and a few other benefits. Literally anyone who is capable of spending $4,000 in 3 months should get this card.
I would love to be able to not put 4k on a credit card in 3 months actually lol. I pay for everything with my card for the points, so this shouldn't be an issue. What are the main perks of the card besides the points in 3 months and travel credits.
The main benefit beyond that is that you can redeem the points for travel via the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal. When doing this points are worth 50% more than their cash equivalent, so the sign-up bonus alone is worth $1,500. You can get even more value out of the points by transferring them directly into hotel/airline loyalty programs, but that's a more convoluted approach and I suspect anyone who would do that has already applied for this card. You also get reimbursed for Global Entry or TSA Pre-Check registration fees, and there are a few more perks I'm forgetting because they are irrelevant to me but worth looking into. The unlimited 3x points on travel and dining is nice in and of itself too.
If you can do the $4,000/3 months nothing else should be needed to persuade. Looking a gift horse in the mouth at that point
I would say get it, use it to get the bonus, and then you have one year until your next annual fee hits to decide if its something you want to keep long term. If you are a frequent traveler and spend a lot of money on dining, I think you will find it is worth keeping despite the high annual fee.
No, it's the best card on the market arguably One could easily justify signing up without the 100,000 bonus points
So I now have a Freedom, Sapphire Preferred and Sapphire Reserve. At this point the Preferred is useless so I have two questions: 1. Can I downgrade the Preferred if I already have a Freedom and, if so, is there any point in doing so? 2. If I cancel the Preferred, will I get a prorated rebate on the annual fee (I paid in July), or should I just keep it open until the annual fee is due again? I only ask because all of my credit is outstanding except that I didn't open my first card until I was 25, so my history is limited. As best I can tell, that's the only thing dragging me down. I already cancelled my Delta Amex when I was approved for the Reserve so I don't know if it will hurt my credit to close out another card.
get it now and use the $300 travel credit before the year ends. then you get another $300 travel credit on Jan 1. Next year when the fee comes due, downgrade to a no fee card. The 100k points are worth a lot, especially if you're savvy. I recently got a $300/night room at Hyatt for 8k points. The Park Hyatt in Tokyo is 25k points/night during peak season, or $1400. Not that one would stay there otherwise, but that's still close to $6k in value for those points. There are many extra benefits; just google it and read one of the articles. there are no fewer than 20 million. The Points Guy has a great overview. My favorite is trip delay insurance. If your trip is delayed more than 6 hours or you have to spend the night, Chase will reimburse you up to $500 per ticket that you purchased with the card. So you can drive to your hotel in a limo and order steak and champagne for room service and it'll be reimbursed.
Appreciate it, sorry I have been using my SPG card for years and just recently started looking at other options. Thanks for the insight. I do appreciate it.
What is the advantage of the Freedom Unlimited over the regular freedom, and is there a reason to have both?
1.5% for all purchases w/ the freedom unlimited vs. 1% cash back for all non-bonus purchases w/ the regular freedom so you'd use the freedom for bonus categories and freedom unlimited for everything else (if you don't have CSR or CSP)
While true, I would be very hesitant to do something like this. From what I have read, Chase will basically blackball you from ever getting another card should you do this.
If you can pay with cash, do it. Credit cards are the gateway to debt. *my dad for the first 23 years of my life
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/featu...made-the-perfect-high-for-credit-card-junkies There goes the neighborhood
don't know if this is the right thread for it, but the SPG/Marriott merger is active. You can link your accounts and transfer points between the two. 3 Marriott points = 1 SPG point automatic status match as well
I cleared out most of my Starpoints already but I had almost enough points left with both SPG and Marriott for a night at a bottom category hotel in each. Now I can actually combine and redeem them for something. Nifty.
It's their own damn fault if they didn't see that coming. Its not really even a loophole its so obvious.
I am sure they won't be irate, just will document and keep you from getting future cards that have insane bonuses attached to them. Which according to the Bloomberg article seems like it is already in development. Granted that may be a card that winds up being for the uber elite who knows, they thought that would be for the Reserve as well.
Made my girlfriend get the CSR. After weeks of explaining she finally relented. She was really excited to get the card in the mail today. And she got a METAL card, I got plastic, what gives, Chase????? I take a closer look at the card and it's CSP, not CSR. She is dumb.
Would any of you kind CC experts care to audit my current rewards setup? I'm going to get a new card (likely CSR) for everyday expenses but want to see if I'm missing an obvious way to combine points for extra value. I'm all over the place right now. Current Cards: Gold Delta AMEX (had for like a decade, use for flights) Chase Marriott Rewards (use only for hotels) Barclays Arrival (use for everyday stuff) Chase Slate (don't use at all) Current rewards: 77K delta skymiles 63K Marriott points plus 2 free nights ~10K Hiltonhonors points ~10k Barclaycard miles Couple thousand American Airlines and Hyatt, not enough to really consider
Another idea (hadn't seen posted) for those of you CSR holders with limited extra travel before end of 2016: Even if you have preexisting/prepaid travel on other cards, use the CSR for either gift cards or upgrades from Econ to Econ plus or various other fees(ideal). They should all be coded as travel (ymmv) but it worked for me on a flight I bought months before the CSR was opened, but still consumed some of my $300 travel credit. I'm trying to avoid having to buy gift cards at the end of the calendar year because I think that's more likely to be scrutinised by chase.
Recently I've been pre planning a trip I'm going to make next fall to Europe. We're not going until next September so I can't even book the trip yet but I've been seeing how much things cost when I book our trip 4+ months out. It is a much better deal to transfer your UR points to one of their airline partners then to book through the UR portal. Just last night for two people on an almost two week trip with multiple flights it was going to cost 190,000 United points or 390,000 UR points through their trip booking. Not sure if booking a hotel through their portal is a better deal or just as bad but something I thought I'd share.
Always love to get a shower in before or especially after a flight, even short ones. Here are some locations I've seen that are listed as offering shower amenities via the included Priority Pass membership with your CSR. Sure beats the ~$30 that some places will charge in the airport. Not going to make the titanic effort of linking them, but here is the main page. Atlanta GA International (International Terminal/Concourse F) THE CLUB AT ATL Dallas TX - DFW International (Terminal D) THE CLUB AT DFW Las Vegas NV International (Terminal 3) THE CLUB AT LAS Los Angeles CA - LAX Intl (Terminal 2) AIR CANADA MAPLE LEAF LOUNGE Los Angeles CA - LAX Intl (Tom Bradley International Terminal) KAL LOUNGE Miami FL International (Concourse F) CLUB AMERICA Miami FL International (Concourse J South) VIP LOUNGE MIAMI New York NY JFK International (Terminal 1) AIR FRANCE LOUNGE New York NY JFK International (Terminal 1) KAL BUSINESS CLASS LOUNGE Orlando FL International (Terminal B) THE CLUB AT MCO San Jose CA Mineta Intl (Terminal A) THE CLUB AT SJC Washington DC Dulles Intl (Midfield Terminal) AIR FRANCE - KLM LOUNGE Washington DC Dulles Intl (Midfield Terminal) BRITISH AIRWAYS GALLERIES LOUNGE INT'L (WIP) only really included the cities/airports I've been to or that are on my radar. Lots of terms and fine print for access to Int'l lounges, esp re desination (eg Schengen or non Schengen destination) Amsterdam Schiphol (Terminal 2) ASPIRE LOUNGE (NO.41) Barcelona El Prat (Terminal 1) SALA VIP MIRO Barcelona El Prat (Terminal 1) SALA VIP PAU CASALS Dublin International (Terminal 2) DUBLIN AIRPORT EXECUTIVE LOUNGE Frankfurt Main (Terminal 1) LUXXLOUNGE Frankfurt Main (Terminal 2) SKY LOUNGE Hamburg Fuhlsbuettel (Airport Plaza) AIRPORT LOUNGE London Heathrow 6 of 7 lounges w/ showers London Stansted THE ESCAPE LOUNGE London Luton ASPIRE LOUNGE Madrid Barajas (Satellite Terminal) NEPTUNO LOUNGE Madrid Barajas (Terminal 2) SALA PUERTA DE ALCALA Munich Franz-Josef Strauss (Terminal 1) ATLANTIC LOUNGE ??? Paris Charles de Gaulle STAR ALLIANCE LOUNGE. Terms seem to exclude showers/conf rooms. Prague Vaclav Havel 4 of 4 lounges with showers. Vienna Schwechat (Check-in 1 or 2 (Plaza)) JET LOUNGE Vienna Schwechat (Check-in 3) SKY LOUNGE Zurich SWISS BUSINESS LOUNGE D Zurich SWISS INTERNATIONAL AIR LINES LOUNGE
Has anyone booked a rental car with the reserve yet? was curious what discounts get applied and if i should use that or just do kayak like normal