Credit Card Thread - Now with a Beginner's Guide to free travel/FAQ

Hmm the airline cards are way out of my comfort zone. This guy has good content you can probably find a review of that card on his channel. If you decide on a card post it here and I’m sure someone has a referral link for it.

 

I'm just going to say credit scores are bullshit fugazi numbers and I still don't understand how any of this shit works.

 

Something to also because I just had to look into it about a week ago for friend:

The chase business cards are really only valuable if you have a CSR, CSP, or Ink Preferred. You need to have one of those three cards to transfer points to travel partners. I had a friend sign up for a great Ink Unlimited bonus, but he didn’t have a way to transfer to an airline.

 

Was hoping for more, but only got 25k points for not canceling my Amex Platinum

 

They’re super valuable regardless. That’s a $1200 bonus on $8k in spend, 15% cash back!!!

 

My La compagnie flight from Milan to Newark was delayed by almost 5 hours, so missing my United flight back (last nonstop out at 8:30 pm tonight). Gonna go CSR trip delay insurance route. Do I have to use my CSR card for the expenses I’ll be claiming or am I free to use any card? Would rather use my delta Amex reserve if possible for booking my delta flight

 

here is one for a Marriott business card

Apply for an American Express Card with this link. With your new Card, you could earn a welcome bonus and your friend could earn a referral bonus. Terms Apply.
https://americanexpress.com/en-us/r...american-express-card?ref=DAVIdWg0MG&XL=MIMNS

 

dealer's choice (personal cards)

Amex Bonvoy: Apply for an American Express Card with this link. With your new Card, you could earn a welcome bonus and your friend could earn a referral bonus. Terms Apply. https://americanexpress.com/en-us/referral/marriott-bonvoy?ref=NATHAGz7cD&XLINK=MYCP

Chase Bonvoy:
Choose any Marriott Bonvoy Credit Card that is right for you. I can be rewarded too if you apply here and are approved for this card.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/252j/B40NAJJ5UH

 

Dangit, always too slow here

 

I'm building a house and acting as my own mechanical contractor on it. Need to spend probably close to 50K for materials. I have a Chase Business Premier card that I use for my business stuff. It sucks for travel redemption of any kind but gets 2.5% back on purchases over $5,000 so I do that and then just use it for statement credits. Anyone have a suggestion for another card to get for the $50K that I need to spend that would be better than the 2.5% I can get with the Business Premier card?

 

Quick note - the CSR Trip Delay insurance requires you 1) to have booked the flight on the card, and 2) I don't think it kicks in unless the delay is 6 hours or more.

Would like a review on the La Compagnie product though.

 

Is this $50k all at once or over time? If it’s over time then I would open a bunch of Ink Business Preferred cards and try to hit as many spending bonuses as possible with them. You could hypothetically hit six of them and get 720k Chase points for that.

 

booked the flights with the card
6 hour or more delay OR a delay that results in an overnight stay, so ticked that 2nd box

re: compagnie - i'll get back to you on that, have some thoughts

 

EMAW FC you look into EU 261 here? I think it applies given that the delay was more than 3 hrs and your origin was EU...

 

i have not but i'm about to - ty sir.

the delay for the most part was justified, crazy rainstorm in northern Italy. The plane had to divert to LIN for landing (other Milan airport), while everyone else is at MXP waiting for the plane so we can head back stateside. If I was on the flight to Milan I would've asked if I could get off the plane at LIN

 

used the stay 2 nights, get the 3rd free promotion through Amex FHR last weekend. Stayed at the Whitby in NYC for a little over $500/night, and got upgraded to a suite. I had so much sex.

 

nice. Which service did you use?

 

The 120k preferred bonus is ending soon so I signed up. Spend $8k in 3 months but the card only came with a $5k limit. Kinda strange to me. Just gonna put September and December quarterly taxes on it anyways.

 

Do you know when this promo ends?

 

thought I saw within the next week somewhere but could have dreamt it

 

Yeah that was a pain in the ass when I was trying to get the minimum and I kept getting denied until I realized the $5k limit

Ended up just paying it off ahead of time since I had a couple big expenses and I wanted to just forget about the card.

 

Anyone had issues with chase transfers taking a long time?

I just transferred 132k points to Aeroplan hoping to book a business class flight back to the US on Friday. Before transfer it said that it may take up to 7 business days, but everywhere I looked online said it was instantaneous (so did the notification email from chase). My Aeroplan account is now "disabled" and Chase tells me the process is "pending."

 

When did you open your Aeroplan account? Only anecdotal, but have heard if you open some loyalty programs and immediately transfer points, it raises some red flags and they can put it on hold.

 

that’s exactly what happened. I opened it yesterday. Sucks that I can’t book the flight and now have to wait 7-days to get my points back.

 

remember to ask for retention offers! Just got a 40k offer on $3,000 spend for my AMEX Gold. used this script:

 

Is it fair to say that an AmEx point is worth around ~1 cent, so if you have to pay a big amount (think ~$5k) via wire or credit card and they charge a credit card a 1.5% fee, you'd probably just go wire?

 

Yeah, unless you're doing it to hit a bonus. You might be able to get them for more than 1c transferring to partners, but you're pretty close to break even

 

I’ve been staying at Marriotts all year for work but everything I read says I need to look into Hyatt.

https://monkeymiles.boardingarea.com/chase-world-of-hyatt-credit-card/

 

Forced my gf to switch from Marriott to Hyatt last year. She reached globalist status. Suite upgrades and point earning/redemption is definitely better with Hyatt.

However, Hyatt portfolio is much more limited and the basic brands (house, place, etc.) can be bad.

I stay about 40 nights a year myself at hyatts. They changed their loyalist reward earning last year, so I’m able to snag a few upgrades now which is nice. You really need to reach 60 nights for great value.

 

I wish they would have stuck with points instead of free nights that expire in a year. Still, 5 free nights is pretty nice for a $95 annual fee.

 

Elevated Chase Sapphire Preferred offer. 60k + $300 travel credit.


Limited-time offer – $300 Chase Travel℠ credit + 60,000 bonus points with Chase Sapphire Preferred. I can be rewarded if you apply here and are approved for the card.
https://www.referyourchasecard.com/19P/D4BP2TIOQV

 

Im still getting ink business cards every month or two for 80k. Works for me.

 

Signed up for AmEx Platinum last summer, just used the points to book 4 direct roundtrip flights from Denver to Paris/London for Spring.

Pretty damn cool when you can actually find one of the good point redemption values that fits your dates. When I got the card I was only banking on being able to use points for 2 of the flights but got all 4 for 140k points.

Cheers to whoever gave the heads up on the increased signup bonus (150k) for the Platinum.

Used the IHG CC signup bonus to pay for 6 of our 8 hotel nights also.

 

Shout out milquetoast

 

Chase declined my last two applications earlier this year. Sucks because I have a legit business and have excellent credit. I had 6 cards open with them so I cancelled two of them and lowered limit on a couple of others. Hoping to add more next year.

 

same on the AMEX - going to Lisbon in March for the first time. wish I woulda hopped on the CC points train much earlier in life.

 

Considering Chase Biz wouldn't approve me for the longest, I'm a little trigger shy. Got both the Ink Cash and Business Preferred within the last 6 months. Anyone heard of Chase shutting anyone down for too many in a short time?

 

Anyone have a Chase Hyatt referral?

 

Looks like you can only refer people with the Hyatt business card now, very lame

 

Booooo...oh well, I tried.

 

Speaking of cards you can't refer to, some may want to hop on the Barclay's Aviator Red card. 70k AA miles after you pay the annual fee of $99 and make a single purchase. They haven't hit my AA account yet but the Barclay's app says it's been earned and reflected on my next billing statement. There's talk that AA may go inclusive to Citi so this card/offer may be going away at some point. And I don't think pissing off Barclays by shutting the card down is going to harm many strategies.

 

checked as well, my other cards are eligible but Hyatt not listed.

 

I may apply for the AMEX gold. Any referrals out there higher than 60k?

 

My referral code right now says 100k if you spend 6k in 6 mo plus 20% back on restaurants up to $100 over 6 mo.

https://americanexpress.com/en-us/referral/gold-card?ref=NICHOBsUPI&XL=MIMNS

 

Is 125k a good offer for upgrading amex gold to amex platinum?