American Express

November 9, 2014

Point & Center: 10-20% off Virgin America Flights, $50 off Marriott Hotels with Amex Sync & Using Credit Cards to Pay Bills with Evolve Money

I am in the Phoenix this weekend attending the #westcoastDO where about 100 or so points & miles fanatics meet to hear some interesting speakers talk and to share stories, tips and tricks about manufactured spending, travel hacking and trips they have taken. It’s been an awesome weekend but here is a recap of what’s going on in the points & miles world.

1) 10-20% Virgin America Flights – It seems Virgin America is always offering some sort of discount on flights as there is yet another promotion going on right now in which you can take 10-20% off Virgin America flights with promo code DEAL20. This deal isn’t as good as the one a few weeks ago (that one had a much wider travel period) but this deal does include weekend travel so it might work for a quick weekend getaway. Here are the key details:

  • Must book by 11:59 PST TONIGHT (11/9) using promo code DEAL20
  • Travel must be between December 3rd and December 16th
  • You can take 20% off if you travel on Tuesday, Wednesday or Saturday
  • You can take 10% off if you travel on the other days of the week (including Friday and Sunday which were excluded last time)

I see roundtrip fares from NY to LA at $242 for this promotion which is fantastic for a non-stop transcon. Play around with the dates to get the lowest price.

VADeal20

2) Take $50 Off Your Next Marriott Stay with Amex Sync – There is an American Express Sync offer that will allow you to take $50 off your next Marriott stay by tweeting #AmexMarriott and then booking a reservation directly with Marriott with your American Express card that is enrolled with Amex Sync. It kinda stinks so many Marriott brands are excluded (see below) but this could work if you are traveling for the upcoming holidays at an eligible Marriott Hotel.

Here is a direct link to the terms and conditions but the big things to know are:

  • Tweet using #AmexMarriott to add this offer to your connected American Express Card
  • Must book directly with Marriott Hotels as reservations must be made online at http://www.marriotthotels.com
  • The total amount charged must be over $200 for the $50 credit to hit. So even if the room rate is under $200, you can still charge any incidentals to your room to get to $200 and make this promotion work for you.
  • You must stay in a Marriott hotel between 11/6/14 and 12/31/14
  • Several Marriott Chains are excluded including The Ritz-Carlton®, EDITION®, AC Hotels by Marriott®, Autograph Collection®, JW Marriott®, Renaissance Hotels®, MOXY(TM) Hotels, Courtyard®, SpringHill Suites by Marriott®, Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott®, Protea Hotels(TM), Residence Inn by Marriott®, TownePlace Suites by Marriott®, Marriott Executive Apartments®, Gaylord Hotels® and Marriott Vacation Club®

3) Use Credit Cards to Pay Bills with Evolve Money – I don’t think I’ve blogged about this before but Evolve money is a bill pay service that in the past let you use gift cards or debit cards to make bill payments for student loans, mortgages, utilities and more.  There was even a short time where you could use credit cards to pay those bills without a fee. Unfortunately, Evolve made some changes a while back that stopped allowing credit cards and limiting you to make only one payment per bill in a month.

Well the good news now is Evolve is “evolving” (I’ll be here all week folks) and they are now accepting at the moment, just Discover credit cards to use for bill payments. They also noted that in early 2015 they will be introducing plans to allow users to use Visa or MasterCard credit cards to pay bills. There are no fees for this service from Evolve but I do wonder if the credit card companies will consider this a cash advance instead of a purchase. And if that’s true, there is no point to do this. I don’t have a Discover card to check it out but I am looking forward to testing it once Visa/MasterCards are accepted.

October 18, 2014

American Express Membership Rewards Transfer Bonuses to Starwood, Hilton & Virgin Atlantic

American Express is currently running three different transfer bonuses to convert Membership Rewards points into either Starwood, Hilton or Virgin Atlantic points/miles. I’ll recap each one briefly and give you my opinion whether any of them are worth taking advantage of.

1. 50% Transfer Bonus to Starwood SPG (Targeted) – The biggest transfer bonus on the list at 50% but unfortunately all that means is that you can convert Amex points at a 2:1 ratio instead of the standard 3:1 ratio. Starwood points are more valuable than Amex Membership Rewards points but not double the value in my book. One possible way this promotion could work though is to transfer to an airline that is not a transfer partner of Amex but is a partner of Starwood.

As you might know, if you transfer 20,000 Starwood points to an airline, you automatically get a 5,000 point bonus so if you were to transfer say 40,000 Amex points over to Starwood, you could end up 25,000 airline miles in programs such as Alaska or American, places you cannot transfer to Amex points too normally. By using Starwood as the “middleman”, you can backdoor your way into all of Starwood’s transfer partners here. I don’t have a personal need to do this but this could make sense for some. This transfer bonus expires on 11/30.

SpgTransferBonus

2. 35% Transfer Bonus to Virgin Atlantic – Even though Amex is offering a 35% on transfers to Virgin Atlantic, I’ve discussed how Virgin miles can be difficult to use (though View From the Wing has some great uses of Virgin miles). You can’t depart London without incurring huge fuel surcharges but Virgin Atlantic is a great option to go TO London which is only 13,125 miles + $134 as I’ve written about before here.  Another possible use of their points is on Virgin America, especially if you live on the West Coast as it is only 10,000 miles one way on certain routes, such as LA to San Fran. I am going to sit the transfer out as I just applied for the 90,000 Virgin Atlantic Mastercard and I have no pressing needs for more Virgin miles. This transfer bonus expires on 11/30.

3. 33% Transfer Bonus to Hilton HHonors (Targeted) – Amex’s hotel partners are historically pretty bad so its not that surprising to see that even with a transfer bonus, this is a bad deal. In this case, a 33% transfer bonus to Hilton means Amex points convert at a ratio of 1:2 instead of the standard 1:1.5. Unfortunately, Hilton gutted their award chart a few years ago and any upscale property is for the most part an unreasonable amount of points. I’m talking 95,000 HHonors points for a single night stay when you used to be able to get a 4 night stay at the same property for 145,000 points (ex. Hilton Bora Bora). I don’t mind plan on taking advantage of this transfer bonus and don’t suggest it either unless you need to top off your account for an award stay. This transfer bonus expires on 11/30.

October 15, 2014

Please Don’t Use American Express Membership Rewards Points to Pay for McDonald’s

American Express and McDonald’s announced that starting this week in NY and Chicago and nationwide in December you will be able to redeem American Express Membership Rewards Points for your next meal at McDonald’s. Reading that BusinessWeek article, you can tell both American Express and McDonald’s are excited for this new venture as American Express customers spend hundreds of millions of dollars annually at McDonald’s but you as the customer should not be.

Please Hit The Red Button

Please Hit The Red Button

The ratio of points to food is 100 points = $1 so a $4 Big Mac (do they even cost that?) will require 400 points. This is the standard a penny per point ratio seen with many other credit cards. So why is this a bad deal? Here are a few reasons:

  • American Express Membership Rewards Points are much more valuable when redeemed for travel by transferring them to hotels or airlines. You can easily get 2x-5x the value, probably more if you redeem miles for international first class travel.
  • If you have a Business American Express Platinum Card, each point is worth at 1.2 cents since you can redeem Amex points through Amex Travel for any flight, hotel or car rental.
  • Unless you have the new American Express Everyday card, you most likely pay an annual fee to hold an Amex card that earns transferable Membership Rewards points. If you plan on redeeming points for McDonald’s, you are essentially paying an annual fee ($175 for Gold, $450 for Platinum for example) for “free” McDonald’s. Think about that. Go get a no annual fee, 2% cash back card.
  • You are better off paying for McDonald’s with a card that earns 2x on dining then the any Amex Card. Here’s why:
    • Let’s say you spent $400 on dining expenses over a few months on an American Express Card (say the Gold) and the Chase Sapphire Preferred. Not unreasonable. With the Amex card, you would have 400 points while the Chase card you would have 800 points (2x on dining).
    • If you chose to take advantage of this promotion, you could earn 1 Free Big Mac with Amex. But with the Chase card, you would earn 2 FREE Big Macs! How? Two Big Macs cost $8 so pay for that with your Chase card and then issue yourself a statement credit for $8 by using 800 points. 
  • McDonald’s is creating a rise in childhood obesity and you shouldn’t support them by using your points for free meals there (and jeopardizing your own health at the same time anyway).
  • Lastly, you shouldn’t eat at McDonald’s that often so when you go, you can “treat” yourself and pay $8 for your meal.

Ok, some of those points were a little tongue in cheek but seriously, don’t use points to pay for food at McDonald’s.

October 10, 2014

Point & Center: Last Chance for Amazon Payments, $10 Off Uber for All Users, & Changes with American Express and Delta

*Some of the items below have out in the blogosphere for a while now but I never covered due to my vacation. Think of this post as a catchup for the past 2 weeks*

1) Last Day for Amazon Payments is October 12th – I’ve talked about the death of Amazon Payments earlier but this is a reminder to send your final $1,000 payment to someone on or before October 12th. When October 13th comes around, Amazon Payments will disable this functionality and you will no longer be able to make person to person payments. This was an easy and free 1,000 miles a month – AP will be missed.

2) $10 off Uber for Existing Users, $40 off for New Users – American Express has announced a new promotion in which anyone can take $10 off their next Uber ride if they sync their American Express credit card with Twitter and tweet #AmexUber. Here’s how to do it.

If you do not have an Uber account, you can signup for a new account with my link here and you will receive $30 off on top of the $10 credit above for a total of $40 your first ride (I will also receive $30 off a ride if you signup with my link above).

3) American Express Premier Rewards Gold Devaluation – The American Express Premier Gold Card lost a benefit last week when Amex announced that it will no longer rewards users with 15,000 bonus points if they spend $30,000 in a calendar year. The loss of this benefit might not be applicable to many of you but I really didn’t see the point of keeping this card past the first year with a hefty annual fee of $175 unless you were a big spender. And with that benefit revoked, I don’t understand the love for this card. But that’s another post for another time.

4) Restriction on Delta Transfers from American Express Membership Rewards – In the latest flyer #unfriendly move by Delta, they are limiting the amount of American Express Membership Rewards that can be transferred into Delta SkyMiles to 250,000 miles annually. Before you think that doesn’t matter cause that’s still a lot of miles, it’s not. If I wanted to book two business class tickets to Europe with Delta using my Amex points, that’s 250,000 miles right there. If I wanted to book two business class tickets to Asia or Australia, I will have to transfer miles to each individual’s Delta account since each ticket is over 125,000 miles. But I may not be able to do that, since Amex only let’s you transfer miles to your frequent flyer accounts or that of your authorized users. This takes effect in 2015, so you have until 12/31/14 to make unlimited transfers.