November 23, 2015

Monday Musings – Today Starts 10x at Amazon, No Hyatt Diamond Status For You, Free Miles and More

Welcome to this week’s Monday Musings. As a reminder, Monday Musings is a weekly series where I rattle off a few thoughts I have that mostly relate to points/miles, travel and I might highlight other posts/news/nuggets I found interesting from the past week. For those that are football fans and read Peter King’s MMQB, think of this as similar to his “A Few Things I Think I Think” section.

1. Today is the first day you can earn 10 points per dollar spent at Amazon (and some other online retailers) if you use your Chase Freedom. Speaking of the Freedom, the signup bonus is up to 17,500 points (or $175 cash back as advertised). Chase Sapphire Preferred is up to 55,000 points but if you have applied for more than 5 lines of credit in the past 2 years, forget about applying for these cards.

2. If you have either of one of those cards above, you should be able to refer others via Chase’s Refer a Friend program for some bonus points. I have both cards but for whatever reason, I cannot refer others (and it has been this way for over a year now). If you are interested in signing up, find a friend who has the card and let them refer you for the bonus points.

3. Last week was pretty rough for “The Hobby”. I’m talking of course about the American Airlines devaluation and the SPG-Marriott merger. With the AA devaluation, rates are drastically increasing for first class and business class awards which I can’t say is too surprising. If you don’t mind flying coach overseas, than this devaluation has only a minimal impact. Instead of rehashing everything, I thought this post showed some nice charts with the changes.

It is too early to speculate on the changes coming to SPG but based on prior mergers and consolidations, it most likely won’t be good news for us with sizable SPG balances. It also probably will be painful for SPG elites but I could care less about that since I don’t chase status. I am not going out of my way to spend down my SPG balance but if I had to wager, I will make sure I use or transfer my SPG points before they turn into Marriott points. I think Marriott’s reward program is garbage as its the only major hotel program I’ve never cared for. Lack of inspirational properties combined with high award rates (e.g. Courtyard Marriott for 50,000 points in the middle of nowhere)

4. Speaking of the AA devaluation, I found it strange to see bloggers claim how terrible the changes are but then try to sell a bunch of AA credit cards in the same post. Kind of two different messages, no?

5. In this week’s sign that credit card pumping bloggers make way too much money, The Points Guy paid somewhere in the neighborhood of $25k-$30k (update: he confirmed he did pay $32k) for a one way flight from JFK to Abu Dhabi to check out Etihad’s new First Residence (which contains a bedroom, living room, ensuite bathroom and private butler) on their A380. It looks amazing for sure but to drop that much cash for a one way, 12 hour flight is quite telling to how well he is doing. #PumpingPays

6. Hyatt offering a status match to Diamons turned into a giant clusterf**k as emails/tweets when unaswered for days until most people received an offer for Platinum status, myself included. Thanks but if you spent 2 seconds looking atmy account Hyatt, you know I already have Platinum status. It seems unless if you contacted them when this first was announced, you might have received Diamond status before Hyatt changed the promotion. Timing is everything in this game but boo on Hyatt for the selective change of terms.

M6. Lastly, here are 100 free Aeroplan miles.

Happy Monday!

November 21, 2015

Good Deal Alert: Save 10-15% on All Hyatt Hotels + Easy Hyatt Diamond Status Match

Update: Hyatt is now only matching to Platinum status unless you are top tier at SPG, Hilton or Marriott.

There are actually two separate promotions going on right that anyone with future Hyatt stays should take advantage of. Let’s break them down.

1. Save 10-15% on All Future Hyatt Stays – It what appears to be an annual offering from Hyatt, through November 24th per this Flyertalk thread, Hyatt is offering 10% off gift cards, e-gift cards and certificate checks when using promo code GPGIFT15. Here is the link to purchase these gift cards or certificates.

However there is a way to make this offer better if you have an American Express business card enrolled in OPEN Savings (such as the SPG Business or Amex Business Platinum cards). In years past, purchasing gift cards would qualify for the 5% discount offered by the OPEN Savings program for Hyatt purchases and I assume this will continue to be the case this year as well. This is the last year you can use this benefit as Hyatt is leaving the OPEN Savings program on 1/1/16 so make sure to put these purchases on a card that is enrolled in OPEN Savings even if means giving up 3x Hyatt points for using the Hyatt Visa as I much rather earn 1 SPG point & get an extra 5% discount instead.

This is a great way to lock in a ~15% discount (technically slightly less than 15%) on all future Hyatt stays. I am participating in this offer as even though I have a few Hyatt stays next year booked solely on points, this is a fantastic way to basically get 15% off all incidents at the hotel (food, activities etc.)

2. Easy Status Match to Diamond Status – The big news yesterday was that Hyatt has introduced a new status match to Hyatt Diamond status that will be quite easy for many of you to achieve. All Hyatt is asking for to get matched to Diamond status is proof of elite status at any other hotel chain with at least one eligible stay this year. Now many of us have some form of elite status from credit cards and most of them will work for this status match! If you have Hilton Gold (from the American Express Surpass or Citi Hilton Reserve credit cards), IHG Platinum (from IHG credit card), Marriott Gold (from Ritz Carlton credit card) or Starwood Gold (American Express Platinum card), you can use that to get matched!

You can either send a DM to their twitter team @HyattConcierge but I recommend emailing Hyatt Gold Passport at goldpassport@hyatt.com with proof of your elite status, proof of at least one stay and your Hyatt Membership number. As you might expect, they are overwhelmed with responses so it is taking some time for them to respond so don’t expect a response right away. To be honest, this deal seems too good to be true but people are already reporting success so let’s hope it continues for everyone else!

November 16, 2015

Monday Musings – Paris, Record Time for Amex MR to Singapore Transfer & More

1. Just an unconscionable and unbelievable act of terrorism Friday night in Paris. Truly scary and I can’t imagine how I’d feel if I was in Paris at that time. We went to Paris for the first time last year and loved the City of Lights. This act will NOT deter me from returning and I hope others visit to experience how great Paris is. #PrayforParis

2. I have plenty of experiencing booking Singapore awards for clients but this was the first time booking for myself and with no Singapore Krisflyer miles, I had to transfer them in. I decided to transfer American Express Membership Rewards to Singapore and I was fully expecting a 12-24 hour timeframe to wait for the miles to post. Instead, the miles posted in only 2 hours! I know this because I initated the transfer just after midnight EST and at 1:45 am EST, I received the email below. “My first transaction” was the miles hitting the account – I’ve never seen Singapore transfers happen this quickly so that’s pretty awesome. In reality though, Singapore probably processes these transactions once a day and I happened to submit my transfer right before the cutoff.

3. Why did I need Singapore miles? I booked our outbound flights to Hawaii flying Newark to Honolulu nonstop on United in business class (with flat beds on their 767). I could have booked this for 40,000 United miles per person but the much better way to book this is with 30,000 Singapore miles per person. The cash price for this flight was $1,750 per person so I consider this a great use of miles.

4. Delta becomes the first US airline to try and sell their version of “premium economy” (called Comfort +) as a whole separate fare class (just like economy, business etc.) instead of just having it for paid or Medallion upgrades. Here are some FAQs about the changes. The notable change for travel hackers is that you can now redeem miles directly for a Comfort + seats. I can’t wait to see Delta charge 70,000 miles one way for ATL-LAX Comfort + seat. I’m only half kidding. #SkyPesos

5. I tried out Plastiq and signed up for a Nationwide Visa Buxx account (long overdue I know) this weekend as ways to increase manufactured spend. I won’t get too much into it now but will report back once I get a feel how things are going.

November 12, 2015

My Experience Funding a New Citibank Savings Plus Account With a Credit Card

Earlier this year, I detailed my experience opening a Citigold checking account to earn American Airlines miles and how I was able to fund it successfully with a credit card. Once the miles had posted for opening the Citigold account, I downgraded the account to a Basic Checking account which I have kept open with the minimum amount ($1,500) in it to avoid any monthly service fees. I realized I never opened a savings account with Citibank when I opened that checking account so last week I opened a Savings Plus account for the sole reason to fund it with a credit card to earn points. Spoiler alert – I was successful but here is a recap of the various steps I took and important details you need to know.

While there are various ways to apply for this account, I chose to apply online as this was the quickest and most convenient method for me. On the Citibank Savings Plus account information page, it clearly lists the ability to use a credit card to fund the account which alleviates any concern about using a credit card.

Well don’t mind if I do…

After clicking the Apply Online button, you will see a screen asking you to choose which kind of Savings Plus account package you want (Citigold, Basic etc..). Since I had a Basic checking account now, I obviously just chose the Basic Banking Package (even though it’s called a package, I was only opening a Savings account). After filling out all the required information, you will eventually get to a point where you will be asked how you want to fund your account. The following is important as only the initial funding can be done via credit card and you don’t want to mess this up!

Decline any offer to fund the account with a Citibank checking account or any other account you may have with another bank.
- Note: You actually can’t fund a Citibank account with a credit card online. Unlike when I opened my checking account, I was not given option to print a form to fax in my credit card information to fund the account so I would have to call in to fund it.
It is advisable to wait a day to call in to fund the account as reps can’t initially process funding on the account.
In the meantime, decide which credit card to use and set the cash advance limit to zero. Doctor of Credit maintains an excellent list of which cards will post this as a purchase vs. a cash advance. It might also be helpful to call your bank and inform them of a large purchase but I did not do this.
- I would choose either a Citibank or Barclays credit card as I haven’t read many reports of those cards posting as cash advances. I personally used my Citi Prestige. Citibank won’t accept American Express so no Amex cards will work.
- DO NOT USE a Chase card under any circumstance as this will almost always post as a cash advance.
Once you’ve waited a day call New Accounts at 1-800-745-1534.
- Protip: They are only open Monday to Friday from 9am EST to 6pm EST.
Tell the rep you opened a Savings Account yesterday and you would like to initially fund it with a credit card. My rep noted the funding would be processed as a purchase but did warn me some banks will still treat this as a cash advance and I would be responsible for any fees.
After providing my card information, my rep stated the account would be funded in a few days and in the event something went wrong, I would receive an email notifying me of the issue.

Sure enough, I checked two days later and I saw a $14,500 charge on my Citi Prestige AND $14,500 in my new Savings Account. Success!

Coded as a Purchase on my Citi Prestige

Credit Card Deposit in my Savings Account

I didn’t list it above but the only fees associated with this Savings Account is a $4.50 monthly charge if your average daily balance is less than $500. I didn’t see anything about early termination fees if you wanted to close the account right away but I personally would not do that and jeopardize your relationship with Citibank. My plan is to keep $500 in the account for a few months and close it sometime next year.

Even though I didn’t receive any signup bonus for opening this account (unlike the current Citigold offers for 50,000 ThankYou Points or 50,000 American Airlines Miles), I still think this is a worthwhile endeavor especially if you already have a checking account with Citibank from a previous offer. Opening a savings account allows you another easy opportunity to fund a bank account with a credit card for a large amount – your credit line is the only constraint! For maybe 20 minutes or so of work, I earned 14,500 Citi Thank You Points. If I redeem those points at a rate of 1.6 cents per point for AA flights, that’s worth $232 in free flights!

With how easy this is, anyone else going to try this?

November 10, 2015

There Was a Ton of Bad Blogging Yesterday

Start Rant.

Yesterday seemingly every blogger except yours truly posted about Hyatt Points & Cash awards being available online along with other features such as the ability to upgrade to club rooms using points online. That’s lovely and all (and actually quite useful for many people) but if you took the time to read through all 5,683 posts on this yesterday you could quickly figure out the good bloggers from the bad. How could you determine that? All by looking at their affiliate links or lack thereof in these posts.

Personally, I don’t believe any credit card links needed to be included in a post about Points & Cash award being available online but let’s say I’m wrong and you had to have one or two links because some bloggers are allergic to posts without credit card links (cough MileValue). One would think that breaking news involving Hyatt maybe warrants the inclusion of I don’t know the HYATT CREDIT CARD?!?! You know the one that offers 2 free nights at any Hyatt, a $50 statement credit and 5,000 points for adding an authorized user? That’s a pretty solid offer right there that you never hear about from all these “expert” bloggers.

This drove the blogosphere crazy yesterday

Instead my eyes were repeatedly slammed with Sapphire & Ink links in most of these posts. Yes, I understand that Chase Ultimate Rewards points transfer to Hyatt and you are presenting your readers with an option to earn Hyatt points via those cards. Fine I don’t love the way you’re doing it but I get it. But please explain why it is so difficult to add in a link to the Hyatt card as well? Oh wait you didn’t include it because it doesn’t pay you anything? Ah that makes more sense but for the sake of your readers you couldn’t just included it in your post along with your Sapphire and Ink links? Is it too much to gamble that a reader might choose to apply for a card that *gasps* don’t make you any money? I mean look I just included a link to it here – that wasn’t hard, it doesn’t pay me a dime and look I survived!

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again – before you go trusting all these bloggers and signing up for cards left or right from their links think about how they handle themselves on topics like this. Did they at least mention the Hyatt card in their post ? Or did they say screw the logical insertion of the arguably the most applicable credit card for the post (if one was even warranted) and instead just took it as another opportunity to blast their Chase Sapphire Preferred or Chase Ink links? It’s ~~almost~~ like they care more about padding their wallets than helping their readers….

And don’t get me started on bloggers finally getting their links for the Citi AA 50k offers and claiming the offer just returned. Newsflash the 50k offer never went away if you knew where to look!

End Rant.

Good Day.

PointsCentric

Points & Miles Travel Consulting

Monday Musings – Today Starts 10x at Amazon, No Hyatt Diamond Status For You, Free Miles and More

Monday Musings – Paris, Record Time for Amex MR to Singapore Transfer & More

My Experience Funding a New Citibank Savings Plus Account With a Credit Card

There Was a Ton of Bad Blogging Yesterday