June 9, 2015

Award Trip Breakdown: My Long Weekend in Seattle for Only $11.20

*Yes this is a review of how I used miles for a domestic weekend trip. I want to show that not everyone has to redeem miles for first class flights and 5 star hotels just to get the “best value per mile.” The experience of visiting a good friend and having a great time exploring a new city with them is worth more than any metric valuing miles.

Last weekend my wife and I visited a good friend of ours who moved out to Seattle and we successfully used points & miles to make our total travel & lodging costs $11.20 for the weekend. As much I love redeeming miles for premium cabin international tickets since that generally returns the greatest value on a cent per mile basis, I won’t hesitate to redeem miles for domestic trips even if I only get a penny or less in value. I’m sure some will argue that the below is a poor use of miles but for a trip like this, the value received can’t be calculated on a per mile basis since the value is the fun and memories of a good time with friends. Without points & miles, we were looking at shelling out over $1,700 for travel for this weekend and that wasn’t an option. Here is how we traveled to & stayed in Seattle for $11.20. Part 2 of this award trip breakdown will share some fun activities I recommend others do when visiting Seattle especially if you are an #avgeek.

Seattle3

Since we were going from Thursday to Sunday and I could only use one vacation day at work, it was imperative we left Thursday after work and returned in time for work Monday morning. This meant ideally finding non-stop flights Thursday after 6pm as I had no desire to land around 1am on a connecting flight as it would be 4am on my body at that point. For the return, a Sunday night red-eye was our goal to maximize our time in Seattle but our flights would be limited to a choice of JetBlue or Delta as we did not want to fly into Newark since we live on Long Island.

On the outbound to Seattle, we found flights on Delta leaving at 6:40pm and arriving in Seattle at 10:02pm for $162 each one way. We had $400 in Delta gift cards from using the airline credit on various Platinum cards so the outbound flights were no cost out of pocket. We even upgraded to Delta Comfort + for $99 each for free using part of my $300 annual travel credit on my Ritz Carlton credit card. Delta Comfort + provided free drinks, free entertainment and additional leg room – for our 5.5 hour flight it was worth it.

DeltaComfort+

For the return flight, our options were limited since we wanted a non-stop red-eye and Delta proved to be the best option from a mileage perspective. The Delta flight was ~$275 one way while the JetBlue flight was closer to $350! I chose to redeem 20,000 Delta Skymiles + $5.60 each for this one way flight – yes, I felt dirty not redeeming miles at the lowest level but it was still better using 40,000 miles for the two of us instead of paying $550.

The hotel was quite easy for us to figure out – my wife signed up for the Citi Hilton Reserve back in May 2014 and hit the spending requirement in June 2014 to get two free weekend nights which meant we had a year to use those free nights. Our goal was to use them in Italy at some point but for various reasons that trip fell through and I needed to use them before they expired in June 2015. I chose the Hilton Seattle which was centrally located downtown and retailing for $249/night + tax for the weekend. These free nights covered Friday and Saturday but I still needed to figure out Thursday night. While I could have stayed elsewhere and used fewer points, I decided that it wasn’t worth it to us to switch hotels on such a short stay. I made our hotel costs completely free by using 50,000 Hilton HHonors points for Thursday night. Upon checkout, our bill was $0.00 – absolutely no taxes or fees.

Hilton Seattle

In total, our airfare + hotel costs came to $11.20 which was the taxes on the return flight to New York. Was this my best redemption from a mileage perspective or the most exciting? Of course not but I want to illustrate that you should not be afraid to use your miles for a domestic trip that would otherwise be impossible without points & miles. This trip would have cost us over $1,700 in travel costs alone which is sort of crazy for a long weekend in the States.

In Part 2 of this post, I’ll review some of the exciting things we did and what I think is a perfect itinerary for a long weekend in Seattle.

June 5, 2015

I Made Money by Paying a $40 Annual Fee on the JetBlue American Express Card

One card you never hear talked about in the points & miles world is the American Express JetBlue credit card and I can see why. The signup bonus is weak at only 20,000 points, TrueBlue points are worth less compared to other frequent flyer miles, you can only redeem points on JetBlue (or Hawaiian Airlines) flights and JetBlue’s flight network is mainly confined to the continental 48 states, Anchorage, Mexico and the Caribbean. Being based in New York, I have plenty of chances to fly JetBlue but I will have exactly one roundtrip flight with them this year. So with all that said, I decided to pay $40 to renew my card so I could make money. Let me explain.

Jet_blue_card

First, let’s start with why I have this card. Last year, American Express announced that as of May 1st, 2014 if you ever had a personal American Express card, you would not be eligible for another signup bonus on that card for the rest of your life. At that point, I looked at what American Express cards I had there were already closed that had signup bonuses and it was the JetBlue Card. I proceeded to apply for it again before the 5/1/14 deadline and earned an extra 20,000 TrueBlue points that I would not be able to earn again.

Now a year later the $40 annual fee was due and I had decision to make to cancel the card or pay the annual fee. At first blush, I thought I was going to cancel the card as I don’t fly JetBlue often (even if I did, I don’t think it makes a difference unless you really value the 50% off in-flight food/drinks) and I solely got this card for the 20,000 points a year ago. However, I knew I was going to ask for a retention offer since you should always do that before closing a card. If I got the fee waived, a statement credit for $40 or points equivalent to $40, I’d keep the card open since I’d essentially be even.

Except that’s not true. American Express in the past few months has had several great Amex Offers (Sam’s Club, Smart & Final, Whole Foods and a bunch of others I’m forgetting) and I think its fair to say over the next 12 months, I could definitely find a few to take advantage of. And I’m betting that American Express will run its Small Business Saturday promotion in November which was worth $30 per card last year. If I value the annual savings from Amex Offers at $30 (which is low in my opinion) and Small Business Saturday at $30 (just like last year), I’m actually up $20 after paying the $40 annual fee.

But wait – it gets better. That analysis above is assuming I just have my JetBlue card with no authorized users. As you probably know, you can add Amex Offers to authorized users cards AND those cards are also eligible for Small Business Saturday. You can have up to 5 additional authorized users so if you maxed this out this could be worth $300 ($60 per authorized user). 

American Express lets me add up to 5 authorized users

American Express lets me add up to 5 authorized users

Suddenly, it was quite clear – I will make money by paying the $40 annual fee. There is no way I should cancel this card and that’s true even if I don’t get a retention offer (though I did – see below).

In closing, I think there are two lessons to take away from this.

Lesson 1: To always ask for an offer before closing an account. I literally told the agent on the phone unless I get an offer with points or a statement credit to waive the fee, I will be closing this card now. I didn’t expect to get an offer based on my research I did prior to calling so I was pleasantly surprised. When the agent offered 2,500 TrueBlue points for not cancelling the card, I took it immediately. Valuing those points at 1.3 cents each, that retention offer was worth an extra $32.50 to me.

Lesson 2: The obvious choice isn’t always the right choice. Assuming you agree with my decision to open the card in the first place, I’m sure the consensus from others getting the card would be to close it after one year no matter what. There is no upside to renewing such as bonus points or other upfront perks that other cards offer for renewing. However, by digging down just a little bit, I realized I could make a profit by renewing this card if I used some Amex offers, took advantage of Small Business Saturday and added some authorized users. The icing on the cake would be if I got a retention offer as well. When I did the math above, I came out net positive so I kept the card as well as helping my credit score by not closing another card and shortening the average length of my accounts.

Do you agree with my rationale to keep my card open another year?

June 2, 2015

Point & Center: $5 Free at iTunes for Virgin Atlantic CardHolders, Increased Delta Offers, a 10% Cashback Card & More

I’m slowly getting back into the swing of things after our latest trip so here are a few real quick items to know.

1) $5 Free at iTunes for Virgin Atlantic Card Members – I got an email from Virgin Atlantic below offering me $5 off a $5+ purchase at iTunes if I paid with my Virgin Atlantic credit card. I’m unable to tell if this is for all Virgin Atlantic card members or whether it is targeted. I admit the email did look like spam at first so check your email inbox for an email with the subject “An iTunes® offer that’s music to your ears”. This is an easy and free $5 so check your email if you have a Virgin Atlantic credit card.

iTunesOffer

2) Increased Delta Credit Card Offers – American Express has increased the offers on the Delta Gold SkyMiles and Platinum Delta SkyMiles credits cards through June 30th. The Delta Gold card is offering 50,000 miles + $50 statement for spending $2,000 in 3 months with the annual fee of $95 waived for the first year. The Platinum SkyMiles card is offering 60,000 miles + $100 statement + 10,000 MQMs for spending $2,000 in 3 months with the annual fee of $195 NOT waived for the first year. The offers have also increased on the business version of these cards as well.

DeltaOffer

While these offers are among the highest I’ve seen on the Delta cards, Delta miles are worth less than other airline miles. My most recent SkyMiles redemption? 20,000 miles one way for SEA to JFK as the flight was selling for over $300. Sure I got 1.5 cents in value but paying 20,000 miles one way for a domestic flight in economy left me feeling dirty. If you can’t tell, I’m not a huge fan of Delta right now.

3) 10% Cashback Card – Discover is having a promotion in which they are doubling their normal cash back percentages on the Discover IT card for a year. Since the card offers a rotating list of 5% cash back offers quarterly, this mean those quarterly promotions are now offering 10% cash back on purchases. Unfortunately that is limited to $1,500 in spending per quarter but that’s still $150 a quarter ($600 a year) in your pocket if you max it out. This offer is valid for both new and existing cardmembers.

I would read this Doctor of Credit post for more details about the offer and how to get it. 

4) American Express Premier Rewards Gold Changes Now In Effect – I’ve posted previously about some of the changes coming to the Premier Rewards Gold card and as of yesterday, those changes are now in effect. The biggest changes are a $20 increase in the annual fee to $195 but it now also offers a $100 airline credit, no foreign transaction fees and 2x points on US restaurants. The airline credit should be similar to the airline credit offered on the Platinum card in that it is calendar year based so you can take advantage twice before having to pay another annual fee and buying gift cards for certain airlines should still work. I don’t think this card is worth keeping past the first year but I will look to add this card to my collection soon.

May 22, 2015

PSA: You Shouldn’t Apply for that Starwood Credit Card Just Yet…

This past week there was a blitzkrieg of posts from every other points blogger under the sun about the lower spending requirements on the Starwood American Express credit card. Of course most bloggers that I follow (with the exception of Miles to Memories) highly recommended applying for the card now while the spending requirement was only $3,000 in 3 months vs. the standard requirement of $5,000 in 6 months. I can’t argue that compared to the regular offer, this new offer is no doubt an improvement but it is nothing that makes me jumps to apply for the card. Today’s advice is real simple – I think you can wait to apply for this card & you will most likely be able to score an offer that is 20% better.

What I am talking about? I am talking about how once a year (usually around summertime), for the past several years, American Express has annually raised the signup bonus on the Starwood American Express card to 30,000 Starpoints. Here is a list of when over the past few years the publicly available bonus has increased to 30,000 Starpoints. Anyone spot a trend?

  • June 2014
  • August 2013
  • August 2012
  • August 2011
  • July 2010

SPG30k

That’s a pretty serious pattern and while I have no inside knowledge to it, I would wager it happens again in the next few months (or sooner). I’m sure some of you might be questioning why I’m recommending you should wait a few months for an offer that is only 5k points higher and will most likely revert back to the $5k spending requirement. I do have a few reasons:

  • Starpoints are incredibly difficult to earn – the only feasible way to earn them is via the Starwood credit card and staying at SPG hotels. Since it is difficult to earn these points in bulk, an extra 5k Starpoints is a big difference to me. And to the average person who doesn’t manufacture spend that equates to spending an extra $5,000 on your SPG Amex to make up that extra 5k points.
  • American Express limits you to one bonus per lifetime on the personal card. Basically you only get one shot to signup for this card to earn a bonus so you better make it count. I won’t signup for a personal American Express card unless I know at that point in time, that is the highest ever known offer on a card.
  • Starpoints are one of the most valuable, if not most valuable, points out there. Great flexibility with dozens of airline transfer partners, a transfer bonus of 5k when transferring in 20k increments and some great hotel redemptions in the Starwood chain. Weekend nights for 2k or 3k points a night? Yes please.

Look, I know it sounds like I’m selling the card above but I’m not (not a single link in this post from this no affiliate links blogger) – I’m simply trying to point out the virtues of waiting. American Express reduced the spending requirement to entice some new members to signup but since American Express limits you to one bonus a lifetime, you need to get each Amex card at its peak signup bonus offer. That’s why my PSA is to resist the temptation to signup today and hold out for the better offer which will most likely be coming in weeks or months. I can’t guarantee it but as a man with an undiagnosed gambling problem, I’d bet on it.