I love credit cards so much! v2.0 (see first page for add'l details)

[Lain]

It looks like there is a 15% discount for the Grand Californian for my dates in September. It’s still so expensive. I’m so happy I bought DVC there lol. I think I narrowed it down to the DLH or the Fairfield.

Wait... when did this happen?!?!

 

[StephPlum]

My and DH's Barclay's Aviator Biz cards will be hitting one year mark next month. How are people closing? Call? Is there a chat or SM feature? Thanks.

 

[DisneyMandC]

I ordered some mickey mouse ones online a while ago. Thought I was ordering 4 books of checks but ended up ordering 4 boxes. I rarely write checks so I'll have those for the rest of my life.

I think that’s what I did! I thought I was ordering two books of checks and instead got two boxes of 6 books of checks each...

 

[gottalovepluto]

Ugh...received a letter from Chase that the 2018 1099 they issued me was incorrect and a corrected one will be sent by July 30th....
not sure what’s going on since my support was just over the $600 and I though match my records...going to have to double check everything

They also offer to reimburse any fees paid for filing an amended return

A couple people on Reddit seem to have gotten them as well. How... odd. I concur with @SouthFayetteFan my first thought was maybe a misclasification of the tax year of bonus/es received in Dec/Jan. I really don’t know what else it could be at this point- unless you see even a small typo on your 1099? But that wouldn’t require re-filing your taxes... If they’re charging the value of URs a ton more people ought to be getting the letter in the next couple days.

 

[tink1970]

Yup, the navy jammies are the old ones. On our most recent BA flight we got black jammies that are softer and come in ladies or men's not unisex. The ladies ones have a satin trim at the collar that plunges and crosses over a tad and seems to keep you cooler. Here's a picture so you can see what I mean. They still don't compare to Emirates, Singapore or JAL but they are definitely better than the navy ones.

Thank you for the great news!! Those unisex no hips pjs were not flattering on me. I told DH I need to try out the new ones and he said "guess we have to schedule that." Doesn't that sound like a trip to Scotland to y'all? Yes, me too!

 

[speedyfishy]

Wait... when did this happen?!?!

Oh, I forgot I only shared in our DVC PM group. I passed ROFR on a 100 point Grand Californian contract a few weeks ago? I paid a ridiculous $199 a point because SO didn’t let me negotiate but it will pay for itself.

 

[3 DD love princesses]

Success at one of the staples. So stopped by one close to DH’s MD office and they would only allow 1 per customer and they said the same thing about the girls.

Then stopped at another one on the way to my parents and success. I took one up and asked the guy if I could do more than 1. He said 1k. So I said thanks. Then I asked after I was done would it be possible to do another transaction and he said yes. So an hour later all of them have been used on plastiq. I registered them with my info and then used them by just adding the card. Now going to push my luck and try to get another 2k tomorrow before his surgery. Then I’ll be able to pay the rest of the Mortage

 

[palhockeymomof2]

A couple people on Reddit seem to have gotten them as well. How... odd. I concur with @SouthFayetteFan my first thought was maybe a misclasification of the tax year of bonus/es received in Dec/Jan. I really don’t know what else it could be at this point- unless you see even a small typo on your 1099? But that wouldn’t require re-filing your taxes... If they’re charging the value of URs a ton more people ought to be getting the letter in the next couple days.

Agree it’s very odd...I double checked today going over my statements....will wait and see what the new 1099 shows.....they better not be adding the yearly RR anniversary points to the 1099

 

[Alexle2007]

I am ALL ABOUT pjs! I can't remember if I told y'all that DH left his on the plane after our BA 1st flight to LHR over Christmas and I was very annoyed with him, as perhaps you can imagine. We're flying first in Qantas in seven long months and he's been told very directly "do NOT leave the pjs on board." I've heard him walking around the house muttering "take the pjs, take the pjs."Thank goodness we live a quiet life or some might worry about him.

That said, I lovemy old style United Polaris more than the BA-they are roomier and I like the dark gray. I'm excited to check out both Qantas and Virgin Australia styles and I'll report back

I believe your trip is in Feb, correct? You aren’t headed to the rainforest north of Cairns are you? I believe that is their rainy season and the roads can flood out. (I hope I am recalling the info correct from 19 ago when we went.)

 

[Lain]

Do you mind sharing what is a “great” price or even a decent target price? DH wants to do Hawai’i next year. I have read a lot lately on flights but still seem soooo lost. It is hard to know where to even begin. I have the hotels covered.

From the west coast, the lowest I've been seeing is around $300 roundtrip, for travel midweek in both directions; weekends will bump that up to the mid-$300s to $400 roundtrip. The "low" season tends to be when most kids are in school, so between about February through the first week of June, and September through early November. From the midwest (like ORD) or east coast (e.g., BOS, JFK, LGA, EWR), I've seen low fares in the low to mid-$500s.

I'm not aware of any flights to Hawaii out of BNA, so you'll need to take a positioning flight, maybe to ORD, LAS, or somewhere in California. Hawaiian flies out of Las Vegas, and SFO, OAK, SJC, LAX, SMF, SAN, and LGB in California. Southwest flies out of SJC and OAK right now. SFO and LAX will have most/all? of the major carriers.

You can set up fare alerts on sites like Google Flights, Skyscanner, or Kayak. You can also check blogs like theflightdeal .com. TPG seems to pull a lot of fare deals from that site, but they have more visibility.

ETA: These are cash fares, which you can obviously redeem for with UR points. I haven't done a comparison between the different points programs in a while so I can't really say, and we tend to stick to Hawaiian or United for our flights since DW has a pile of HawaiianMiles and I have a lot of United miles with SFO being a United hub.

ETA2: Here's a recent article from SFGate's resident travel writer about searching Google Flights and Southwest: https://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/How-to-find-cheap-fares-to-Hawaii-13705557.php

 

[tink1970]

I believe your trip is in Feb, correct? You aren’t headed to the rainforest north of Cairns are you? I believe that is their rainy season and the roads can flood out. (I hope I am recalling the info correct from 19 ago when we went.)

Yes, February, but no not anywhere near Cairns, unfortunately --just Sydney, Melbourne and Tasmania and lots of places in NZ. DH and I agreed we really couldn't be gone from the dogs longer than 3 weeks (and we're missing DD's first college Spring Break so there's already some drama).

 

[kmc8826]

It looks like there is a 15% discount for the Grand Californian for my dates in September. It’s still so expensive. I’m so happy I bought DVC there lol. I think I narrowed it down to the DLH or the Fairfield.

I have only owned a year but DVC paying for itself is really clear trying to make other room reservations here and there. For both our upcoming trips I don’t want to burn DVC points so just booked one night with the AP discount for arrival nights. Still paying $300 for a moderate is crazy. And when I think that my points will be there for next year too it is even more exciting. I knew that intellectually but going through the booking process has made me really understand it. Getting it all paid off kind of sucks (sorry Amex I am using my 0% APR’s to pay for DRR) but I am so glad I finally just bought in.

 

[kmc8826]

@disneymagicgirl SLC has a bunch of flights to Hawaii too. When we went last year it was direct to Maui for 35000 skymiles. So if you could get to a delta hub like SLC that might be an affordable option. You would just need to watch for the flash sales.

 

[Lain]

Oh, I forgot I only shared in our DVC PM group. I passed ROFR on a 100 point Grand Californian contract a few weeks ago? I paid a ridiculous $199 a point because SO didn’t let me negotiate but it will pay for itself.

Congratulations!

You bought there because the acronym is VGC, didn't you?

It's so poetic that your VGC MS paid for your VGC DVC!

What does 100 points at the VGC get you?

 

[gottalovepluto]

Agree it’s very odd...I double checked today going over my statements....will wait and see what the new 1099 shows.....they better not be adding the yearly RR anniversary points to the 1099

This person said they got a leter referencing their Marriott account and that they know Chase under-reported their referrals on the first 1099. This one says their referrals were reported correctly and it was with regards to a UR card. So, it looks like not just URs are being corrected

 

[palhockeymomof2]

This person said they got a leter referencing their Marriott account and that they know Chase under-reported their referrals on the first 1099. This one says their referrals were reported correctly and it was with regards to a UR card. So, it looks like not just URs are being corrected

Edited .....oops it does reference the last 4 numbers on my CIP...so I am guessing it’s the $200 earned in 2018...that posted in 2019

 

[platamama]

Quoting myself in hopes of more opinions



Thank you! I'm feeling a little nervous about a CIP#2 right away ugh A CIC makes sense because of the 5x at Staples etc but it's so many fewer UR!

I know, that AF is just so high. Bleh. I'm trying to weigh the positives against the AF.

My questions today--

1. Should dh PC his CSP to a CF or a CFU? I know the math on opening one of those cards points to the CF. Do you think it's the same with a PC? He'll only carry two cards at the most.
2. What AMEX would be best for him to start with? I haven't checked in a couple months to see if we can pull up a 100K Plat offer for him. If it isn't there, would you start at the 75K incognito offer (assuming it's available)? If that's not available, is another personal AMEX better? He will not go for a business card at this time.
3. CIP2 or CIC for me? We are currently 40K UR from being able to book everything we can on points for Australia Sept/Oct. Or should I use the AA biz mailer or email code I have? I don't know if I want to further diversify our points yet because I don't know what we'll be doing in 2021.

Thanks for taking a second (or first) look I'll need to get dh's new card soon for a big ol' United airlines spend.

Ok, I'll take a go at this! Just my 2cents.

1. I personally find a CF to be more useful to me than an CFU just because of the 5x categories. Maxing out one quarter gives me 7500 URs on $1500 spend, whereas I'd have to spend $5000 to get the same 7500 URs on the CFU (the $3500 difference in spend is close to a whole 'nother MSR!). Sometimes the 5x categories are pretty lame (like the current one IMHO), but on the whole I use the CF more (I have 2 of them where 1 was a pc from CSP; DH has 1 CF, and 1 CFU which was a pc from CSP). As you can see, I've pc'd our CSPs into one of each, haha! Doesn't the CFU have a $100 support bonus though? However that's probably only relevant if you're thinking of getting one for yourself, and from the sounds of it that's not in your near future. My vote is CF.

2. If your DH doesn't get the 100K Plat offer, or the 75K incognito Plat offer, my vote goes to the personal Amex Gold card available with a 50K MR/$2K MSR SUB via support link. 4x restaurants, 4x grocery stores ($25K cap), 3x airlines, $100 airline incidental credit, $10/mo. dining credit. $250 AF with no foreign transaction fees. I think of all the MR cards I manage including DH's (BBP, Biz Plat, Biz Gold, Biz Green, vanilla Plat, Gold) the Gold has the best Amex offers. The sad thing about it is no Centurion lounge access.

3. I'm hesitant about the CIP2 or CIC given your heavy Chase activity in the past 12 months. Even though the biz cards don't count toward your 5/24, Chase is fully aware that you've opened 5 Chase cards in the past 12 months. By Sept 1 you'll still be at 5 in 12. Some others might pipe in with their opinions on your Chase velocity. Those last 40K URs seem tantalizingly close, but I don't think I'd personally feel comfortable going for another Chase card now. I'll also just mention that if you anticipate using the CSR's travel protection, it helps to have some paid on the CSR card that shows up on a billing statement when you make a claim, so there is a positive aspect to you paying some OOP for your tickets. There is a really good write up about that recently at https://milenomics.com/2019/07/using-chase-sapphire-reserve-travel-insurance-benefits-in-real-life/

I'm not sure what to say about the AA Biz mailer, only because whatever the SUB is, it's probably not sufficient to get you overseas flights depending on your goals. If you have a use in mind for the AA miles then I think it's a good way to spend some MSR while letting your Chase accounts season longer.

 

[speedyfishy]

Congratulations!

You bought there because the acronym is VGC, didn't you?

It's so poetic that your VGC MS paid for your VGC DVC!

What does 100 points at the VGC get you?

Haha omg I didn’t even think of that. 100 points will get us like 5 ish nights in a studio at the time we like to travel. But I think we will need to use 200 a year when we have kids and alternate every year and stay at DLH. I will eventually add more points but I want either the poly or BLT.

 

[Alexle2007]

From the west coast, the lowest I've been seeing is around $300 roundtrip, for travel midweek in both directions; weekends will bump that up to the mid-$300s to $400 roundtrip. The "low" season tends to be when most kids are in school, so between about February through the first week of June, and September through early November. From the midwest (like ORD) or east coast (e.g., BOS, JFK, LGA, EWR), I've seen low fares in the low to mid-$500s.

I'm not aware of any flights to Hawaii out of BNA, so you'll need to take a positioning flight, maybe to ORD, LAS, or somewhere in California. Hawaiian flies out of Las Vegas, and SFO, OAK, SJC, LAX, SMF, SAN, and LGB in California. Southwest flies out of SJC and OAK right now. SFO and LAX will have most/all? of the major carriers.

You can set up fare alerts on sites like Google Flights, Skyscanner, or Kayak. You can also check blogs like theflightdeal .com. TPG seems to pull a lot of fare deals from that site, but they have more visibility.

ETA: These are cash fares, which you can obviously redeem for with UR points. I haven't done a comparison between the different points programs in a while so I can't really say, and we tend to stick to Hawaiian or United for our flights since DW has a pile of HawaiianMiles and I have a lot of United miles with SFO being a United hub.

ETA2: Here's a recent article from SFGate's resident travel writer about searching Google Flights and Southwest: https://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/How-to-find-cheap-fares-to-Hawaii-13705557.php

Doesn’t Hawaiian also fly out of PHX? I thought I checked once when I thought about visiting my in-laws in conjunction with a trip.

 

[Lain]

Doesn’t Hawaiian also fly out of PHX? I thought I checked once when I thought about visiting my in-laws in conjunction with a trip.

Yes it does!