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

[Andysol]

Thanks! And congrats on the CIP bonus! I’ve been around for quite a while but mostly lurk. I’ve looked a little more into that ANA RTW ticket on reddit. A few have commented on how tiring it would be, which I could see. With 8 stops though it seems like a fun way to hit all the international Disney parks and see some sights at the same time. Better start earning those MRs

I feel like someone has mentioned those tickets on this thread before. @calypso726 @Andysol @Albort @gottalovepluto @CaliforniaGirl09 @Calfan @*WDW*Groupie* come to mind as those crazy enough to do it. lol

I'm one that's crazy enough.

I actually got J availability for 4 for next year, which is no easy task. Not ideal airlines/routes, but for 4, no complaints.

Dallas-Toronto-London on Air Canada
Venice-Vienna on Austrian
Vienna-Istanbul-Ho Chi Minh City on Turkish
Bangkok-Seoul on Thai
Seoul-Honolulu on Air Asiana

54 Nights and several inter-country small flights not included. London-Paris train (will do Disneyland Paris). Paris-Rome via small flight, Rome-Florence-Vienna train, throughout Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and to Bangkok are small puddle jump flights.

Ended up being 105k MR + ~$600 per person.

You could easily make a Japan-Hong Kong-Shanghai-Paris route though and hit all the parks. Going west to east is a bit tougher for availability but easier for jetlag for most people. East to west is better availability. And with 4, that's what I had to do. Getting to and from Japan will be your hardest leg to find availability for J.

 

[GPC0321]

Thanks for the replies, guys. I wasn't sure about the fees, but good to see it can be used for that too, as well as gift cards.

Looks like the Priority card is the way to go for me!

 

[afan]

It was only $200 idk why he was bugging. When I went to the other staples they didn’t even ask to see the ID. Plus I always show my ID at grocery stores getting VGCs and no one has ever commented on my out of state ID. It was weird.

What's it to him? You could be an out of state student. Or if I remember you're close enough to DC you could be a congressional staffer which means you aren't a full time res of VA. My guess he or someone close to him got caught and a ticket so he's annoyed he sees others that haven't switched. Plus you could have moved there 3 weeks ago.

 

[Haley R]

My brief googling tells me that EZ pass is only good for central Florida for now. Can't use it for sunpass. So weird to have multiple ones in one state. We drive from NH and use EZ pass all the way down... Til Florida. Will have to do some more googling in December, when we drive to Kennedy Space Center.

We live by the Kennedy Space Center and our E-Pass works great for trips to Orlando.

 

[vanjust14]

Looking for experiences using the $75 travel credit on the Southwest Priority card. I think I've read that it works for Early Bird Check-in. It is usually $90 for us to do EBCI. Will the $75 be automatically credited once that expense is put on the card?

Other than EBCI, is there another good use for the credit for those of us who fly on points?

Thanks!

I have been using it to erase our $5.60 fee.

Same!

Quoting myself to see if anyone has any input.

I didn't try Dosh but T-Mobile Money worked for my Chase DD

 

[speedyfishy]

What's it to him? You could be an out of state student. Or if I remember you're close enough to DC you could be a congressional staffer which means you aren't a full time res of VA. My guess he or someone close to him got caught and a ticket so he's annoyed he sees others that haven't switched. Plus you could have moved there 3 weeks ago.

Exactly I just said I was a student and he was kinda arguing and said again I have 90 days to change it and I was like no my permanent residence is at my fathers house in NY. I really should change it but we are looking to move soon and I don’t want to deal with it all again just to change it again.

 

[striker1064]

Do you put spend on all your cards?

Hah! That's funny. No, never. Almost all of my cards are sock-drawered. The only exception is I recently got the $15k free night on the Hilton Biz, so maybe all of that spend (since January) has me in Amex's good graces. Doesn't explain the Hilton no-AF, Aspire, and Surpass that have been gathering dust though.

It was only $200 idk why he was bugging. When I went to the other staples they didn’t even ask to see the ID. Plus I always show my ID at grocery stores getting VGCs and no one has ever commented on my out of state ID. It was weird.

Any particular reason why you haven't changed it over, out of curiosity? Seems like more trouble than it's worth these days to not have your ID accurately reflect your address.

 

[chattadisser]

Whoo hoo, DH's points are pending on his CIP for the MSR!! Now, I can have him refer me for CIP2 till later this month. I thought I had read something to be cautious when drinking from the CIPpy cup??? I went back through the news feed on Dischurners but didn't see anything. Anything to be aware of other than not self-referring? Right now we value UR's the most, they're the most versatile for what we may use them for. We're both under 5/24 (2/24 and 3/24) so we could do a personal later if we wanted.

 

[speedyfishy]

Hah! That's funny. No, never. Almost all of my cards are sock-drawered. The only exception is I recently got the $15k free night on the Hilton Biz, so maybe all of that spend (since January) has me in Amex's good graces. Doesn't explain the Hilton no-AF, Aspire, and Surpass that have been gathering dust though.



Any particular reason why you haven't changed it over, out of curiosity? Seems like more trouble than it's worth these days to not have your ID accurately reflect your address.

Well when I first moved I was going to school so I didn’t have to. And then I was not happy here and have been begging my SO to move back home ever since lol now he is finally on board with moving but we are waiting for the right opportunity. He has turned down a few offers. We also have no idea where exactly we are moving too he isn’t thrilled with going back home but we will see. So anyway since we are actively looking for new opportunities it just doesn’t seem worth it. My dad has been lecturing me about it but i would also have to change my car registration and I hear in VA you have to pay some huge tax or something? I also don’t want to do that.

 

[RoyalJay]

I'm one that's crazy enough.

I actually got J availability for 4 for next year, which is no easy task. Not ideal airlines/routes, but for 4, no complaints.

Dallas-Toronto-London on Air Canada
Venice-Vienna on Austrian
Vienna-Istanbul-Ho Chi Minh City on Turkish
Bangkok-Seoul on Thai
Seoul-Honolulu on Air Asiana

54 Nights and several inter-country small flights not included. London-Paris train (will do Disneyland Paris). Paris-Rome via small flight, Rome-Florence-Vienna train, throughout Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and to Bangkok are small puddle jump flights.

Ended up being 105k MR + ~$600 per person.

You could easily make a Japan-Hong Kong-Shanghai-Paris route though and hit all the parks. Going west to east is a bit tougher for availability but easier for jetlag for most people. East to west is better availability. And with 4, that's what I had to do. Getting to and from Japan will be your hardest leg to find availability for J.

That is awesome I’m very jealous. I have 5 so it would be even tougher. But I’m thinking this is my summer 2021 goal. Hopefully I’d have the MRs by then. I think I know the answer but back to my original question, there’s no good way to convert URs for this other than with a big ratio loss, right?

 

[Andysol]

That is awesome I’m very jealous. I have 5 so it would be even tougher. But I’m thinking this is my summer 2021 goal. Hopefully I’d have the MRs by then. I think I know the answer but back to my original question, there’s no good way to convert URs for this other than with a big ratio loss, right?

Just saw your original post, sorry.

If Summer 2021 is the goal, you have tons of time. A couple Biz plats, a couple personal plats and a couple of personal/biz golds and you're there. You're not as far off as you think. Anyone with healthy spend should be able to stockpile 575k MR in a year if you stay focused.

Has anyone done the ANA RTW ticket? I'm trying to figure out what points I can use to purchase that. I do have a stash of MRs, but also have a family of 5 so I figure business class will cost me at least 575,000 miles. I also have URs, Marriott rewards, HH, AA, and Delta. So, is there any way to transfer either URs (or United) points to buy the RTW ticket that I'm not thinking of? I know you can transfer URs to Marriott, then move all combined URs and Marriott points to ANA, but you would lose 1/3 value of the URs in that route. Originally I hoped I could transfer all of my URs to United since it was Star Alliance and do it that way, but now I'm thinking that's not right. My research says I just have to wait and accumulate MRs, which is fine, but just wondering if I'm missing anything.

That would be a terrible, terrible use of points. UR to Marriott makes me almost die inside. Marriott to ANA finishes the job.

UR currently has two main purposes post the United deval:
-Transfer to Hyatt, which is the biggest value
-Booking travel via UR Portal w/ a CSR (or CSP/CIP at worst) @ 1.5cpp

Marriott/HH/AA/Delta should be used for their respective chains.

You just need to start stockpiling MR. J availability for 5 is going to be a bit of a pain but doable. You, like me, will have to pick non-ideal airlines and potentially be economy for a small leg or two. Example- I couldve gone from Vietnam to Taipei on EVA economy, but only availability out of Vietnam in J was Asiana, Air China or a lucky Thai route to Bangkok.

3 Must-Have websites:
www.flightconnections.com is one resource to see what star alliance flies and out of where.
www.United.com will be your other one to see which flight has saver avaibility. Saver availability = you're good. ETA here: Don't log onto united while searching. Because if you search logged in it'll give you "exclusive" saver routes. Those won't transpose to ANA and aren't available.
https://matrix.itasoftware.com is your last one to check your exact fees you'll be paying. Europe is notorious for high fees so be very conscience here. American or British through LHR would be $650/person alone. Air Canada was $5.60.

Istanbul will be a necessity for you whether going east or west. You're going to fly Turkish through IST for certain at that'll be ~$300 fees/pp there alone. Good thing about IST though, is you can plan a long layover and do a free city tour that Turkish puts on. They'll even feed you. The longer layover you can swing here, the better.

You're limited to 8 stopovers and 13 segments. Ground transfers count as a stopover.
Example, I'm doing DFW-YYC-LHR then train to paris then plane to rome then train to venice. VEN-VIE is my next flight under my RTW ticket. But LHR is a stopover, Venice is one, and Vienna is one. So that's 3 stopovers and 5 segments.

The other thing to keep track of is which plane flights what segment. Not all J are created equal. But with 5, the bottom line is: beggers can't be choosers. You'll have to take what you can get and be happy about it.

 

[CaliforniaGirl09]

I feel like someone has mentioned those tickets on this thread before. @calypso726 @Andysol @Albort @gottalovepluto @CaliforniaGirl09 @Calfan @*WDW*Groupie* come to mind as those crazy enough to do it. lol

Ha, I am indeed—don’t give me ideas

 

[1st*toright]

I'm one that's crazy enough.

I actually got J availability for 4 for next year, which is no easy task. Not ideal airlines/routes, but for 4, no complaints.

Dallas-Toronto-London on Air Canada
Venice-Vienna on Austrian
Vienna-Istanbul-Ho Chi Minh City on Turkish
Bangkok-Seoul on Thai
Seoul-Honolulu on Air Asiana

54 Nights and several inter-country small flights not included. London-Paris train (will do Disneyland Paris). Paris-Rome via small flight, Rome-Florence-Vienna train, throughout Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and to Bangkok are small puddle jump flights.

Ended up being 105k MR + ~$600 per person.

You could easily make a Japan-Hong Kong-Shanghai-Paris route though and hit all the parks. Going west to east is a bit tougher for availability but easier for jetlag for most people. East to west is better availability. And with 4, that's what I had to do. Getting to and from Japan will be your hardest leg to find availability for J.

Just one question - can I come? Sounds amazing!

 

[platamama]

I tried to close CitiBizAA#2 via chat but they wouldn't let me. I had to call it in, well turns out I had a retention offer of 9000 bonus miles if I spend $1000/mo for 9 months. HAHA, no, I'm good. Anyhow, now it's closed, I double checked online. In about a week, I'll chance going for #3 (#1 and #2 closed) with an expired mailer. I'm going to be the DP I want to see!

 

[Andysol]

Just one question - can I come? Sounds amazing!

Maybe. Send pics and I'll decide.

 

[RoyalJay]

Just saw your original post, sorry.

If Summer 2021 is the goal, you have tons of time. A couple Biz plats, a couple personal plats and a couple of personal/biz golds and you're there. You're not as far off as you think. Anyone with healthy spend should be able to stockpile 575k MR in a year if you stay focused.



That would be a terrible, terrible use of points. UR to Marriott makes me almost die inside. Marriott to ANA finishes the job.

UR currently has two main purposes post the United deval:
-Transfer to Hyatt, which is the biggest value
-Booking travel via UR Portal w/ a CSR (or CSP/CIP at worst) @ 1.5cpp

Marriott/HH/AA/Delta should be used for their respective chains.

You just need to start stockpiling MR. J availability for 5 is going to be a bit of a pain but doable. You, like me, will have to pick non-ideal airlines and potentially be economy for a small leg or two. Example- I couldve gone from Vietnam to Taipei on EVA economy, but only availability out of Vietnam in J was Asiana, Air China or a lucky Thai route to Bangkok.

3 Must-Have websites:
www.flightconnections.com is one resource to see what star alliance flies and out of where.
www.United.com will be your other one to see which flight has saver avaibility. Saver availability = you're good.
https://matrix.itasoftware.com is your last one to check your exact fees you'll be paying. Europe is notorious for high fees so be very conscience here. American or British through LHR would be $650/person alone. Air Canada was $5.60.

You're limited to 8 stopovers and 13 segments. Ground transfers count as a stopover.
Example, I'm doing DFW-YYC-LHR then train to paris then plane to rome then train to venice. VEN-VIE is my next flight under my RTW ticket. But LHR is a stopover, Venice is one, and Vienna is one. So that's 3. 5 segments.

The other thing to keep track of is which plane flights what segment. Not all J are created equal. But with 5, the bottom line is: beggers can't be choosers. You'll have to take what you can get and be happy about it.

This is great information thanks so much! I’ll keep all of this mind as I plan it out.

Sort of as an aside, other than SUBs and category spend (both of which I’m working on) is there a good way to work up my MR balance through MS? I haven’t done the whole Serve thing, and from what I’m reading Amex frowns on the gift card purchases anyway. Plastiq restricts what you can use Amex for. Are there other options I’m missing?

 

[miztressuz]

Can anyone translate this from BOA to see if it actually counted as a DD?
TypeepositDescription:Hxxx Lxxx DES:ACH-WEB ID:XXXXX67xx INDN:Hxxx Lxxx CO ID:XXXXX67xx PPD

Merchant name:

Hxxx LxxxSelect to Edit the merchant name

Merchant name current value is Hxxx Lxxx Save changes to merchant name button disabledCancel edits to merchant name

Merchant name change
If you edit the merchant name, it will only apply to this transaction and won't affect or recategorize future transactions.
Transaction category:

148Income: Deposits

Trying to see if depositing from my CU works before I change by DD for my paycheck.

Can't help too much, but my legit DD comes in as "DES: PAYROLL" so I'm not sure the "ACH-WEB" would be included in the triggering. Also the transaction category is "Income: Paychecks/Salary" but I'm guessing that's keyed off that DES: field in the description.
Since Serve seems to work, how that codes might be an indication but not a guarantee that anything else that codes that way works. @platamama , what did serve look like?

Unfortunately in this case, it looks like BoA gives a 2 month grace period before they start charging the monthly fee, so probably not advisable to wait and see if it waives the monthly charge either. Typically BoA pays the bonus out within a couple weeks of meeting the requirements so you could try to hold out and see if you get paid first, but I second @gottalovepluto and work on changing payroll just in case.
For reference:

https://www.reddit.com/r/churning/comments/bgf1za/_/elr6idt

Couple other DP's around the same time that bonus still posting within a couple weeks of requirements met.

 

[striker1064]

Well when I first moved I was going to school so I didn’t have to. And then I was not happy here and have been begging my SO to move back home ever since lol now he is finally on board with moving but we are waiting for the right opportunity. He has turned down a few offers. We also have no idea where exactly we are moving too he isn’t thrilled with going back home but we will see. So anyway since we are actively looking for new opportunities it just doesn’t seem worth it. My dad has been lecturing me about it but i would also have to change my car registration and I hear in VA you have to pay some huge tax or something? I also don’t want to do that.

Makes sense. Thanks.

Yeah I neither own a car nor live in VA - both of those things seem awful - so I can see why it would be more of a pain.

 

[1st*toright]

Maybe. Send pics and I'll decide.

Hmm. Not sure I'm making the cut if beauty is the criteria... how about I send you my credit score or MR balance? Then I might have a shot...

 

[speedyfishy]

Makes sense. Thanks.

Yeah I neither own a car nor live in VA - both of those things seem awful - so I can see why it would be more of a pain.

We maybe ditching our car if we go back to NY. We want to actually live in Manhattan and no way am I dealing with a car living there. Our car lease is up in Feb so we gotta decide what we are doing soon. If we don’t go to NY though I’m pretty sure we are getting a Tesla lol.