I love credit cards so much! v5.0 - 2022 (see first page for add'l details)

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Asking for a bit of advice for those of you who have planned trips to Asia.... Do you recommend getting extra travel insurance for trip to South Korea? It'll mainly be flights,as DS has a friend over there to stay with.... using CSP for all expenses... right now I'm eyeing Star Alliance flight options after transferring UR...perhaps thru United, he doesn't care if it cheapo seats as long as it get s him there..... advice/opinions? thanks

I would get it. It's not just to cover what you pay for but help if you get sick and need medical care or if you need to leave due to a shutdown, typhoons etc. If your state allows for that coverage, a few don't.
 
Hi, just dropping my first post here in this thread. I got into churning and MS back in 2014 but have taken a break in the last few years. I operate in 2P mode with DH. We are both currently 1/24 and both have open CSPs (last bonuses were >48mos). I am planning to downgrade my CSP to do a MDD for CSP/CSR for me and then for him later this year. I believe I only need to wait 4 days after downgrade to apply. Can anyone confirm? (I would wait longer, just want to make sure the minimum.)

I am excited to get back into it, although will largely be playing with SUBs and actual spend, unless some easy reliable MS opportunities are out there. I never felt super comfortable with MOs and now that Kate is gone (RIP) I feel like I am starting from scratch. I hope I will be able to contribute nonetheless. Thanks for reading! :)
 
So the Visa GCs that Staples sells can be loaded to Serve at Walmart but only $99 or less per transaction, is this correct? (Tagging @LilSweetPeaPhoto since I think she mentioned this in an earlier post.)
That was the magic number working back in the day. Kinda why I hate the Staples VGCs since it takes so much longer to process them all for me. There's only 1 FD close and I swear it hits the "max" loads by 9am daily. Grrrr! But knowing I'll be in NC in June, I'll be able to easily do the $500/loads at FD, LOL.

I know more people now that have (or are just getting over) COVID than any other time since this began. This includes me. I attended 2 nhl hockey games last week, mostly unmasked, and started having symptoms on Friday, tested positive on Saturday (I work from home and went nowhere else). The numbers reported by the state's HHS have to be off by a gigantic magnitude due to everyone home testing.

I would be *very* careful about masking in public if you are traveling or have a big/important event on the near horizon. I only missed a tennis lesson, my book club, a hockey game, and another social event due to this, but I would have been heartbroken if it impacted more important/expensive/travel plans.
We have 27 students and 5 teachers out right now. I'm sure it's actually more than that. My sister had 20+ people cancel on her party last weekend because they got COVID. I caught it in the crazy wave back in Jan, my son and BF got it too. My 17yo escaped it. Last week she went to a concert w/ a friend who just tested positive. But so far she's holding strong. I did run and grab my free 8 tests for this month, and Rite Aid was saying tests are getting hard to find again. I think I have 10 stockpiled right now. And I finally got the checks for the tests I bought back in Jan that insurance agreed to refund! I had given up hope that they were going to pay for them! That was a nice $100 surprise!
 
Recovering from a panic attack. Informed delivery showed I had a package coming from US Dept of HHS. Finally figured out its covid tests. I've been testing nonstop with my cruise coming up (one of my direct reports tested positive this week and my boss’ daughter's family who she babysat for last week has it).
This is why I'm forgoing further international travel. Too much stress for me.
Hope all goes well and you can enjoy your cruise.
 
I bought a dishwasher online at Costco, sale ends 5/11. The charge is pending on my CIU 5/6, I see a credit for that amount dated today. My order still shows in my Costco account, I have no email from them canceling my order. I'm counting on this to meet my MSR. Should I be worried?
I got a dishwasher too ! I hope you got the shop card, they don't charge you until it's on the truck. I just got it yesterday loving the better-designed 3rd rack my old one was leaking and i was at over 500 in repairs I should have probably replaced it sooner. You know you have become an adult when you get excited about a new dishwasher :)
 
"I'm one of those that frowns upon it. SW has no policy that allows you to save seats either,"

That may be true but since my luggage and I are in the seats they’d have to move me. I’d rather that than separate families and leave small kids alone. We’ve split up as long as one of us is with the kid. I won’t save seats to be with DH but DS is not sitting alone.
Then don't be too upset if at some point someone decides to move your bags to sit down. A failure of planning on your part does not change the rules. There are ample ways on SW to board earlier, or if it's really that important you can always fly a different carrier that has assigned seating. It may very well never happen, but the few times I have heard of it happening, SW official policy is that people may sit in any open seat. Open seat being defined as a seat without a person in it, or a card that says it's been paid for by a Customer of Size.
Question on AmEx offers - DH referred DS to a gold card from his platinum card to earn bonus points awhile back. If DS has an offer on his card that DH had already used, can he use it too?
What do you mean by "referred?" Did your son open an account in his own name or is this a gold Authorized User card on your husband's Plat account? In the first case, it's a separate account and your son's card would certainly be eligible. For the second, as an AU with his own login, I don't know. Someone else here with more history with AMEX AUs would have to jump in.
Does anyone have recent experience renting a car from Hertz? That's always been our go to due to a discount thru our employer and generally good service (with an exception of last summer in DEN). Anyway, I booked a sedan for our Bozeman trip several months ago -- price was high (obvously), around 700+ for a week. A month or so ago I checked the reservation and the price had dropped to $431. I've NEVER had a booking price change like that (I made no modifications). I printed the reservation out so I could use it if the price changed again. Today I checked and it's $526 now.

I have never know there to be "variable pricing" once you book (we never pre-pay). I'm not sure if I should bother calling or just hope for the best when showing up with the print out from when it was $431. I mean, I'd rather it be the cheapest possible, but I'm also afraid of showing up and it being $900 or something. Anyone see this happen with a booking?
I book a couple times a year with Hertz and have never seen anything like this. What type of discount code did you use? I've seen this happen when contracts get renegotiated or cancelled like what happened with MouseSavers last year, and to lesser extent on my corporate code, but even those only fluctuated one time. I did have Hertz at BNA charge a rate substantially different than what I had booked back in March, but the manager on site fixed it in about 15 minutes.
 
Why is it so hard for me to plan a trip to WDW?
I am trying to book the week after Thanksgiving. We have limited DVC points for this trip so I have us booked Mon-Thursday at BLT. I was hoping to do a cabin at Fort Wilderness Fri and Sat. Disney won’t let me book just the Fri and Sat. I’d have to add the Thursday. Don’t really want to spend $1600 on a cabin just because I think the kids would like the bunk beds and gold cart. I also had no plans to do the parks this trip other than a night at the Xmas party.
DS7 saw the new guardians ride and wants to go. He is in a GOTG phase right now watching the movie and playing a video game. It is his birthday on so it would be nice.
My luck though I buy a day ticket to Epcot and I can’t get the ILL$ for it.

Part of me just wants to use up my Amex resort credits on my two Platinums and book two nights at Portofino. Do the Orlando informer event and stop giving Disney my money they dont seem to want to make it easy to take. Kids are 5 and 7 so I am leaning towards sticking with the misery of booking Disney but man, Universal is so much easier. I just know as they get older we will spend more time at Universal so get in Disney now right?


Need to finalize my bookings by the end of the month so I can know which dvc points to bank.

@Haley R - I saw your post about the dirty cabin. How was the rest of your trip at Fort Wilderness? For some reason I have always wanted to stay there and with my kids ages it seems like now is a great age to take them. I am afraid I’ve build it up in my mind though and will be disappointed
We absolutely LOVE fort wilderness and the cabins. Even with a dirty cabin we still loved it. It’s perfect for a toddler because they have so many playgrounds and places to run. We had a golf cart which is another fun thing to do. We only did mornings at the parks and spent the rest of the time at the fort. We really liked the campfire and s’mores. The boat to MK is nice. We drove our car everywhere else. The biggest let down were the food trucks. I wouldn’t plan on there being a lot of them and maybe have another dinner plan. We ended up cooking burgers
 
Does anyone have recent experience renting a car from Hertz? That's always been our go to due to a discount thru our employer and generally good service (with an exception of last summer in DEN). Anyway, I booked a sedan for our Bozeman trip several months ago -- price was high (obvously), around 700+ for a week. A month or so ago I checked the reservation and the price had dropped to $431. I've NEVER had a booking price change like that (I made no modifications). I printed the reservation out so I could use it if the price changed again. Today I checked and it's $526 now.

I have never know there to be "variable pricing" once you book (we never pre-pay). I'm not sure if I should bother calling or just hope for the best when showing up with the print out from when it was $431. I mean, I'd rather it be the cheapest possible, but I'm also afraid of showing up and it being $900 or something. Anyone see this happen with a booking?
The only way to get the lower rate, would have been to just cancel and rebook. Did you do that? Unless you prepay, you can always rebook a car, people here do it all the time. Back in the day, I would rebook probably 7-8 times, right up until the days before we left. EDIT, did I misunderstand, and your actual reservation had a lower price on your confirmation?

Agree on the COVID comments, I have a friend I was suppose to spend the day with last weekend, but she had it for a second time. No one in our family, us, parents, siblings, had gotten it. UNTIL this past weekend. My son, who never goes anywhere, works at home, curbside groceries, had to attend a Microsoft conference for work. 4 10 hour days, two days later, yup, he's sick. I was watching his dog those days, but he didn't get super close when he picked her up. So, no son for mothers day, and yesterday was his birthday, which he spent alone. I did put a cake outside his door. He is feeling a bit better today, didn't get too sick, basically just a cold and sleepy.
 
I would get it. It's not just to cover what you pay for but help if you get sick and need medical care or if you need to leave due to a shutdown, typhoons etc. If your state allows for that coverage, a few don't.
thanks for the advice I'll have him get that
 
Does anyone have recent experience renting a car from Hertz? That's always been our go to due to a discount thru our employer and generally good service (with an exception of last summer in DEN). Anyway, I booked a sedan for our Bozeman trip several months ago -- price was high (obvously), around 700+ for a week. A month or so ago I checked the reservation and the price had dropped to $431. I've NEVER had a booking price change like that (I made no modifications). I printed the reservation out so I could use it if the price changed again. Today I checked and it's $526 now.

I have never know there to be "variable pricing" once you book (we never pre-pay). I'm not sure if I should bother calling or just hope for the best when showing up with the print out from when it was $431. I mean, I'd rather it be the cheapest possible, but I'm also afraid of showing up and it being $900 or something. Anyone see this happen with a booking?
Yes,all the time. You would need to book that lower rate,then go back in and cancel the previous one. IF you didn't your rate will stay the same. I check my rental rates daily about a week before my trip,they sometimes drop quite a bit and I rebook. if you check,and see a cheaper rate, book it. (no prepay)
 
I book a couple times a year with Hertz and have never seen anything like this. What type of discount code did you use? I've seen this happen when contracts get renegotiated or cancelled like what happened with MouseSavers last year, and to lesser extent on my corporate code, but even those only fluctuated one time. I did have Hertz at BNA charge a rate substantially different than what I had booked back in March, but the manager on site fixed it in about 15 minutes.


The only way to get the lower rate, would have been to just cancel and rebook. Did you do that? Unless you prepay, you can always rebook a car, people here do it all the time. Back in the day, I would rebook probably 7-8 times, right up until the days before we left. EDIT, did I misunderstand, and your actual reservation had a lower price on your confirmation?

I never modified my reservation in any way. Given all the weirdness of renting cars, I just went in to search for rates in case they went down (haha) and then checked my reservation and it was 300+ lower. Once that happened, I've just been checking periodically.

I used my large corporate entity, but when it pops up if it's leisure or business, I select leisure. Last summer we had a Tahoe booked out of DEN and I noticed it went up when I was double checking the reservation before the trip. It was like double! So I called and the phone rep said to print out the confirmation email. I did that and they did honor the price but told me that the dates were probably "blacked out" by the corporate code. Which makes no sense because June is June every year, so why would the "black out" not be there from the get-go. We've been using Hertz via this discount for 15 years and first time it happened. I wondered if it was a 1 time deal, now seeing something similar for this June. I guess the corporate code is variable now? We'll see what happens in a little over a month!


Yes,all the time. You would need to book that lower rate,then go back in and cancel the previous one. IF you didn't your rate will stay the same. I check my rental rates daily about a week before my trip,they sometimes drop quite a bit and I rebook. if you check,and see a cheaper rate, book it. (no prepay)

The different rates are showing under my reservation page itself. The car I have booked isn't even available now if I do a new search. The print out I have from about a month ago has the lowest rate and the original conf #.
 
Asking for a bit of advice for those of you who have planned trips to Asia.... Do you recommend getting extra travel insurance for trip to South Korea? It'll mainly be flights,as DS has a friend over there to stay with.... using CSP for all expenses... right now I'm eyeing Star Alliance flight options after transferring UR...perhaps thru United, he doesn't care if it cheapo seats as long as it get s him there..... advice/opinions? thanks

I've been to Asia multiple times, including South Korea once. I didn't get any extra travel insurance--I'm not sure why you'd need anything different/extra. The only time I buy extra travel insurance is for a cruise (medical evacuation).

ETA: This was all before COVID so I don't know if I'd do things differently now. Although if I did it would be because of COVID not because of Asia.
 
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That was the magic number working back in the day. Kinda why I hate the Staples VGCs since it takes so much longer to process them all for me. There's only 1 FD close and I swear it hits the "max" loads by 9am daily. Grrrr! But knowing I'll be in NC in June, I'll be able to easily do the $500/loads at FD, LOL.
Thanks--although as it turns out, my Staples is out of $200 Visa gift cards . . . Hopefully Office Depot will run their special again soon.
 
I got a dishwasher too ! I hope you got the shop card, they don't charge you until it's on the truck. I just got it yesterday loving the better-designed 3rd rack my old one was leaking and i was at over 500 in repairs I should have probably replaced it sooner. You know you have become an adult when you get excited about a new dishwasher :)
I got one in January with the 3rd rack from Costco and I'm still excited to have a new dishwasher to use! Doesn't take much......lol.

Now I'm looking at my next replacement to be a stove but the old one just won't die. I guess that's a good thing. Almost replaced it with a half price scratch and dent where the small dent on the side would have been hidden since it would butt up to a kitchen cabinet, then decided to just wait it out for a bit.

Since we started using the Ninja Foodi air fryer oven we rarely turn on the big oven.
 
Hoo Boy -- this BZN trip is the travel gift that keeps on giving. We've been changed SO many times both going/returning on Delta. We FINALLY thought we had a firm itinerary and after getting yet ANOTHER email, realized that our BZN-RDU return (via SLC) was changed. They moved a 10:30am flight from SLC to RDU to 10:31PM red eye! Literally a > 12 hour layover. Worst part is, I don't see an itinerary that makes any sense at all for us now. We have tickets to a concert on that night, which of course, I realize is precarious on a travel day, but we had like a 4 hour window of slack.

I think perhaps the only option is going to red eye the night before and give up our afternoon/evening in Bozeman (our traditional thing after visiting yellowstone and tetons). Literally only 2 flights with only 1 connection and 1 is a red eye. Ugh
 
Approved for Barclays AA biz and Jetblue biz! Barclays only pulls once on the same day, so figured why not.

Got a call from their Delaware number last night, but didn't pick up since I saw DP that it just gets approved soon after. Didn't happen for me, so when they called again this morning decided to pick up. I feel very comfortable talking about our rental business. Mostly just verified info that's already on the application. They did ask about sources of income other than the business income. The way it was phrased confused me at first. Also asked why I applied for 2 cards. Was then transferred to someone else who didn't really ask anything, just processed the application. Both agents were very nice.

It'll be 24 months from when I closed the previous AA biz next month. Wasn't sure if that rule is enforced or if the card being discontinued for a bit makes it a new card. I saw both approval and denial DPs. Wasn't sure how long the SUB was going to last, so decided to chance it.
 
Why is it so hard for me to plan a trip to WDW?
I am trying to book the week after Thanksgiving. We have limited DVC points for this trip so I have us booked Mon-Thursday at BLT. I was hoping to do a cabin at Fort Wilderness Fri and Sat. Disney won’t let me book just the Fri and Sat. I’d have to add the Thursday. Don’t really want to spend $1600 on a cabin just because I think the kids would like the bunk beds and gold cart. I also had no plans to do the parks this trip other than a night at the Xmas party.
DS7 saw the new guardians ride and wants to go. He is in a GOTG phase right now watching the movie and playing a video game. It is his birthday on so it would be nice.
My luck though I buy a day ticket to Epcot and I can’t get the ILL$ for it.

Part of me just wants to use up my Amex resort credits on my two Platinums and book two nights at Portofino. Do the Orlando informer event and stop giving Disney my money they dont seem to want to make it easy to take. Kids are 5 and 7 so I am leaning towards sticking with the misery of booking Disney but man, Universal is so much easier. I just know as they get older we will spend more time at Universal so get in Disney now right?


Need to finalize my bookings by the end of the month so I can know which dvc points to bank.

@Haley R - I saw your post about the dirty cabin. How was the rest of your trip at Fort Wilderness? For some reason I have always wanted to stay there and with my kids ages it seems like now is a great age to take them. I am afraid I’ve build it up in my mind though and will be disappointed
Fort Wilderness is my happy place and for kids that age, it's a wonderful place. There's a feeling of freedom that isn't there in a hotel - there's the pool with a playground right next door, they lend you balls and anything else to play, there are ponies, and boats, and a beach to play on. We use it as a resort, rarely going to a park when we are there and we can fill multiple days.
What do you mean by "referred?" Did your son open an account in his own name or is this a gold Authorized User card on your husband's Plat account? In the first case, it's a separate account and your son's card would certainly be eligible. For the second, as an AU with his own login, I don't know. Someone else here with more history with AMEX AUs would have to jump in.
@newski_mom I use the offers on my children's Gold AU accounts often (AU from my Plat). Just pay with their card and it always credits just fine.
 
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