I love credit cards so much!

[Lain]

Not churning but budget board related. I'm enjoying my free IKEA lunch of Swedish meatballs before I go use the $15 off $15 or more coupon I got. Both are for my birthday and from being in their free family thing that gives you better pricing.

I'll probably get some more of their packing cubes, they're nice and a great price. 2 1/2 weeks til we leave for Paris!

You are really living up your time off! Dining on international cuisine, traveling the world!

 

[Lain]

DoC is now reporting GC>GC at BBY is dead: Gift Card Conversion at Best Buy is No Longer Working. I hope no one got stuck with too many BBY GCs.

 

[amalone1013]

Not churning but budget board related. I'm enjoying my free IKEA lunch of Swedish meatballs before I go use the $15 off $15 or more coupon I got. Both are for my birthday and from being in their free family thing that gives you better pricing.

I'll probably get some more of their packing cubes, they're nice and a great price. 2 1/2 weeks til we leave for Paris!

They have packing cubes there? Trip to ikea!

Happy Birthday!

I just added SO and I’s credit limit up for fun. Between Discover, Amex and Chase we have 124,500 in available credit. We could get ourselves in a lot of trouble. Credit cards are beneficial if you use it properly. I’m 23 and a lot of my friends have maxed out cards. Like they can’t put a $5 purchase on their card.

Hey, we have $127k! I can't wait to teach our future children about money. I've got some friends like that too. Late 20s now. Or at least they were, but we haven't discussed that stuff lately now. A few years ago my friend and I planned a trip to London and Paris, starting a year out. I ended up spending $4k for a 12 day trip, with splitting the hotel room. I had estimated things out and shared it with her, and made myself a savings goal of $5k for anything unexpected. She bought a few more gifts than me but otherwise her spending during the trip was about the same, I'm not sure what she spent on things for the trip because we lived in different states at the time. She lived at home and her only monthly bills were $200 to her parents for her share of phone bill and insurance, and her $150 car payment, and she worked full time. So when I visited her a few weeks before our trip for some last minute planning, I was shocked when she told me that she had refinanced her car loan and added $2k or something to it to pay for the rest of the trip. And on the trip, the hotel was going to split the charge between our cards for us, and hers got declined for the $700, so I paid and she transferred me the money. Same with our flights, which were $1800. But hey, I had my new Barclay Arrival and got to earn 2x points on that stuff! That was my first travel card and I felt so fancy

Growing up we would occasionally have electricity, cable, phones shut off for a few hours when my dad forgot to pay the bills. He was in charge of all of the finances. When I got out of college and moved home for a bit, I started seeing the cell phone bills... he was always 3 months behind, and when shut off day would roll around he'd call up and pay one month plus the late fee to keep it from being shut off. My family wasn't hard up or anything, there was really no sensible reason for that. That was when I stopped listening to my dad for financial advice and hit the internet.

 

[havaneselover]

DoC is now reporting GC>GC at BBY is dead: Gift Card Conversion at Best Buy is No Longer Working. I hope no one got stuck with too many BBY GCs.

It depends where you are is what I’m reading. I suspect it will soon be dead for all. Their terms appear to have changed and now it says you can’t use a gift card to buy “some third party gift cards.” Would be nice if what those are is defined by Best Buy.

I’ve got $50 in Best Buy gift cards but almost bought $200 more last night. Glad I was on the Disney gift cards thread yesterday!

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

Very good point on calling....just need to figure out which cards to reduce...my thought is to reduce the two cards I’ll be closing at the end of the year when the bonus SW points hit.

As far as cards for my husband...since he’s never had his own SW card I want to wait and see what this new personal card is all about and yes assuming I’m approved for the CIP I’d like to refer him once the spend is complete on my card.
So my thinking is call and reduce CL...wait a week then apply for my CIP.....if approved it will probably take 2-3 months to hit the min spend.....then refer my husband for the CIP or is there a different personal card I should consider for him ?

If you’re comfortable with CIP, I’d start with 2 of them about 2-3 months apart. I’d assume the $5k spend would keep you busy awhile! Hitting those big spends first is great because it keeps your pace slow.

After that we will recommend you look at CSR/CSP (and potentially double dip both cards at once) for max earnings

Thanks for the information...I’m ok with waiting to apply for the CIP, last year it did go pending ...with the 30dY message then was approved .

Last year you mean on a card other than CIP right?

 

[amalone1013]

DoC is now reporting GC>GC at BBY is dead: Gift Card Conversion at Best Buy is No Longer Working. I hope no one got stuck with too many BBY GCs.

Sad day. $275 here. Not preferred, but low enough to be within my risk tolerance. Movies for everyone for Christmas!

 

[Lain]

It depends where you are is what I’m reading. I suspect it will soon be dead for all. Their terms appear to have changed and now it says you can’t use a gift card to buy “some third party gift cards.” Would be nice if what those are is defined by Best Buy.

I’ve got $50 in Best Buy gift cards but almost bought $200 more last night. Glad I was on the Disney gift cards thread yesterday!

Yeah, I see reports in the Disney Gift Card Deals thread that some locations are still working. It seems just a matter of time before all POS are updated to disallow GC>GC.

That language has been there for a long time now. I remember reading those terms months ago and figured it's a catch all that gives discretion to deny whatever GC>GC transaction they want.

Sad day. $275 here. Not preferred, but low enough to be within my risk tolerance. Movies for everyone for Christmas!

Best Buy runs a lot of great doorbuster deals during the holidays and I know we spent way more than $275 on presents at BBY last year, so hoping you have no troubles liquidating them on some good deals!

 

[DisneyMandC]

I called in for a match and was also told to call back once I meet the min spend. It seemed too easy and didn’t seem like the rep was guaranteeing me the 20k points. She said the marketing team would have to approve the request and that she’d make a note on my account. I hope it’s easy but I’m anticipating a little fight. I made sure to sound very presumptuous that I’d get the points on the call so that if somebody had to go back and listen I could argue that I felt like they made a promise and they didn’t correct me either lol!m

EDIT: and yes I did all of this in my high feminine voice

So interesting. Just I really just got the luck of the draw with my agent because she made it clear that I would definitely be getting the points. I would definitely argue hard for it if they give you any trouble! I was sugary sweet when I called earlier and made sure to thank her a lot, so maybe someone else will get lucky and draw that agent when they call!

 

[amalone1013]

So interesting. Just I really just got the luck of the draw with my agent because she made it clear that I would definitely be getting the points. I would definitely argue hard for it if they give you any trouble! I was sugary sweet when I called earlier and made sure to thank her a lot, so maybe someone else will get lucky and draw that agent when they call!

"What is your direct extension? I have some friends that would love to speak with you!"

 

[Albort]

really stupid question. i charged $.41 to my SPG account... thats 1 SPG point right?
lol.

MS opportunity?

 

[Lain]

Sad day.

Sad day, indeed. Best Buy was one of the last places that regularly had 10%+ off deals on what amounted to Disney Gift Cards, and they were very easy to deal with. I got scared off BBY GCs when a cashier at my local store told me they'd stop accepting GC>GC in February, but that came and went. This change looks like it's finally here. I hope Target and Walmart/Sam's Club don't follow. I guess I'll be waiting for Amex Offers, Chase Pay promos, and grocery store deals. God forbid I try BB&B and get accused of a federal crime.

 

[DisneyMandC]

Growing up we would occasionally have electricity, cable, phones shut off for a few hours when my dad forgot to pay the bills. He was in charge of all of the finances. When I got out of college and moved home for a bit, I started seeing the cell phone bills... he was always 3 months behind, and when shut off day would roll around he'd call up and pay one month plus the late fee to keep it from being shut off. My family wasn't hard up or anything, there was really no sensible reason for that. That was when I stopped listening to my dad for financial advice and hit the internet.

This is how my mom's boyfriend is... and he's a multi millionaire. He won't let things get shut off, but he'll be late on stuff and just not care. I remember he and my mom were shopping somewhere like Lowe's or Home Depot one time and were purchasing a large appliance where it would benefit them to have the store card. He was denied for it, but my mom was approved--and I can promise you that she is NOT a millionaire!! My mom has offered many times to take over paying his bills for him since she's very good at that kind of stuff, but he just keeps doing what he's doing.

"What is your direct extension? I have some friends that would love to speak with you!"

No kidding!! Might have sounded a bit suspicious if I asked that... haha.

 

[peel]

Can someone help me understand the Hilton Honors site? I've signed up for the new double points promotion like 5 times but it doesn't show anywhere I look on our account. If I go to https://www.hiltonhhonors.com/MyOffers/ it tells me I'm not signed up for any active offers, it says to "Check the My Eligible Offers tab to see the offers available to you." but that label doesn't exist anywhere. I have a My Available Offers tab but it's only the credit card offer, always, for months now (since we started using the account again). On the plus side it says the 100k points offer is good until Jan 2019 so I'm not in a rush to get the card now as long as that stays on our account.
We signed up for the 2000 points offer that ended 4/30 and that showed in our active offers. So I assumed I'd see the double points one in there too. I want to make sure we'll get double points for our stay this weekend. What am I missing?

I signed DH up for the offer when it was first announced and it doesn't show up in his My Offers tab either. He just stayed at a Garden Inn last night, too. I just re-signed up now to be on the safe side, and it still isn't showing under My Offers. It will take a few days before last night's stay will be added to the site. I'll let you know if he gets the points. He'll be making a phone call if he doesn't. I find these Hilton offer sign ups to be extremely confusing. There are usually separate landing pages specifically for the offers that I can't find on the Honors site. I have to click through DoC or some other blog to access them.

 

[havaneselover]

I hit my minimum spend on my spg biz today! Cf is almost maxed out for the quarter. I think my next move is to cancel some chase cards (my cl with chase is 70% of my household income-yikes!). I need to accumulate Marriott points for Europe next summer and I’m thinking between the Amex spg luxury and chase Marriott premiere I’ll have the points I need.

 

[afan]

They have packing cubes there? Trip to ikea!

Happy Birthday

Thanks!

They changed the packing cubes so their mostly too small to do anything with. Bummed because they were good with 5 pieces and I could get everything for 8 nights at wdw in 2 sets.

 

[Lain]

This is how my mom's boyfriend is... and he's a multi millionaire. He won't let things get shut off, but he'll be late on stuff and just not care. I remember he and my mom were shopping somewhere like Lowe's or Home Depot one time and were purchasing a large appliance where it would benefit them to have the store card. He was denied for it, but my mom was approved--and I can promise you that she is NOT a millionaire!! My mom has offered many times to take over paying his bills for him since she's very good at that kind of stuff, but he just keeps doing what he's doing.

Seems to be working for him.

 

[DisneyMandC]

I just called and changed my WDW reservation for November through Cruise and Tour. We were planning on one night at BWV and I changed to two nights at CBR. It worked out to be the same price and I'll call back to get discounts applied when they come out. The agent I spoke to was very nice and MDE has already updated. I asked her if I would be able to apply any of my UR points to the reservation as I was changing it and adding a night and she confirmed that NO, you may not apply URs after the initial booking. She offered to cancel my existing reservation and rebook the entire thing for me so that I could use URs, but I didn't want to pay the new parking charges and didn't actually want to use my URs anyways.

So now we'll do Nov. 8-10 at CBR, and then move to a hotel near Universal for Nov. 10-12. Don't have anything picked out yet, honestly might just book the Marriott at the prepaid member rate since the point valuation is awful.

 

[DisneyMandC]

Seems to be working for him.

LOL I guess you're not wrong! Who needs a good credit score when you can buy a house in cash, right?

 

[Lain]

I hit my minimum spend on my spg biz today! Cf is almost maxed out for the quarter. I think my next move is to cancel some chase cards (my cl with chase is 70% of my household income-yikes!). I need to accumulate Marriott points for Europe next summer and I’m thinking between the Amex spg luxury and chase Marriott premiere I’ll have the points I need.

The new Marriott consumer card is supposed to be released tomorrow. The rumor is it'll have a 100k signup bonus, with the option for existing Marriott cardholders to upgrade for a bonus. Speculation is Chase will have a one-Marriott card rule so you can't get the new card if you have the old card.

 

[miztressuz]

Plus doesn't a credit score play into renting...?

Last week, I attempted to pass along good credit card information to two coworkers, who are just a year or two younger than me, so mid-20s. One was talking about how her mom set her up so well because she worked at Wells Fargo, and had gotten her a secure card when she was younger, and how crazy it was that her card she has now (I didn't ask what it was) upped her limit to $2k and that's just crazy! And the other coworker agreed about that, and I'm just standing there like, oh my last card gave me a $15k limit... which is nothing compared to some of you!

Oh, the days when monthly expenses I could use a CC for were $500 or less Back then they kept upping my CL every few months I think to entice me into using it, and when it hit 2k I was like 'wow' too. But all they did was just kept helping me lower my utilization ratio! When you're not having to spend much it does seem crazy, although by my mid 20's I'm pretty sure I had at least 75% of my annual salary in credit among of all my issuers.

Now I can't imagine it after finally getting every card above the 5k mark, except for one. So when I got my SW card and it only had a limit of 2k I was disappointed (I'm up to 3500 now randomly within the last 6 months, woo hoo, still not using it though...) and wondered what I did wrong to have such a measly limit when just the year before IHG had given me my highest Chase CL yet. Guess IHG was hoping I'd spend a couple weeks at an Intercontinental