I love credit cards so much!

[Lain]

oh dang, I was rooting for a spontaneous dischurners airport meet up.

I know! Our most recent Disneyland trip apparently overlapped with @Angrose and @Calfan’s trips.

Long post ahead everyone...

Thanks to everyone who helped out with my questions today! Now that I have everything booked I want to share about my most exciting redemption yet!

Back story: Two years ago, my father-in-law had a massive heart attack. He was home alone doing yard work when a neighbor found him in cardiac arrest and started performing CPR. He was shocked three times before they brought him back and spent the next two weeks in a coma. We're not sure how long he was actually "dead," but it affected his brain and he had to learn how to walk and talk again. He spent 8 weeks in the hospital and rehab before he got to come home, but, incredibly, he walked out of the hospital on his own. He was self-employed and the breadwinner, and has been unable to work since then as he no longer has the aptitude and focus, nor the fine motor skills, to do the type of work he was before. If you talked to him today, you would think he'd had a stroke because he has poor balance and slurred speech. All of this has been tough not only emotionally, of course, but financially as well as my mother-in-law attempts to make ends meet as my FIL continues with a variety of different therapies to try to regain some semblance of who he was.

Fast forward to present day, and a good friend of ours sent us a link to a neuro institute in Florida that has been doing spinal injections on stroke and TBI patients, among others, and is seeing truly miraculous recoveries in terms of speech and mobility. I mean, I almost didn't believe it until I watched videos of several different patients' before and afters. My MIL called and did a phone consult and the institute said my FIL sounds like a great candidate to receive the treatment and has an appointment in December!! We are all thrilled and are hoping that we will see some good results for him, as he is now to the point that he's so self-conscious about his voice that he will hardly speak. While the procedure is not prohibitively expensive ($6,000), it is an unexpected expense for my MIL. Then there's getting to FL... (now you see where churning comes in).

As soon as we got the news that he had an appointment, I told DH that I wanted to cover the expenses for their trip. My MIL is very resistant to us helping with anything (I have to track down the waiter in restaurants to pick up the bill), so I knew I had to be sneaky. I've been keeping an eye on Jetblue and Spirit flights to FLL, and saw a great UR redemption on return Spirit flights for their trip at 3,600 URs each. I texted her this morning and asked her what day they were planning to come back from Florida after the treatment and once she let me know, I booked their return flights and sent her the email confirmation! I know it's not the fanciest of redemptions, but it's a direct flight at a decent hour and they won't need anything more than backpacks for a two day trip down there, so no baggage fees. Before she could argue with me about it, I booked them two nights a Doubletree two miles from the doctor's office on Hilton points and forwarded her the confirmation for that too. She told me she didn't want me to use my points when I could use them for something else for me and DH I told her I was saving the URs for the Disney trip we're planning to take them on next year, so she could buy me a snack when we get there to pay me back

I still need to do flights down there, but I don't like how late the Spirit flight puts them in, so I'm going to wait and see if Jetblue has a sale and probably book that.

I'm so excited for this trip that I'm not even going on, and really hoping my FIL can get some much needed help!

Best DDIL Ever Award!

Wishing your DFIL the best of luck on his recovery.

 

[Calfan]

My MR balance was 100K higher when I checked this morning! Woo hoo!! It appears my sign-up bonus points landed in my account as soon as the final charge that put me over the $10K MSR went from pending to posted. I think that is pretty typical of Amex. So sorry for all those waiting for their Chase sign-up bonus points to hit their accounts. I can imagine how frustrated everyone is. I'm planning to apply for CIP in November, so I hope this issue gets resolved.

 

[WVMomof3]

@striker1064 are you in the path of Gordon? Thinking of all our gulf coast friends here. I believe @tink1970 and maybe 1 or 2 more (lost my @Lain spreadsheet) in Pensacola so I’m sure you will get hit some too. Most of My DHs family on the MS coast so I am monitoring its progress.

 

[afan]

I need someone to talk me down from the ledge. I know they are awful but SW is 17k pts (and I will be using URs). (ETA: I keep trying to remind myself that it is too early for SW. I usually get better deals inside 3 months. Do I chance it and wait?) This is so tempting...View attachment 348350

I wouldn't do it. There's a difference between those that are in MSP and can use Sun Country without problems because it's their base, there's more than one flight potentially, vs using it elsewhere when there's only one or two flights a day. If it was SC home it would be slightly better because at least you wouldn't miss vacation if something happened. I'm all for saving money but I'm also for saving vacation stress whether it's potential or not. I just don't trust SC to do what's right if something happens, clearly after they left people in Mexico because it was the end of the season and where moving the planes to the new routes.

 

[DisneyMandC]

Best DDIL Ever Award!

Wishing your DFIL the best of luck on his recovery.

Aww thanks I'm very thankful to have wonderful in-laws! I'm hoping DH will get to go to the appointment with them too. Some patients see some aspects of recovery instantly, so I would love for him to be there if things go really well.

 

[Haley R]

I am soooo confused. I REALLY wish I could pinpoint what's happening with your next statement but I'm at a loss! If it doesn't update tomorrow I'd say you should call and ask again but...wow, I just don't know. Sorry - I am super frustrated for you and they aren't even my points. I can only imagine your frustration.

I'm really hoping to see some points tomorrow. If not, I will definitely be calling.

 

[tink1970]

@WVMomof3 ...thanks for thinking of us! Right now we have some winds and rain and people were getting ugly at the gas station. Hoping it fizzes out so no one is affected too much if any.

 

[Haley R]

Did your August statement close on the 3rd...is that the date you see when you go in to view it

Yes it closed on the 3rd

 

[happ]

Long post ahead everyone...

Thanks to everyone who helped out with my questions today! Now that I have everything booked I want to share about my most exciting redemption yet!

Back story: Two years ago, my father-in-law had a massive heart attack. He was home alone doing yard work when a neighbor found him in cardiac arrest and started performing CPR. He was shocked three times before they brought him back and spent the next two weeks in a coma. We're not sure how long he was actually "dead," but it affected his brain and he had to learn how to walk and talk again. He spent 8 weeks in the hospital and rehab before he got to come home, but, incredibly, he walked out of the hospital on his own. He was self-employed and the breadwinner, and has been unable to work since then as he no longer has the aptitude and focus, nor the fine motor skills, to do the type of work he was before. If you talked to him today, you would think he'd had a stroke because he has poor balance and slurred speech. All of this has been tough not only emotionally, of course, but financially as well as my mother-in-law attempts to make ends meet as my FIL continues with a variety of different therapies to try to regain some semblance of who he was.

Fast forward to present day, and a good friend of ours sent us a link to a neuro institute in Florida that has been doing spinal injections on stroke and TBI patients, among others, and is seeing truly miraculous recoveries in terms of speech and mobility. I mean, I almost didn't believe it until I watched videos of several different patients' before and afters. My MIL called and did a phone consult and the institute said my FIL sounds like a great candidate to receive the treatment and has an appointment in December!! We are all thrilled and are hoping that we will see some good results for him, as he is now to the point that he's so self-conscious about his voice that he will hardly speak. While the procedure is not prohibitively expensive ($6,000), it is an unexpected expense for my MIL. Then there's getting to FL... (now you see where churning comes in).

As soon as we got the news that he had an appointment, I told DH that I wanted to cover the expenses for their trip. My MIL is very resistant to us helping with anything (I have to track down the waiter in restaurants to pick up the bill), so I knew I had to be sneaky. I've been keeping an eye on Jetblue and Spirit flights to FLL, and saw a great UR redemption on return Spirit flights for their trip at 3,600 URs each. I texted her this morning and asked her what day they were planning to come back from Florida after the treatment and once she let me know, I booked their return flights and sent her the email confirmation! I know it's not the fanciest of redemptions, but it's a direct flight at a decent hour and they won't need anything more than backpacks for a two day trip down there, so no baggage fees. Before she could argue with me about it, I booked them two nights a Doubletree two miles from the doctor's office on Hilton points and forwarded her the confirmation for that too. She told me she didn't want me to use my points when I could use them for something else for me and DH I told her I was saving the URs for the Disney trip we're planning to take them on next year, so she could buy me a snack when we get there to pay me back

I still need to do flights down there, but I don't like how late the Spirit flight puts them in, so I'm going to wait and see if Jetblue has a sale and probably book that.

I'm so excited for this trip that I'm not even going on, and really hoping my FIL can get some much needed help!

That's fantastic that you are able to help and the treatment sounds really promising. Praying that all works out well for your FIL.

 

[Haley R]

I think it’s because you don’t have any payment due. When I was first looking at moving up statement close dates they said to make sure the card closes with a payment due.

I think we moved our statement after meeting the MSR last month. Idk what's going to happen.

 

[miztressuz]

So I’m planning on opening a PNC account to help meet the MSR on my new CIP. If I get DH an employee card and open him a separate PNC account would it be problematic to fund both from the new CIP?

It should not, PNC just wants the name on the card to match the name on the account; they don't appear to save your CC info and then say "hey, that was used already!". (there's also occasional DP's that show someone was able to leave their name but use SO's CC number and the charge went through anyway; but if you're going for a bank bonus too probably don't want to risk that) There's also the occasional DP that the PNC funding gets reversed. There seems to be periodic spurts where this happens, but for every one person's story there's usually 3 others that did it on or around the same day and had no trouble. It happened to me but there were many other folks around the same time that went through without issue. Have no clue why it gets reversed a week later.

You should be able to do it exactly as you want. But like everything in this game, have a backup plan.

 

[1st*toright]

Aww thanks I'm very thankful to have wonderful in-laws! I'm hoping DH will get to go to the appointment with them too. Some patients see some aspects of recovery instantly, so I would love for him to be there if things go really well.

Yep, that really is best redemption ever. Its so nice that you're able to help out - and I find that saying "don't worry, it was on points, so it didn't cost anything" really helps people be able to accept gifts of travel that they otherwise might turn down out of pride. I'm sure you'd offer anything your FIL needed, but getting them to feel ok about accepting the help is huge! Here's another person hoping that he benefits from the treatment!

 

[nhgirl]

Be careful here, you may have gotten bad info. Their policy is 30 days.

Yep called again and they said 30 days.

 

[kidsfirsttrip]

It should not, PNC just wants the name on the card to match the name on the account; they don't appear to save your CC info and then say "hey, that was used already!". (there's also occasional DP's that show someone was able to leave their name but use SO's CC number and the charge went through anyway; but if you're going for a bank bonus too probably don't want to risk that) There's also the occasional DP that the PNC funding gets reversed. There seems to be periodic spurts where this happens, but for every one person's story there's usually 3 others that did it on or around the same day and had no trouble. It happened to me but there were many other folks around the same time that went through without issue. Have no clue why it gets reversed a week later.

You should be able to do it exactly as you want. But like everything in this game, have a backup plan.

Ok great. I’ll plan on getting him an employee card and I’ll open his account a few days after mine.

When I got approved for CIP I created a new login - I figured it was better to keep business cards separate. But it won’t let me login. Is my card still being set up? I want to expedite it but really don’t want to call!

 

[Calfan]

I wouldn't do it. There's a difference between those that are in MSP and can use Sun Country without problems because it's their base, there's more than one flight potentially, vs using it elsewhere when there's only one or two flights a day. If it was SC home it would be slightly better because at least you wouldn't miss vacation if something happened. I'm all for saving money but I'm also for saving vacation stress whether it's potential or not. I just don't trust SC to do what's right if something happens, clearly after they left people in Mexico because it was the end of the season and where moving the planes to the new routes.

Not knowing anything about SC, I second this advice based on our recent delay experience with Delta out of BOI. When our plane couldn't go as scheduled, Delta didn't have any kind of feasible back-up plan to get us to LAX on the same day we were supposed to arrive. It is just too small of an operation out of BOI to allow for reasonable alternatives. That would make me REALLY hesitant to trust a low-budget carrier out of an airport where it doesn't have many flights.

 

[MrPTato]

I am having a difficult time linking my PNC account to PayPal . Anybody else experience this?

I had to link my dd18's PNC to an account. It was such a headache. I could never get Ally to link. I finally got chase but tons of hoops to jump through. I'd like to open a PNC account for myself but I remember how much trouble it was and not really looking to deal with that again

I just got off Paypal trying to link mine. It took 3 attempts but it finally went through. I kept getting hung up on a blank screen or the verify you are human screen. I just setup the transfer into paypal from my main bank for the $5k and will push it to PNC when it comes through.

 

[palhockeymomof2]

@WVMomof3 ...thanks for thinking of us! Right now we have some winds and rain and people were getting ugly at the gas station. Hoping it fizzes out so no one is affected too much if any.

Ohh..stay safe and after Sandy..the gas station lines were horrible

 

[palhockeymomof2]

Yes it closed on the 3rd

That is so odd..maybe since yesterday was a holiday it will close after midnight tonight and you’ll see the points tomorrow morning

 

[Haley R]

That is so odd..maybe since yesterday was a holiday it will close after midnight tonight and you’ll see the points tomorrow morning

That's actually what I'm hoping happened and that's why I haven't contacted Chase yet.

 

[striker1064]

The responses to this question interest me because I am tentatively in the "over 5/24 but trying to get back under" group but I am leaning towards the "over 5/24 and not looking back" group.

I would be at 4/24 in May 2019 if I didn't get any more cards that count. I already have a lot of Chase cards (7 I think) and don't want any more cards for their benefits (e.g. I already have the Amazon card for 5% back) -- I just want UR points. So if I were to get to 4/24, my plan would be to double-dip the CIP and CSR. (This would also require PCing the CSR that I got in 2016 and still have.)

Another factor in the mix is the possibility of a Chase shutdown, although objectively I don't think that's a huge possibility (I have a mortgage, and none of my 4/24 cards would be Chase cards).

The one personal card that I really want and am currently holding off on is the AmEx Platinum. I have the business Platinum and the MB Platinum -- the MB Platinum was an impulse application in April because that card was being discontinued. The rumor at the time was that the card would be automatically PCed to the regular plat in December -- which would be a problem because once you have an AmEx card you can't get the sign-up bonus. I should venture on to reddit to see if there are any updates to this, but it has been in the back of my mind that I need to apply for the personal plat before the end of the year.

Anyone have any advice?

I am one of the 3 (THREE! Only 3 of us???) respondents that are indeed over 5/24 and not looking back. It should probably be 4 because P2 is also in the same boat!

There's a ton of value and plenty of like after Chase. All of Chase's restrictions, mental gymnastics, and shutdown threats are exhausting to me.

@striker1064 are you in the path of Gordon? Thinking of all our gulf coast friends here. I believe @tink1970 and maybe 1 or 2 more (lost my @Lain spreadsheet) in Pensacola so I’m sure you will get hit some too. Most of My DHs family on the MS coast so I am monitoring its progress.

Thanks for checking. Our rental home is on the coast of MS, but we now live in DC. My family is still there though. No one is terribly worried. It sounds like it'll be wind and heavy rain, with some storm surge at low-lying areas.

I suspect Gordon will continue to tighten up, and friction may end up pulling it near the MS/AL border. But I'm not a professional meteorologist, and that's just a guess.