I love credit cards so much!

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How do you know if something counts as a direct deposit with PNC?
If you go on DOC there is a link to what counts as DD for the different banks. I can tell you that my credit card funding with SW Biz worked for DD twice. The bonus posts a few weeks after the 10 debits are done, so you can always wait and see if it's posts. If you have a statement posted yet you can look on there and mine was listed as direct deposit, and then did qualify.
 
I just applied for the Amex Hilton Ascend for DH using a referral link from my Aspire. No pop up and instant approval! This new Amex wrinkle of no pop up and no bonus gives me some slight discomfort, but DH only has one Amex (before the Ascend), which is the Biz Green. I have put occasional spend on this when he gets a good Amex offer, so I don't think there's much reason to think he is in the Amex doghouse. Hopefully I'll see my referral bonus soon and that will be a good sign. We could really use those 150K (plus 20K referral) points for a Hilton Tokyo Bay ressie for our 2020 Japan trip. Still noodling on whether to get him the regular no-fee card as well with 100K sign-up bonus through another referral from my Aspire. I'm definitely going to see how this one goes first and whether the sign-up bonus via referral holds at 100K on the no-fee card.

ETA: This puts DH at 3/24.
 
So glad the game is in KC!! I hope it's a real ordeal for the Pats to get there and they are exhausted and not focused. Go Chiefs :cheer2:

PS I like New Englanders and y'all are great people just could do without the Pats!
Seems to be a common opinion for non NE with the no love for the Pats. I actually dislike Tom Brady. Respect him as a player but I’ve heard one too many stories about how arrogant he is IRL
 


Well we decided....we are going to keep our yc club level room. We were really excited to try club level and had an Epcot day planned plus a day to walk to Fantasia putt putt and use the little sea raycers if the weather is nice. We used our CSR to book so we will get 3x points for it being travel. We aren’t breaking the budget or anything by spending $900 more and we were already okay spending that much in the first place. Thanks everyone for your inputs. I’ve started getting really excited about the festival of the arts!
 
I was initially planning on canceling DH's BGR, but I really want the Schwab Plat for him (and me too eventually). No pop ups yet for either of us, but neither of us have canceled an Amex to date and his BGR is the first up with a high fee. I think I will suck up the $175 AF for a year, get him the Schwab Plat (fingers crossed), and then when his Biz Plat and Green come up for renewal in a few months I will cancel those. That will leave him with the BBP, personal Gold, Biz Gold, and Schwab Plat as MR cards and next year when the Biz Gold comes up for renewal I'll cancel it (since the AF will be $295 then). That keeps the option of 25% rebate on flights paid with points open for another year from the BGR, and since I've saved $295 in Amex offers on that card by itself + 165K MRs on it, I can completely talk myself into thinking this is a good plan. :D
What about getting the Shwab before the BGR renewal happens?
I agree that I have seen DPs of folks getting the pop up for “higher end” cards like the Gold, then applying right afterwards for a lesser (no fee or co-branded) card, and getting approved without a pop up. Whether or not they get their bonus on the second card despite not getting the pop up is a new wrinkle.
True. But most have a small sign up bonus anyways so might be worth the risk.
 
Well we decided....we are going to keep our yc club level room. We were really excited to try club level and had an Epcot day planned plus a day to walk to Fantasia putt putt and use the little sea raycers if the weather is nice. We used our CSR to book so we will get 3x points for it being travel. We aren’t breaking the budget or anything by spending $900 more and we were already okay spending that much in the first place. Thanks everyone for your inputs. I’ve started getting really excited about the festival of the arts!
Sounds great. We never stay above a mod on our disney trips because we are literally never in the room. But if we were doing more resort time like you guys it seems like money well spent. My kids would never go for it but sounds nice to me!!
 


Seems to be a common opinion for non NE with the no love for the Pats. I actually dislike Tom Brady. Respect him as a player but I’ve heard one too many stories about how arrogant he is IRL

We live on Long Island.....my son is a Dallas Cowboy fan(Due to me...one of the nuns who taught me in HS was Roger Staubachs aunt) and my daughter is a Pats fan :confused3
 
I think I have like 16. DH has a heart attack every time we go to do the bills but I have it all straight (for the most part lol)

Lol DH just leaves it all to me at this point. I don't think he knows how many cards we have... it's all right there in YNAB if he wants to see it, and I update everything every day because I'm obsessive about it (and I enjoy it). But I'm honestly not sure when the last time is that he looked at it.
 
Lol DH just leaves it all to me at this point. I don't think he knows how many cards we have... it's all right there in YNAB if he wants to see it, and I update everything every day because I'm obsessive about it (and I enjoy it). But I'm honestly not sure when the last time is that he looked at it.
He just thinks it’s way too many (which it is). I tell him I plan to streamline but then a new offer comes I can’t pass up and oooppps!!!
 
Sooooo... when my Discover Savings bonus is finished, are there any other bank bonuses like it where you don't have to leave money sitting for several months? I've got Chase on my list for DH, but don't want to miss any other easy/quick posting ones.
 
Ah, I thought personal cards only affected other personal. Didn't realize business cards could affect the bonus too. So looks like I'm out on Chase Marriott.

So looking at this list- https://www.doctorofcredit.com/specifics-of-chase-american-express-limiting-spg-marriott-bonuses/ does this mean I could get DH the Amex SPG Luxe, and then get him the SPG Biz? I'm not seeing the Luxe included on the exclusions list for SPG Biz.

Yep, you can have all 3 SPG's together. Can have both Marriotts together. Gets hinky when you try to mix and match. I see @Lain got you the "good" link with the chart :) That seems to be the easiest way to figure it out what you can and can't do when you start to mix and match.
 
Sounds great. We never stay above a mod on our disney trips because we are literally never in the room. But if we were doing more resort time like you guys it seems like money well spent. My kids would never go for it but sounds nice to me!!
I think we will take advantage of it while we can without kids. We usually rush ourselves around and stay at parks from open to close. This trip we are forcing ourselves to slow down. With 3 dah we have quite a few days to sleep in and not rush anywhere in the morning. I’m excited to try cbr for the first time too
 
For what it’s worth I just got both of my bonuses for BBP and PGR no problem so I think you’ll be fine. I just posted my list and I hit amex hard aug-dec. I can’t remember did your DW get the pop up?

Thanks for the vote of confidence. Totally in admiration along with @SouthFayetteFan at your impressive run of cards. DW got the pop up on 10/3, the night before the Amex Gold refresh. She's only had 2 Amex cards in her name. I think what contributed to the pop up was DW has only been an Amex customer, herself, since 2018, and in that time signed up for 2 biz cards, met MSR, and had a drop off (not entirely sock drawer) in spend. No biggie, since we're having her hit Chase cards right now. Next up, the United Biz in February.
 
What about getting the Shwab before the BGR renewal happens?

Ah, well I got myself a BGR last week and DH a United Biz this week so we have 10K MSR in ~90 days between those two, plus I'm still finishing up my MSR on SW for the CP and my BBP so I don't want to bite off more than I can chew at the moment. The AF on the BGR already posted and is due in a week. I probably should've triple dipped the Schwab at the end of last year but I was handling a lot of MSR then (9 cards) and even though I do some MS I honestly don't enjoy it. Right now I'm trying to find a $500 MCGC that I seem to have misplaced somewhere. :crazy2: That seems to be a weak point in my MS system.
 
So I read and read and read and google and research and I still don't "get" the whole AMEX thing. I look at the cards (gold, lux, blue, green, etc) and they don't seem that lucrative. No big sign up bonuses. Is there a write up somewhere where I could learn WHY people love them so much?

*DH just got approved for the AMEX Hilton Ascend for 150,000 Hilton points so I'm wondering if I should be ready to *do* something with this and his next card should be another AMEX.....I want to be prepared.

Amex MRs can be used with several domestic and international carriers. They often run a "bonus" when you transfer to one of their partners. DH and I have flown British Air in first at Christmas on Amex MRs, will be flying home business on Aer Lingus thanks to MRs (both of these with a generous 40% transfer bonus last fall), and have topped off Delta Skymiles to fly two of us Business to London. Also, there is the option for use with Hilton and Marriott (while some feel that is not a good use of points it could come in handy in a pinch). So if you're at all interested in flying up front overseas it's a good program to investigate. If you are a mostly domestic flier then perhaps not.

So glad the game is in KC!! I hope it's a real ordeal for the Pats to get there and they are exhausted and not focused. Go Chiefs :cheer2:

PS I like New Englanders and y'all are great people just could do without the Pats!
t

I agree, life without the Pats (especially in the play offs...again) would be nice.

I was initially planning on canceling DH's BGR, but I really want the Schwab Plat for him (and me too eventually). No pop ups yet for either of us, but neither of us have canceled an Amex to date and his BGR is the first up with a high fee. I think I will suck up the $175 AF for a year, get him the Schwab Plat (fingers crossed), and then when his Biz Plat and Green come up for renewal in a few months I will cancel those. That will leave him with the BBP, personal Gold, Biz Gold, and Schwab Plat as MR cards and next year when the Biz Gold comes up for renewal I'll cancel it (since the AF will be $295 then). That keeps the option of 25% rebate on flights paid with points open for another year from the BGR, and since I've saved $295 in Amex offers on that card by itself + 165K MRs on it, I can completely talk myself into thinking this is a good plan. :D

Are you confusing the products of Amex BGR and Biz Gold? They are two separate products and unlike the personal gold, the new changes are for the new product and the BGR is not grandfathered into it, although you can call to convert it if you want. So if your DH has the BGR there won't be the 25% points redemption. Just was a little unsure since you were discussing both products. See lucky's discussion: https://onemileatatime.com/new-amex-business-gold-card/ Otherwise, keeping amex happy in order to get the Schwab is a great idea.

Well we decided....we are going to keep our yc club level room. We were really excited to try club level and had an Epcot day planned plus a day to walk to Fantasia putt putt and use the little sea raycers if the weather is nice. We used our CSR to book so we will get 3x points for it being travel. We aren’t breaking the budget or anything by spending $900 more and we were already okay spending that much in the first place. Thanks everyone for your inputs. I’ve started getting really excited about the festival of the arts!

I love YC and CL ! I think you made a great decision--you have a place to exercise, the BW is close, if you like sand in the pool there's that...YC and WL are probably my favorite resorts so I am biased. Hope you have a great time!
 
And the sad news whole reason if I have time to catch up and post is that we just got notice our flight to MCO is delayed 2.5 hours. So now we will be getting in at 2 am. I guess it is the snow you all are talking about on the east coast?

I am hoping this is not a sign of a not great trip. Girls have all been fighting off being sick, work and school is so busy, my husband's knee has been bad. And this is our first DVC trip. Split stay at AKV Kidani and BLT one bedrooms. I really hope I don't find out that I dumped all this money into DVC and do not even like it. Starting everyone off completely exhausted is not good.

I hate when the lead up to trips makes me feel like the trip itself will be swept up in the chaos. I hope your travel goes smoothly and you have a great first DVC trip! I have been way to stressed about getting sick for this trip and I think I am swearing off of January trips after this one (too much crud all around me).
 
This is me now. I have 19 cc's with payments due this month. If my dh knew, he would croak. And I do feel like I am spending more to keep Amex happy and use offers that are, many times for me, something I would not have purchased if not for the offer and my desire to use the offer plus put spend on the card. I need to back off a bit on my spend and I will be in a cancelling frenzy for the next 8 mos with Amex cards, with the exception of the couple I will keep. So, I may never get another Amex again after that as they will put me on their naughty list.

I also realize that, for us, the spg cards were maybe not the smartest move. I got caught up in the FOMO here (no one's fault but my own!) thinking I *needed* those cards. In the end, there aren't really too many properties that I think we will use the points at. I was able to redeem a boatload of points and get the N&F package. The 7-night cert isn't too valuable but I love getting the 120k SW RR's. So not a total loss at all!

I'll find somewhere to use the points (and the cert hopefully) but it is a lesson to make sure you have a use for points before just blindly going for them because everyone else has a good use and therefore, thinks they are great. Each of us travel differently, have different family sizes, are in different seasons of life that may limit our traveling, etc. I get a bit mad at myself for using up so much Amex 'grace' (??) getting all those spg cards but I learned a valuable lesson so I'm glad for that.

I was at 8 cards at the beginning of last year and now with the 2 new cards this month I am at 16. It is getting to be too much. And I do feel like these Amex and Chase offers make me spend more to "save more". I do try to be good about only buying what we would anyway. But I now have $300 in Amazon credit. True that I got it for 30% off with the Staples offers, but it is not something I was budgeting for all in January. I think I will be cancelling my SW next month as soon as the points post. I also think I will cancel DHs FU (hmm, is that really the abbreviation for that lol?). We will both have the regular Freedom, I now have the Unlimited and we never max out one Freedom, so I don't think we need 3 of them. I also plan on canceling my CIP in June, but I am nervous about only having the cash UR cards. so still pondering on that one. We are both still only at 1 Amex each, so still have many cards to get.
 
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