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

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Since @SouthFayetteFan was writing about the slowing down of the churning world, I will take this opportunity to point out the changes in the hotel points world in regard to our recent NY trip.
Wyndham had a promo last year, where if you stayed 2 nights you got any free night for 15k points. In fact all their free nights were 15K points - back then. So, she signed herself and DH up for Wyndham accounts and went for a weekend to a friends house down near Fredericksburg, Va. Both had a cheap room booked for $40ish. Then they drove out to Monticello, where they actually stayed in a room out that way for really cheap. Apparently they didn't 'stay' too long after check in. They went back and spent the night at friends beautiful home of route 3. Meanwhile, she also collected a night at the Microtel in Ocean City which was new at the time and although a teeny room, we survived. So that made 4 nights for under $200, and she collected her 2 free nights (15K points each) and booked the Tryp for last weekend. The 2 nights would have been approximately $700 plus. Actually more, but at a minimum, $700. So she was locked in prior to the program changes.

Meanwhile Wyndham switched their program around and the Tryp premium family room is now 30K per night, or double what they were a year ago in points. Almost makes Bonblah look reasonable, if I didn't know better!

So, things change. When you see a deal you can use you pounce. And then move on. Enjoy this game while you can and keep your eyes open for the next opportunity to travel on points!
 
Anyone flown economy international and not hated every minute? Any airlines that are better than others? I put in all this work to find us business class flights to Scotland and got it down to 280K UR + $600 and DH is all meh because he says he’d rather save the UR and fly coach 🙄. You know, the UR that I’ve helped us earn while he plays the stock market. *sigh*

Nearly 20 years ago was the last time I flew international economy.

Well, if I did all that work and my DH wanted to save URs and fly in coach, I wouldn't object. I'd book him in coach. When he walks by me, along with the rest of boarding group 5, while I am stretched out in my business class seat, I would raise my glass of champagne and and whisper "Slàinte" as he walks past.
 
ETA - maybe you can compromise and book yourself in biz and your DH in coach!!!
I'd have no problems doing that :laughing: "Ok, if you'd like to save some points, here's your coach seat, I budgeted for biz so I'll see you on the ground"

Fortunately or unfortunately, I don't believe I'll ever have that conversation since hubby prefers the creature comforts. If I say we have biz seats in the budget he wouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth, given that I pick the cheapest option on everything and only the side-eye gets a reconsideration. (I get a decent amount of side-eye...)
 


Nearly 20 years ago was the last time I flew international economy.

Well, if I did all that work and my DH wanted to save URs and fly in coach, I wouldn't object. I'd book him in coach. When he walks by me, along with the rest of boarding group 5, while I am stretched out in my business class seat, I would raise my glass of champagne and and whisper "Slàinte" as he walks past.
Luckily my dh refuses to fly coach. He has actually told me a route is "sold out", when in reality what he means is that business class is full. He always pays cash on his Platinum AmEx, so I get the benefit of his MRs (I should check his balance -- it must be getting up there again). He isn't into churning so I'm don't push him. He doesn't think that we should "punish" dd by having her fly coach, but she has a few times with school trips and / or going to camp. Ds usually flies business class but doesn't mind flying coach on short haul flights (he is a big guy at 6'2"). Now my dear parents never once flew business class and they took many, many trips and both were quite tall (mom was 5'11" and dad was 6'2").
 
I'd have no problems doing that :laughing: "Ok, if you'd like to save some points, here's your coach seat, I budgeted for biz so I'll see you on the ground"

Fortunately or unfortunately, I don't believe I'll ever have that conversation since hubby prefers the creature comforts. If I say we have biz seats in the budget he wouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth, given that I pick the cheapest option on everything and only the side-eye gets a reconsideration. (I get a decent amount of side-eye...)

Haha, my DH, too. He would be really sad if I put him in economy. DD, on the other hand, is just grateful to be included and keeps telling me to save the points on her ticket and to just put her in coach. We haven't taken her up on that one yet, but if she finds out that she can join us next summer I suspect it will be too late to get her a biz seat on our flights at that point, so I may have to do it.
 
Anyone flown economy international and not hated every minute? Any airlines that are better than others? I put in all this work to find us business class flights to Scotland and got it down to 280K UR + $600 and DH is all meh because he says he’d rather save the UR and fly coach 🙄. You know, the UR that I’ve helped us earn while he plays the stock market. *sigh*
We flew economy to Munich this summer in AA and it was fine. It’s not roomy but the seatback entertainment had tons of good movies, the meals were okay and the snacks were really good (ice cream!), and free alcohol. It’s not an experience to write home about but I prefer to save UR too :).
 


For those wondering if we're experiencing a slow-down in activity here on the thread... The r/churning daily discussion thread is discussing the same issue today.

Duff, A moderator over there shared this:
In the last year, we haven't had much positive news to comment on - no new earth-shattering card introductions, no major program mergers, stuff like that. What has been newsworthy is all negative - 1099s for referrals (which mostly only affects vets), Amex self-refer clawbacks, Serve shutdown, etc. Without new things to comment on, it's all just generally variations on the same questions like "If my P2 is an AU on my CSP can they get a CSP bonus for themselves?". Less novel content leads to fewer contents. And people are more likely to downvote because we have much better search tools now than we did a couple years ago - if you can't use the tools provided here, how good at this hobby are you going to be? And searching eliminates questions because people found their answer by searching.

Churning is definitely in a lull right now. We're in an era of simple strategies for those still playing the game. We are over 3 years removed from the introduction of the CSR and 2 1/2+ years since the 100k bonus went away. This was a major "needle mover" for churning. It attracted many new people to the game. I'd venture to guess that since that time we have seen more people fall away from this hobby than join it. Reasons for why I'd think that:
  • Concern over credit score and myths that churning hurts it: It was nice to earn a few bonuses but being a "real churner" is scary to many people
  • Fees and Interest: We all assume nobody is paying any fees or interest in the game but the truth of the matter is that some people are not paying their cards off in full every month. It's possible that there are even some among our group here that are incurring these "costs of the game" and just masking it to play along.
  • Lack of Organization: Churning typically requires a high degree of organization. You have to keep track of when you signed up for cards, the MSR, did the bonus post, multiple payment dates, etc. It would be interesting to know the average shelf life of a churner. They always say the average career of an NFL player is less than 3 years. I wonder if the same might be true of churners?
  • Scarcity of Opportunity: going along with my last bullet point, I also wonder if people hit 5/24, run into an Amex popup or 2 and just start to think this isn't worth the hassle anymore.
  • Perhaps one more reason is what Duff spoke to: a generally negative news cycle. Perhaps the plethora of bad news events has just resonated with people and they just don’t find churning to be worth it any more with so many rules and issues.
So a fun discussion topic for US here today: Do you think CC Churning is in a lull? Do you agree with my reasons? Do you have any other reasons? And why are YOU still here and any other thoughts?

EDIT: Should I take the lack of responses to this in the first 20 minutes as an indication that our thread is dying too? 🤣 🤣 🤣
EDIT2: I've been told my discussion topic is not "fun" so I will strike that word, LOL!

I'm behind so I'm probably repeating others. Oh well I didn't have time to get on today. I had to actually work, lol!

  1. I will say I've noticed r/churning being sort of "dead" for awhile now. At least dead compared to the sub's heyday.
  2. BoardingArea is crazy slooow these days in regard to new content. I visit a couple times a day and there isn't much new even after several hours have elapsed.
  3. Yes, this thread has even slowed down somewhat. There are only so many card offers to go around and there's nothing particularly good right now - nor has there been for awhile.
  4. Flyertalk is unreadable these days. Unlimited scroll is hell.

I'm one of the old fogies on here when it comes to the game - been doing it for years and years. At this point, I focus on ease. I'm not paying $1k a year in annual fees anymore. I'm not juggling 24 accounts anymore. I'm not opening 6 bank accounts a year. I just don't have that kind of time. My preference is to always focus on one or two issuers at a time and stick with them. Transferrable points are where it is at these days. Or cash back. That's looking better and better.
 
No that makes sense. It would be kind of last minute just because we won’t know how the baby is. Do you think waiting until 1 year would be better?

For me, traveling with infants is much easier than toddlers. My under 1 crowd was better at being held or lounging in a car seat for flights. The toddlers wanted to just get up and move around, just because they could. :D
 
I totally agree, and you said it really well. I've picked and chosen family and they aren't all related to me, either. :goodvibes Coming from another ex-sorority girl who isn't a joiner (but one of those chosen family members is from that group).

San Francisco State is very much a commuter school and I was an out of state student living in the dorms. It was hard to meet new people. At that time there was 4 sororities, only 3 now, and none were bigger than 30 members. No one has a house either so for me it was a perfect way to meet more people. But I've had so much more fun as an alumna but it's all in the alumnar chapter and who you meet. Some chapters are better than others. Even if it's not practiced well our whole thing is it's not 4 years its for life.
 
For anyone else keeping an eye on the AmEx Green refresh, leaked details from u/Not_posting on r/churning but DoC consolidated the details from that discussion in his update:
https://www.doctorofcredit.com/amer...-accepting-new-applications-refresh-incoming/
No mention whatsoever of Amazon or streaming, which was the direction earlier this year. AmEx is doubling down on the travel crowd with this card too. Credit for CLEAR and Loungebuddy, with special welcome offer of $100 credit to Away (luggage). Doing 3x MR points for travel, transit, and dining categories.

Can't decide if it was a waste of AF to keep our long running Green this year. Was hoping they'd release before our Prime subscription came up for renewal, and they should since ads are expected to start on Thursday, but seems like a moo point now :p

Looks like Amex is going for a Membership Rewards quadfecta or a pentafecta.

Platinum - 5x airfare and Amex Travel
Gold - 4x restaurants and supermarkets
Green - 3x (general) travel and transit
[Biz Gold - 4x gas; BGR - 3x gas; EDP - 2x gas]
BBP - 2x everything

And maybe - [Biz Platinum - 35% rebate on specific points redemptions for flights]

So the next time an Amex rep comments about how many of their cards you have...
 
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FYI - Check your Albertsons/Safeway J4U account or app:

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Looks like Amex is going for a Membership Rewards quadfecta or a pentafecta.

Platinum - 5x airfare and Amex Travel
Gold - 4x restaurants and supermarkets
Green - 3x (general) travel and transit
[Biz Gold - 4x gas; BGR - 3x gas; EDP - 2x gas]
BBP - 2x everything

And maybe - [Biz Platinum - 35% rebate on specific points redemptions for flights]

So the next time an Amex rep comments about how many of their cards you have...

It's kind of annoying, really. The Plat should have 3x on general travel but it doesn't. It makes the CSR a keeper for us.
 
Haha, my DH, too. He would be really sad if I put him in economy. DD, on the other hand, is just grateful to be included and keeps telling me to save the points on her ticket and to just put her in coach. We haven't taken her up on that one yet, but if she finds out that she can join us next summer I suspect it will be too late to get her a biz seat on our flights at that point, so I may have to do it.

It sounds like you’ve raised a good kid.
 
Anyone flown economy international and not hated every minute? Any airlines that are better than others? I put in all this work to find us business class flights to Scotland and got it down to 280K UR + $600 and DH is all meh because he says he’d rather save the UR and fly coach 🙄. You know, the UR that I’ve helped us earn while he plays the stock market. *sigh*

I have only ever flown international in coach. As long as there is a seatback TV with a decent selection of movies on it and enough palatable food, I'm good. However, I am pretty short and don't bother trying to sleep on planes, so being in a small seat that doesn't recline very far isn't a big deal. Also, my last truly long-haul international flight was 5 1/2 years ago...now that I am older I might not be able to handle it as well! My IAH-NRT trip was with United (14 hrs), IAH-DME was with Singapore Airlines (12 hours), and our DFW-CDG (9 hrs) was with American Airlines. Of the three, I want to say that Singapore Airlines had the best service (of course), however I don't remember anything objectionable about American or United.

However, I agree that since you have the points, book your husband in coach and yourself in business class, since he wants to save points so badly!
 
I was always told you could not wear during take off and landing.

I can also confirm that if there are extra seats they will.allow you to bring the car seat on board. If not you must gate check. Be very early to the gate desk to request. We had a very lightweight Cosco Scenera to travel with.
Yes, same for takeoff and landing...I just had to unbuckle the clip that’s behind my back. I also recommend the scenera. There is a cute minnie one.
 
It's kind of annoying, really. The Plat should have 3x on general travel but it doesn't. It makes the CSR a keeper for us.

You won’t find any disagreement with me. I still have a hard time grasping how Amex’s most expensive, super premium consumer rewards card has the least useful or least frequently used category bonus. Who (at least among us) pays for flights? Then I remind myself that the Platinum isn’t really intended for people like us. At least the Platinum card is getting trip delay, interruption and cancelation coverage on those 5x MR flights next year, but the same city round trip requirement means it’s still not as good as the CSR.
 
You won’t find any disagreement with me. I still have a hard time grasping how Amex’s most expensive, super premium consumer rewards card has the least useful or least frequently used category bonus. Who (at least among us) pays for flights? Then I remind myself that the Platinum isn’t really intended for people like us. At least the Platinum card is getting trip delay, interruption and cancelation coverage on those 5x MR flights next year, but the same city round trip requirement means it’s still not as good as the CSR.

I still pay for flights, lol! If a flight is cheaper cash wise I’m definitely paying cash and earning my 5x MRs v. burning skypesos or MRs. Cash also helps me keep medallion status- life of an essential DL hostage😄
 
Anyone flown economy international and not hated every minute? Any airlines that are better than others? I put in all this work to find us business class flights to Scotland and got it down to 280K UR + $600 and DH is all meh because he says he’d rather save the UR and fly coach 🙄. You know, the UR that I’ve helped us earn while he plays the stock market. *sigh*
We're flying American from PHL to Rome in 2.5 weeks, so I can let you know how that goes!

Our only other international flights were in economy when we flew from JFK nonstop to Beijing. I do NOT recommend doing that in economy if you can help it :laughing: At least the 3 of us had a group of 3 seats together!
 
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