I love credit cards so much! v6.0 - 2023 (see first page for add'l details)

[reliev]

Hyatt annual category changes coming. Link

Andaz Papagayo going up again to a cat 7. Book by March 25 to lock in the old rate.

worth it

 

[CyndiLouWho]

Yep

The issues people run into are with the cash-equivalent GCs like Visa and MasterCard.

Yes those are more likely for sure but Reddit is full of stories. I'm risk averse so still avoid any GC purchases from stores with L3 data reporting while working on a SUB.

 

[KPK02090]

DH is planning a trip to Thailand in Feb 2025. He's flying on his own from Boston (meeting up with friends in Thailand), so just one biz class seat needed. Time to start accumulating the points. From a very quick search, I’m thinking AA miles for JAL. Anyone done Thailand on points? He has a friend who lives there so they are staying with him and don’t need hotels. Just need to figure out the flight.

 

[Duckbug.Ducktales]

DH is planning a trip to Thailand in Feb 2025. He's flying on his own from Boston (meeting up with friends in Thailand), so just one biz class seat needed. Time to start accumulating the points. From a very quick search, I’m thinking AA miles for JAL. Anyone done Thailand on points? He has a friend who lives there so they are staying with him and don’t need hotels. Just need to figure out the flight.

Feb of next year? I think it may be too late to start accumulating. Unless it's different for Thailand than for Japan on JAL using AA miles.

 

[KPK02090]

Feb of next year? I think it may be too late to start accumulating. Unless it's different for Thailand than for Japan on JAL using AA miles.

Oops, just edited my post. Meant to say Feb 2026.

 

[sky13]

We’ve been looking at our England trip more for next May and trying to decide how we want to get there to avoid BA’s crazy taxes and fees. Our plan is to fly home with BA so we can come directly to Orlando but on the way there we’re willing to position.

Right now we’re looking at either flying from Miami to Paris with Air France or Houston to Manchester with Singapore airlines. Both would be business class. Miami would be about a 2 1/2-3 hour drive from us vs flying to Houston which is a 2 hr 45 min flight. We’re leaning towards flying with Singapore out of Houston, mainly because we’re interested in the Manchester area and not super interested in flying to Paris but I wanted to see if anyone had any thoughts.

I'm biased but I really like Singapore airlines. With the caveat that my experience with them has been many many economy flights (yet to fly business with them - though do have an upcoming trip flying short-haul business class with them thanks to miles and credit card points!). But even in economy they're very decent.

This website https://milelion.com/2023/02/17/ranked-my-favourite-singapore-airlines-business-class-seats/ is a Singapore-based site which has a nice write up of all the different Singapore airlines business class seats... I think Houston to Manchester should be the 2013J seats but I could be wrong.

Although I had the impression that the really high taxes/fees for flights for the UK are for flights departing the UK rather than flights arriving in the UK? So if that's the case - might be cheaper to fly into the UK, then leave from somewhere else in Europe? Though I guess the only direct flights from Europe to Orlando that I can think of are from Dublin, various UK airports, and Frankfurt. Not sure if there are others...

As far as flying into Paris - I've flown through Charles de Gaulle airport twice and disliked it both times. It's not terrible, but it's also one of my least liked airports. That being said there is a TGV station at the airport, and if things haven't changed you should be able to take a TGV from CDG to Lille, and change at Lille to the Eurostar to get to London - shouldn't be too hard to do this transfer. Unless you want to go into Paris itself of course in which case there is the direct Eurostar from Paris to London.

 

[Haley R]

I'm biased but I really like Singapore airlines. With the caveat that my experience with them has been many many economy flights (yet to fly business with them - though do have an upcoming trip flying short-haul business class with them thanks to miles and credit card points!). But even in economy they're very decent.

This website https://milelion.com/2023/02/17/ranked-my-favourite-singapore-airlines-business-class-seats/ is a Singapore-based site which has a nice write up of all the different Singapore airlines business class seats... I think Houston to Manchester should be the 2013J seats but I could be wrong.

Although I had the impression that the really high taxes/fees for flights for the UK are for flights departing the UK rather than flights arriving in the UK? So if that's the case - might be cheaper to fly into the UK, then leave from somewhere else in Europe? Though I guess the only direct flights from Europe to Orlando that I can think of are from Dublin, various UK airports, and Frankfurt. Not sure if there are others...

As far as flying into Paris - I've flown through Charles de Gaulle airport twice and disliked it both times. It's not terrible, but it's also one of my least liked airports. That being said there is a TGV station at the airport, and if things haven't changed you should be able to take a TGV from CDG to Lille, and change at Lille to the Eurostar to get to London - shouldn't be too hard to do this transfer. Unless you want to go into Paris itself of course in which case there is the direct Eurostar from Paris to London.

Thank you for the response! The only concerning thing is the small footwell on the plane from Houston to Manchester. I’ve seen a decent number of people complain about that. Dh is a big guy and might have problems fitting his feet in there.

That’s what I’ve been told about the taxes and fees but when we looked it was higher getting there for some reason. I can check again to be sure. We also thought it would be nice to fly straight back to Orlando at the end of the trip instead of positioning.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

DH is planning a trip to Thailand in Feb 2025. He's flying on his own from Boston (meeting up with friends in Thailand), so just one biz class seat needed. Time to start accumulating the points. From a very quick search, I’m thinking AA miles for JAL. Anyone done Thailand on points? He has a friend who lives there so they are staying with him and don’t need hotels. Just need to figure out the flight.

Seconding @sky13 recommendation of Singapore Air. Though I haven't been, we were attempting to plan a Thailand trip with friends for this December/January 2025, so I looked into many options. The other ones were Qatar Airways, British Airways, United and AA. In my opinion the best point redemption and availability was Singapore, every time I checked. A close second was Qatar Airways, but I couldn't find availability for my dates at all since I was so close in. If you have a lot of time, that's another option though!

 

[GZanta77]

Thank you for the response! The only concerning thing is the small footwell on the plane from Houston to Manchester. I’ve seen a decent number of people complain about that. Dh is a big guy and might have problems fitting his feet in there.

As someone who is 6'4 with size 14s, I have flown a number of Biz class seats that have comments about small footwell and I don't think I have ever found it to be a huge problem. Sure, you might not be able to get the 'perfect' position, but I have had no problem getting myself comfortable. I'd rather be in Biz with a small footwell than anywhere else on the plane.

Edit: Just to note, I have not personally flown Biz on Singapore.

 

[Haley R]

As someone who is 6'4 with size 14s, I have flown a number of Biz class seats that have comments about small footwell and I don't think I have ever found it to be a huge problem. Sure, you might not be able to get the 'perfect' position, but I have had no problem getting myself comfortable. I'd rather be in Biz with a small footwell than anywhere else on the plane.

Edit: Just to note, I have not personally flown Biz on Singapore.

Dh said he’s fine with it because he’d rather fly Singapore to Manchester than Air France to Paris. I wish we could fly straight to London from Orlando without the crazy taxes and fees but I don’t think that will happen. We looked at positioning elsewhere and flying AA, Delta, or United but they all have such high points for one way flights.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

Saw on DoC that there's a "spend $100+ in select bill pay categories, get $15 statement credit" on some Chase cards. Checked all mine and DH's cards, only had it on one card - an old Amazon card. Here's the direct link to check your cards: https://www.chase.com/mybonus/2024q1spend100

 

[Duckbug.Ducktales]

Saw on DoC that there's a "spend $100+ in select bill pay categories, get $15 statement credit" on some Chase cards. Checked all mine and DH's cards, only had it on one card - an old Chase Amazon card. Here's the direct link to check: https://www.chase.com/mybonus/2024q1spend100

Yeah, I also have it on my old Amazon card. I guess they want me to use it

 

[ljhayes]

Saw on DoC that there's a "spend $100+ in select bill pay categories, get $15 statement credit" on some Chase cards. Checked all mine and DH's cards, only had it on one card - an old Amazon card. Here's the direct link to check your cards: https://www.chase.com/mybonus/2024q1spend100

Another one that only has it on my Amazon card.

 

[havaneselover]

My Hilton Amex is acting so odd. There's a gas charge pending from Saturday and my Hampton Inn stay is pending for $50. I tried to apply $100 in gift cards and they had no clue how to do it. It looks like they did charge the gift cards and my card and credit my Amex back $25 (applied the other $75 to the pet charge) but the room charge isn't on my Amex still.

I'm about to cancel Japan. My plane tickets are refundable because of a flight change. Everything else is Hilton points, FNCs, and a deposit at Disney. Down with my parents and there's absolutely no way I would feel good about being out of the country in two months. Things are really, really rough at the moment

 

[afan]

Another one that only has it on my Amazon card.

I didn't get it on anything and I don't have amazon.

 

[Judique]

I didn't get it on anything and I don't have amazon.

Same. I have several cards that I haven't used much recently, and no go. I'm about to pay my electric and gas and would have been nice.

As far as Amazon goes, no temptation there.

 

[Judique]

My Hilton Amex is acting so odd. There's a gas charge pending from Saturday and my Hampton Inn stay is pending for $50. I tried to apply $100 in gift cards and they had no clue how to do it. It looks like they did charge the gift cards and my card and credit my Amex back $25 (applied the other $75 to the pet charge) but the room charge isn't on my Amex still.

I'm about to cancel Japan. My plane tickets are refundable because of a flight change. Everything else is Hilton points, FNCs, and a deposit at Disney. Down with my parents and there's absolutely no way I would feel good about being out of the country in two months. Things are really, really rough at the moment

You are doing the right thing. Sorry to hear things are rough.

Was happy to see my older brother earlier this month and it was a good reminder to make the most of the time we have.

 

[AndreaDM]

Saw on DoC that there's a "spend $100+ in select bill pay categories, get $15 statement credit" on some Chase cards. Checked all mine and DH's cards, only had it on one card - an old Amazon card. Here's the direct link to check your cards: https://www.chase.com/mybonus/2024q1spend100

I had those offers on a few cards a few months ago and used them. I got 2 yesterday but now mine are spend $150 get the $15 back. Not quite the incentive that it previously was.

 

[georgina]

Saw on DoC that there's a "spend $100+ in select bill pay categories, get $15 statement credit" on some Chase cards. Checked all mine and DH's cards, only had it on one card - an old Amazon card. Here's the direct link to check your cards: https://www.chase.com/mybonus/2024q1spend100

Got 4 emails from Chase yesterday. Both of our IHG personals and CFU's got the offer, 3 of them spend $150, one only $100, all get $15 back. We barely use the IHG cards, CFUs occasionally.

Also got a 15% back on Starbucks in app purchases on a CIU ($up to 4.50), expires March 5. Tried a reload to see if it would work

 

[EACarlson]

Does anyone here have the Ebags Motherlode 21" Carryon? I just got the 29" checked and now my wife is really interested in the carryon sized one. I'd love to hear reviews from anyone that actually has one.