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

[wanderlust7]

At one of the 2 The Clubs in San Jose. I know now many/if anyone goes through this airport but they have you order your food via qr code. It's a decent selection. Interesting since neither SEA or MCO were doing that during covid. May not have been self serve but you didn't order. It didn't make the food any warmer than if you'd been able to get it yourself which is a bummer.

Nice and big, esp compared to SEA. Prob about similar to MCO but less crowded. Too cold though, which seems to be the theme of this weekend

We usually fly out of SJC. The Club is my favorite lounge so far. Not crowded and decent food selection as you said (though it's getting a little repetitive by now lol). Good cocktail selection too and we love not having to order at the bar. Only con is it can be a bit of a trek from the Southwest gates.

 

[Princess Michele]

Not Calypso, but my advice is to carefully look at the difference you'd need when paying through Amex. We've booked flights by moving points because we needed to use far fewer points at times, but not always. On the other hand, there's also the risk of moving your MRs and then getting them stuck at an airline if for some reason you don't end up taking the flight.

If this were a couple of years ago, I’d say not really. However, lately there’s been a lot of flight cancellations and delays for a myriad of reasons and when that happens, you’re stuck dealing with Amex as opposed to the airline. I would take my chances if it’s a trip where there’s plenty of flexibility and I have a plan B or C in place. If say for example, I’m looking at a quick trip to New York from Miami for a weekend or something, I’d do it because if the airline cancels or delays my flight, there’s plenty of other options to hop on another flight if the airline won’t accommodate me and I can deal with Amex travel later.

I’ve got a friend dealing with an issue but for booking via Chase UR travel portal. Her flight was cancelled by the airline and Chase wasn’t refunding the UR points. They wanted to charge her $200 and the flight wasn’t much more than that, plus it was a fully refundable flight which the airline cancelled. Chase kept blaming the airline but the airline said it wasn’t them causing the problem. This went on back and forth for weeks. So yes there is definitely a potential downside.

Until things are back to normal with the airlines and staffing etc. I’m not planning on doing anything other than direct airline transfers with Amex unless it’s a flight where I’ve got tons of flexibility if things go sideways. I wouldn’t let any of that dissuade you from getting an Amex business Platinum. I will happily pick up another when the next NLL offer for one comes around.

Thank you both for your responses. I will keep the ability to book through Amex Travel as an option as I continue my planning. I have a long way to go yet.

 

[mmmears]

At one of the 2 The Clubs in San Jose. I know now many/if anyone goes through this airport but they have you order your food via qr code. It's a decent selection. Interesting since neither SEA or MCO were doing that during covid. May not have been self serve but you didn't order. It didn't make the food any warmer than if you'd been able to get it yourself which is a bummer.

Nice and big, esp compared to SEA. Prob about similar to MCO but less crowded. Too cold though, which seems to be the theme of this weekend

It's our local airport, although we tend to fly out of SFO most of the time. Thanks for the info - I really appreciate it.

 

[LilSweetPeaPhoto]

So I downgraded my Amex Everyday Preferred on Friday. And I see this offer already on my account.

"Earn 15,000 Membership Rewards® Points
after you spend $2,000 in qualifying purchases on the Card within your first 6 months of Card Membership.†"

I think I got 40k MR when I took the offer last time. Is it worth holding out for a better offer? Is this standard?

 

[pinkxray]

I am hoping to upgrade my Amex gold to Platinum. An offer finally popped up for 25,000MR for $2000 spend. I feel like in the past it was better? Sorry @LilSweetPeaPhoto, I don’t mean to steal your question. I was coming to post this anyway

I should have just renewed with my retention offer a few months ago but I didn’t think we’d be doing much big travel. Here I am looking to book our Hawaii trip and thinking I could easily use the hotel and airline credit. Plus they got me hooked on Walmart+ and since I’m paying it anyway…

 

[disneybirds]

Heading to London tomorrow via ORD and FRA, portion from ORD to FRA is on the Lufthansa 747 in first class. I hope they will allow me to have a medium top and large pants. I am not abnormally large on my bottom half, but the medium pants I received in the fall are too tight for my liking (I prefer loose-fitting pajamas). Checked the menu for the flight and it sounds divine. Will be visiting the United Polaris lounge in ORD and hoping to get a seat in their restaurant-style area.

Staying 6 nights at the Conrad St James (2 rooms -- ds's on points, mine cash and 1 night URs). Was thinking of changing last minute to something less expensive, but I really prefer to have separate rooms and I didn't want to pay cash in London for ds to have his own room.

Next Saturday we are going to an Arsenal game at Emirates stadium. I booked Hospitality tickets in the fall as I didn't want to join the fan club and try to get tickets when I knew that booking flights on points needed to be done as far from the dates of travel as possible (ds flying biz class on AC with 56.3k pts and we are coming home on BA in Club World Suites using Avios). The hospitality experience sounds amazing, so it should be a fun experience. I booked a tour of the stadium at 10:40am, match starts at 3:00pm and we can head up to the suite 2.5 hours before the game (and stay for 90 minutes after it's over). We get a 3 course lunch and unlimited beer and wine, though not premium brands. They also serve crudites during half-time and nibbles after the game.

I have a ticket to see Six on March 1st; ds wants to try to stream the Arsenal game (it's not being televised). We will visit the Churchill War Museum and Sir John Sloane's Museum. Borough Market is a must visit for us. No other plans for the week, figure we will decide as we go. Ds has never been to London and I've been a few times; I want him to choose what he wants to see / do, but since he isn't doing any research we will be winging it there. I was trying to load our Oyster cards yesterday (had to use a VPN), but since they haven't been used in over 8 weeks I have to load at a terminal at Heathrow.

If anyone has suggestions for things a 30-ish guy would enjoy please let me know as I have no clue other than what's mentioned above!

For only the second time in her 12.5 yrs of life I have to board the dog. She is a very anxious dog (about people, other dogs, places and pretty much everything), so I am dreading dropping her off and leaving her for a week.

Have a great trip! We stayed in the Conrad last summer and really enjoyed it. We had 2 rooms as well and it was definitely worth it.

 

[PolyTigger]

I am hoping to upgrade my Amex gold to Platinum. An offer finally popped up for 25,000MR for $2000 spend. I feel like in the past it was better? Sorry @LilSweetPeaPhoto, I don’t mean to steal your question. I was coming to post this anyway

I should have just renewed with my retention offer a few months ago but I didn’t think we’d be doing much big travel. Here I am looking to book our Hawaii trip and thinking I could easily use the hotel and airline credit. Plus they got me hooked on Walmart+ and since I’m paying it anyway…

You should look at the Resy offer it is 100000 points for 6000 in 6 months.

 

[AndreaDM]

I am hoping to upgrade my Amex gold to Platinum. An offer finally popped up for 25,000MR for $2000 spend. I feel like in the past it was better? Sorry @LilSweetPeaPhoto, I don’t mean to steal your question. I was coming to post this anyway

I should have just renewed with my retention offer a few months ago but I didn’t think we’d be doing much big travel. Here I am looking to book our Hawaii trip and thinking I could easily use the hotel and airline credit. Plus they got me hooked on Walmart+ and since I’m paying it anyway…

I got an offer last year to upgrade for 100,000 points, not the Resy offer, just the regular plat. I believe it was 6K spend in 6 months and also 5x points on groceries/restaurants/gas for the first 6 months.

 

[StephPlum]

DP. I didn’t know this so maybe will help someone else. Getting ready to get a new CIC so I was reducing CLs On the new SW cards I got last year. On SW performance Biz, at issue I had 5k CL. Tried to lower, but they said min CL on that card is 5k. Oh well, still was able to lower the personal card, so I should be fine.

 

[lsutigers03]

I'm going to apply DW for a CIU using my support link. I was looking online and in the app and the same card has different links. Is there a reason for this? I've never noticed before but I assumed the link would be the same.

 

[babyready]

My dd and I are headed to London and Paris for her graduation trip this May. I have our flights into London booked via AirFrance and back home from Paris via AA, all booked with points. Our hotels in each city are booked, also via through Hyatt and the Cap1 Portal. (Yay!) I have been working on itineraries and the next thing I need to book was the Eurostar from London to Paris. Yikes! I should definitely have factored those costs when planning the trip and booking hotels. Because now we don't have much flexibility and the prices are high! $414. Much more than I had budgeted.

Anyone have any tips for utilizing points or getting a discount? I read online that you could transfer AMEX points to Club Eurocar but I don't actually see that as a travel partner, so maybe that is not available to the US? Or it was just bad info.

It might actually be cheaper to fly at this point but we were kind of looking forward to the train, so trying to make that work. I do still have 125,000ish URs that I was planning to cash out to cover our various activities for this trip, just didn't anticipate spending so much of it on the train!

Any ideas? Or do I just need to suck it up and pay it?

Thanks!

 

[becauseimnew]

My dd and I are headed to London and Paris for her graduation trip this May. I have our flights into London booked via AirFrance and back home from Paris via AA, all booked with points. Our hotels in each city are booked, also via through Hyatt and the Cap1 Portal. (Yay!) I have been working on itineraries and the next thing I need to book was the Eurostar from London to Paris. Yikes! I should definitely have factored those costs when planning the trip and booking hotels. Because now we don't have much flexibility and the prices are high! $414. Much more than I had budgeted.

Anyone have any tips for utilizing points or getting a discount? I read online that you could transfer AMEX points to Club Eurocar but I don't actually see that as a travel partner, so maybe that is not available to the US? Or it was just bad info.

It might actually be cheaper to fly at this point but we were kind of looking forward to the train, so trying to make that work. I do still have 125,000ish URs that I was planning to cash out to cover our various activities for this trip, just didn't anticipate spending so much of it on the train!

Any ideas? Or do I just need to suck it up and pay it?

Thanks!

$414 each? wow, I would fly, you can fly British Airways for about 10K miles.

 

[becauseimnew]

Anyone been to Costa Rica over Thanksgiving week? Would that be better than spring break in mid-march weather wise?

More into hiking than relaxing on the beach.

 

[wanderlust7]

So I downgraded my Amex Everyday Preferred on Friday. And I see this offer already on my account.

"Earn 15,000 Membership Rewards® Points
after you spend $2,000 in qualifying purchases on the Card within your first 6 months of Card Membership.†"

I think I got 40k MR when I took the offer last time. Is it worth holding out for a better offer? Is this standard?

There's a DP where the 15k offer changed to 40k. Link I think I'd hold out.

I am hoping to upgrade my Amex gold to Platinum. An offer finally popped up for 25,000MR for $2000 spend. I feel like in the past it was better? Sorry @LilSweetPeaPhoto, I don’t mean to steal your question. I was coming to post this anyway

I should have just renewed with my retention offer a few months ago but I didn’t think we’d be doing much big travel. Here I am looking to book our Hawaii trip and thinking I could easily use the hotel and airline credit. Plus they got me hooked on Walmart+ and since I’m paying it anyway…

I used to have the 25k offer on my gold. Would check every so often to see if it increased and it never did. Eventually canceled the card after the year was up from the retention. If you really want a plat now, you could go for a Schwab if you haven't had it before (100k SUB).

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

Anyone been to Costa Rica over Thanksgiving week? Would that be better than spring break in mid-march weather wise?

More into hiking than relaxing on the beach.

We haven't been yet, but we're planning on the week after Thanksgiving because of the start of dry season. I figure things should still be lush, but not raining every day, and we're much happier with that weather.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

Instant approval on another CIU for DH, yippee! And I did remember to use my support link, so 20K for me and at least 99K for him. That's a NICE sub. I wish these elevated offers on the Ink cards would stay around!!

 

[lsutigers03]

The 60k MR bonus for the AMEX business checking account posted for me and DW. From the time we fulfilled the requirements to the points posting was around 2 1/2 weeks.

 

[Judique]

The 60k MR bonus for the AMEX business checking account posted for me and DW. From the time we fulfilled the requirements to the points posting was around 2 1/2 weeks.

And all they offered me was $300 this morning. Wasn't planning on it anyway but the 60K sounds so much better. Of course all I've been doing on the amex biz card is a dribble here and there.

 

[lsutigers03]

And all they offered me was $300 this morning. Wasn't planning on it anyway but the 60K sounds so much better. Of course all I've been doing on the amex biz card is a dribble here and there.

I opened the account in early December. The original bonus was 30k but they updated it to 60k so I quickly jumped on it.

 

[GZanta77]

My dd and I are headed to London and Paris for her graduation trip this May. I have our flights into London booked via AirFrance and back home from Paris via AA, all booked with points. Our hotels in each city are booked, also via through Hyatt and the Cap1 Portal. (Yay!) I have been working on itineraries and the next thing I need to book was the Eurostar from London to Paris. Yikes! I should definitely have factored those costs when planning the trip and booking hotels. Because now we don't have much flexibility and the prices are high! $414. Much more than I had budgeted.

Anyone have any tips for utilizing points or getting a discount? I read online that you could transfer AMEX points to Club Eurocar but I don't actually see that as a travel partner, so maybe that is not available to the US? Or it was just bad info.

It might actually be cheaper to fly at this point but we were kind of looking forward to the train, so trying to make that work. I do still have 125,000ish URs that I was planning to cash out to cover our various activities for this trip, just didn't anticipate spending so much of it on the train!

Any ideas? Or do I just need to suck it up and pay it?

Thanks!

Wow - when are you looking to travel? don't think I have ever paid more than $150 for the eurostar, and usually closer to $100. Or are you looking at business class?