What’s Up with Grant? CA Fires, CVS-AMEX, Citi Photo Cards, Update on Checkout51, and Hamburg/Copenhagen Planning
Good morning everyone! California has a had a rough couple of days deals with several forest fires. I hope my friends/family/readers in San Diego County are all doing ok. Thank you for all the hard work from the fire fighters and other respondents. I am going down to San Diego on Saturday June 7 (3 weeks from today) to meet a friend of mine. She is a big miles/points aficionado like myself, so I wanted to know if anyone would like to join us, a very casual miles/points meetup. The time and place has yet to be decided, but it will probably be in the afternoon on Saturday.
Also, I have been a *really bad* blogger this week. I haven’t posted anything in the last 3-4 days so I apologize for not keeping you up to date on the latest miles/points news:
- Southwest Airlines credit card now 50,000 mile sign up bonus
- Barclays Arrival Plus credit card now with chip and pin and the same sign up bonus
- Chase Ink Bold/Plus credit card now with 60,000 Chase UR Points
- American Express Daily Deals, maybe I should say “deals”, not too impressive this year
- Evolve Pay now you can pay with some credit cards (mostly MasterCard)
- Charlotte Mile Madness reviews
- Whatever else I missed
Just because I haven’t been writing the last few days doesn’t mean I haven’t been experimenting with different topics/ideas. I have some pretty good posts in the pipeline. One post that’s been 1+ month in the making is my headache of a problem dealing with CVS and my American Express Target card. Have you ever had a situation where neither company could help, but then you decided to do a 3 way conference call and have them speak directly to each other and solve the problem? Ya, that’s what happened here. I’m glad to finally have my $503.95 back. More info to come shortly (P.S. crazy story).
Umm, what the heck is a reversal of chargeback and why do you do this to me AMEX??
I have also been researching Citi’s Benefit Builder which is a little known site run by Citi that shows and explains all of your benefits on every Citi credit card. One cool features is that you can usually request a chip (chip and signature) for any credit card and also request a photo of yourself on the card, some cards will even let you do both. Supposedly the photo makes it harder for thieves to use and reduce fraud, but I doubt that. It just looks cool.
I’m so happy I have my photo on my credit card, I’m the coolest one in this store!
A few weeks ago I talked about Checkout51, a cool smartphone app that let’s you earn cash back on your groceries purchases (read original post), has anyone used it lately? I personally don’t shop for food/cleaning products often, I much prefer the high-end gift cards, but I’m sure some of you actually shop for food/cleaning products. Have you had much luck earning cash back? I’m up to $3 so far, just need $17 more to cash in my earnings! I will have a follow-up post explaining how to use the service soon.
Saved 50 cents on a bag of Jalapeno Kettle Chips, mmm savings
It’s been over a month since my trip to Hamburg, Germany and Copenhagen, Denmark, I figured I would start working on a post showing my strategy and planning for using miles and points to reduce the cost of my trip. I will talk about:
- 21,250 Virgin Atlantic miles and $131.50 to fly non-stop from LAX to LHR
- $284.80 to fly German Wings (Lufthansa’s subsidiary) from LHR to HAM (nothing special, just an expensive paid ticket)
- 10,000 Marriott points to stay at a Courtyard Hamburg Airport hotel
- $198 for 4 nights at an AirBNB apartment in Hamburg
- $90 to fly SAS from HAM to CPH (nothing special, just a cheap paid ticket)
- 48,000 Hilton HHonors Points + $28 USD to stay 2 nights at the Hilton Copenhagen Airport hotel (double upgrade to executive floor with lounge access)
- 50,000 American Airlines miles and $63.40 to fly CPH-DUS-LAX on Air Berlin Business Class (my first/only international business class seat with a lie flat bed, I’m hooked!)
Chilehaus – very pointy building in Hamburg
Nyhavn by canal tour
If you have any questions, please leave a comment below. have a great weekend everyone!
Where are your pics from Reeperbahn?
Hmm I don’t think I went there. I looked it up on google images, looks like a cool place.
I also just came back from Copenhagen, Hamburg (while in transit to Munich and back to Copenhagen), Amsterdam and Lubeck, and Munich, Germany. I was waiting on your blog posts since you went about a few weeks before I did. New follower to your blog BTW (and new mile collector), also from OC. I have a feeling we live in the same area :) Keep up the helpful posts!
I’m sorry I didn’t post anything about my trip before you went, I hope you had great weather like I did. I’m in Irvine. Let me know if you have any questions about the miles and points game.
As great as weather can be in Copenhagen. Last few days we got rained on in Munich and Lubeck. We sought shelter in one of the beer tents in Munich (Theresienwiese) though, we just happened to be in town in time for Fruhlingfest. Not bad. Amazing food, and the beer was SOOOO good, and I’m not even a big beer drinker myself but I almost gobbled up the whole liter! Thanks for the offer. I might take you up on that, neighbor!
We also stayed at the Radisson Blu Amsterdam. Did you try their breakfast buffet when you were there? To die for!
I love German food and beer, sooooo good. When I stayed at the Radisson Blu in Amsterdam, they didn’t offer free breakfast, so we ate at other places down the street. Was breakfast included for you when you stayed on points?
It was a paid stay. I have no points yet with them, first time staying on a Carlson property actually. Quite happy with my IHG platinum so always stayed with them. But I found a ridiculous rate for radisson blu, which I filed for best rate guarantee so even sweeter! Then later on I get them to match my IHG status so I got the Carlson gold elite right in time for my stay. They graciously upgraded me to a corner business class room on the top floor without me asking. Upon check in, they also offered us a reduced breakfast rate so it was a no-brainer. Overall a very pleasant stay.
I may be able to join your next meet up. Keep us posted when it gets closer. Would love to hear your travel stories.
Wow, nice deal there, I wish Club Carlson provided breakfast for their award stays and credit card holders, no love from them. IHG platinum isn’t very special, but whenever you show up, they treat you like a god, so I like it. The next scheduled Meet Up will be in San Diego on Saturday June 7, location TBD. I was talking to Travel-Summary and we are trying to get an OC Meet Up in early August. He is another OC based travel blogger, so it is fun to catch up with him.