Tag Archives: American Express Membership Rewards Points

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My Travel Philosophy for Redeeming Miles vs. Paying Cash for Flights (w/ Account Balances as of March 2020)

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Good morning everyone, happy Friday!  I just finished listening to the Miles to Memories podcast (latest episode) and enjoyed listening to them talk about Disney when they redeem miles vs. pay cash for flights.  I don’t have a hard and fast rule that I live by, so I thought it would be fun to share my travel philosophy of when I redeem miles vs. pay cash for flights.  I specifically mention flights because I plan to write a similar article about hotels and didn’t want to make this article too long.  Lastly, when I use the word cash, that could mean paying for the flight with a credit card, or paying with an airline gift card, or using credit card rewards to pay for the flight – basically anything other than booking an award ticket with airline miles.

I also think it is important to share how many credit card reward points I have, since my thinking would be much different if I had 1,000 Chase Ultimate Reward Points vs. 1 million Chase Ultimate Reward Points.  With that said, here are my transferable points balances, as of March 2020, from smallest to largest:

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What’s in Grant’s (iPhone) Wallet?

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Good morning everyone, I hope you had a great Super Bowl weekend.  I was down in Orange County enjoying the warm weather, but now I am back up in the chilly Bay Area.  I’ve been wanting to write about this topic for a while, but my final motivation was reading 2 Frequent Miler articles: What’s in Nick’s wallet? and What’s in Greg’s wallet?  The first thing you should know about me (if you already didn’t know) is that I am a millennial and I live in the Bay Area, so I can go weeks without using cash.  For that reason, my wallet is built into my iPhone XS case.  I use the Urban Armor Gear (UAG) iPhone Case ($30 on Amazon) that has room for 4 cards: my drivers license and 3 credit cards.  Which 3 credit cards do I carry with me on a daily basis and which credit cards do I have in my ApplePay Wallet?

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If I Could Only Keep 5 Credit Cards with Annual Fees…

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Good afternoon everyone, I hope your weekend is going well.  A few weeks ago, I wrote these 2 posts:

In those posts, I listed all the credit cards that Laura and I have.  I also justified why I paid $4,588 in credit card annual fees in 2019.  Since that post, there have been a few credit card changes (JPMorgan Chase Ritz Carlton Credit Card lost the Visa Infinite Discount Air Benefit and the Chase Sapphire Reserve Credit Card added Lyft and DoorDash benefits).  A few readers commented and other bloggers linked to the top post and shared which credit cards they keep every year.  As part of my 2020 travel resolutions, I said I wanted to reduce the amount I paid in credit card annual fees.  In this theoretical post, here are the 5 credit cards with annual fees that I would keep…

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Keep, Cancel or Convert? American Express Business Platinum Charge Card ($595 Annual Fee)

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Good afternoon everyone.  As part of my “Keep, Cancel or Convert?” series, I like to evaluate and reevaluate credit (and charge) cards to make sure they still deserve a spot in my wallet.  Last month, the $595 annual fee posted on my American Express Business Platinum Charge Card.  I have read a few recent blog posts about whether to keep or cancel the AMEX Platinum Card (from Frequent Miler and Your Mileage May Vary), so I wanted to share my view on this card.

First things first, I added my brother as an authorized user so he could access the Centurion Lounges, Escape Lounges, and Priority Pass Lounges (no more restaurants).  He used the card a few times, but he decided that the $300 annual fee was not worth it to him.  My statement closed on December 2, I called AMEX on December 2 or 3, and said I would like to downgrade my brother’s AMEX Business Platinum to a no annual fee AMEX Business Green (which comes with no perks, other than the $100 Global Entry credit).  AMEX processed the downgrade request right away, but did not provide a full refund (I was charged $1.64 for those 2 days).  Seems kind of petty to me, but let’s see if I decided to keep, cancel, or convert my AMEX Business Platinum.

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American Express Business Platinum Airline Credit Used for 2 $99 JetBlue Seat Assignments

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Good morning everyone, I hope your week is going well.  As part of My 5 New Year’s Travel Resolutions for 2020, I said that I would “Use American Express Airline Fee Credits (Without Buying Airline GCs / eGCs).”  So far in 2020, I am following through on my resolution.  Last month, I used my JetBlue True Blue Points to book flights for Laura and I to fly from SFO to BOS.  It is a 5.5 hour red eye flight, so I looked at how much the Even More Space seats cost and found out the seats I wanted were $99 each.  Instead of purchasing those seats with cash in 2019, I decided to use the $200 airline fee credit that comes with my American Express Business Platinum Charge Card to cover the charges.  I selected JetBlue as my airline for 2020 and paid for the 2 seats with my AMEX Business Platinum.  The pending charge looked like a single $198 JetBlue purchase…

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