Tag Archives: American Express

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Switching Marriott Bonvoy Business Credit Card from Chase to American Express Paid Off with 5 Marriott 50K Free Night Certificates

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Updated at 8:30am on 10/9/24: I updated this post after the sign up bonus posted a few days ago.

Good morning everyone, I hope your week is going well. This post has been a work in progress for several months since March 2024.  Let me explain.  Back in March 2024, American Express had an increased sign up bonus on the American Express Marriott Bonvoy Business Credit Card that offered 3 Marriott 50K Free Night Certificates (FNC) after spending $6,000 in 3 months.  That was a great offer, but due to Marriott’s Eligibility Matrix (see Frequent Miler’s awesome chart), I wasn’t eligible for the AMEX Marriott Bonvoy Business Credit Card because I currently had the Chase Marriott Bonvoy Premier Plus Business Credit Card. I would need to close my old Chase card, wait 30 days, and then apply for the new AMEX card.

This was a big gamble because there was no guarantee that the AMEX card would have a decent sign up bonus again in the future and because my Chase card was no longer available, so once I closed that card, I could never get it back.  I strongly prefer to hold onto cards that are no longer available, like my Chase Ink Plus and my JPMorgan Chase Ritz Carlton.

The increased sign up bonus on the AMEX card ended on March 20, 2024, and my Marriott 35K FNC from the Chase card would post the following month in April 2024.  As expected, the FNC posted to my Marriott account on April 15, 2024, and now was the time to proceed with my plan.

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American Express Gold Card Introduces $50K Limit on Restaurant Spending for 4X Rewards (Starting 1/1/25)

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Good morning everyone, happy Friday!  Laura was reviewing her recent American Express Gold Card statement and noticed an upcoming change that said:

Effective January 1, 2025, you will continue to earn 3 additional points (for a total of 4 points) for each dollar of eligible purchases charged at restaurants worldwide now on up to the first $50,000 of these purchases per calendar year.

Previously, I do not believe there was a cap on restaurant purchases that would earn 4x AMEX Membership Rewards.  I did some more digging to learn more.

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How to Combine P1 and P2 Hawaiian Airlines and Alaska Airlines Miles into a Single Account

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Good afternoon everyone, I hope your week is going well. In this post, I will show you how we moved Alaska Airlines Miles into Hawaiian Airlines Miles, transferred those miles between Hawaiian Airlines accounts, and then transferred those miles to Alaska Airlines.  We wanted all of our miles to be in a single account (my Alaska Airlines account) to make award booking easier since we would book all of our award tickets from a single account.  Transfers between Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines were free and instant.  Here are the steps we did…

A few weeks ago, Laura and I transferred large chunks of American Express Membership Rewards Points into Hawaiian Airlines Miles when AMEX had a 20% transfer bonus to Hawaiian Airlines.  I transferred 417K AMEX MR Points into 500K Hawaiian Airlines Miles on August 29.

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Sortable Table of Eligible Properties for $200 Semi Annual Hilton Resort Credit

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Good afternoon everyone, I hope your week is going well.  Yesterday, American Express and Hilton updated their list of properties that are eligible for the $200 semi annual Hilton resort credit on the American Express Hilton Honors Aspire Credit Card.  The current list (found here) contains 256 properties (as of 9/24/24), but they are grouped by Brand Name, not sorted alphabetically by property name or country.  This makes it difficult to find a property or see which properties are available in certain cities or countries around the world.  I decided to take a crack at the list and add the city and country for each property and make the list sortable and searchable.

For some international properties, I was not sure which part of the property address was the city vs province / state / territory, so I need your help.  Please review the list and let me know if the city listed next to a specific property is incorrect and I will update the table.

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Last 2 Weeks Summary: Barclays Denials, Carmel / Monterey, Hilton GC Issue & New to Aligned Incentives

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Good afternoon everyone.  Confession time: I feel like a bad blogger when I don’t post anything in several weeks and it’s been 2+ weeks since my last post.  I’ve been busy with work / life / travel and nothing has inspired me enough to write a full blog post, but I figured I could compile a few different topics into a single post to clear out the cobwebs in my mind.  If you have any questions or comments about any of these topics, please share them in the comments section.  Let’s get to the topics.

My 2 Barclays Credit Card Denials

With all the hype around the Hawaiian Airlines and Alaska Airlines merger, Laura and I decided to apply for Barclays Hawaiian Airlines Credit Cards.  Laura was instantly approved for the personal Barclays Hawaiian Airlines Credit Cards that offers 70,000 Hawaiian Airlines Miles after first purchase (read Frequent Miler’s post).  I decided to apply for the personal and business Barclays Hawaiian Airlines Credit Cards at the same time and both applications went pending.  I called the Barclays reconsideration department to see if I could move some of my credit limit from my 3 existing personal and business Barclays credit cards.  Unfortunately, the rep said Barclays could not approve me for either card and that they could not reallocate my credit limits to approve either/both cards.  That was disappointing and a hit to my ego.  But I am glad Laura was instantly approved for her credit card.

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