Tag Archives: Citi Bank

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Citi Rewards+: 2,500 Bonus ThankYou Points Posted to TYP Account, Not Credit Card Statement

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Good afternoon everyone.  Last month, I received a targeted spend offer on my Citi Rewards+ Credit Card where I could earn 10x Citi ThankYou Points up to 2,500 TYPs for online purchases.  Doctor of Credit wrote about the offer.  Spending $250+ online in a month seemed pretty easy and 2,500 TYPs is worth $31.25 toward TYP travel redemptions, so I activated the offer, made the online purchases, and waited for the TYPs to post.  My credit card statement closed yesterday, so I downloaded the statement and looked at the TYP earning section, but I didn’t see the 2,500 TYPs.  I did some digging and found that the 2,500 TYPs posted directly to my TYP account instead.  I will share my findings below.

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Reconsideration Strategy for Credit Card Annual Fees During Coronavirus Pandemic

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Good morning everyone.  After reading recent articles by Omar @ Travel Summary (It’s Time to Reduce Your Credit Card Annual Fees) and Doctor of Credit (Credit Card Annual Fee Due? Remember To Ask For A Retention Offer Before Cancelling), I decided to take a look at my credit cards, their annual fees, and whether or not they are worth keeping going forward.  I will share my strategy for organizing my credit cards and my recent call with US Bank regarding my US Bank Altitude Reserve Credit Card.

I opened up my master credit card spreadsheet and looked at all the credit cards, debit cards, and authorized user cards in the table (68 total cards).  I then removed all my debit cards and authorized user cards and was left with 42 credit cards in my name or Laura’s name.  I then removed all the no annual fee credit cards and was left with 25 credit cards that have annual fees.  The annual fees totaled $4,134.  If you are curious about why we pay so much in annual fees, read I Paid $4,588 in Credit Card Annual Fees in 2019 & Was it Worth it?  Here are the credit cards sorted by card name:

Credit Card Name AF Credit Card Name AF
AMEX Business Platinum $595 Chase Sapphire Reserve $450
AMEX Gold $250 Chase Southwest Airlines Priority (Laura) $149
AMEX Hilton Honors Aspire $450 Chase World of Hyatt (Laura) $95
AMEX Platinum Delta SkyMiles $195 Citi AT&T Access More 1 $95
Banco Popular Avianca Vuela $149 Citi AT&T Access More 2 $95
Bank of America Alaska Airlines (Laura) $75 Citi AT&T Access More 3 $95
Capital One Venture Rewards (Laura) $59 Citi Premier $95
Chase Hyatt Hotels $75 US Bank Altitude Reserve $400
Chase IHG Rewards Premier $89 US Bank Radisson Rewards Business $60
Chase IHG Rewards Select $49 US Bank Radisson Rewards Premier Visa Sig 1 $75
Chase Ink Plus $95 US Bank Radisson Rewards Premier Visa Sig 2 $75
Chase Marriott Bonvoy Boundless $95 Wells Fargo Propel World $175
Chase Marriott Bonvoy Premier Plus Business $99 Total Annual Fees $4,134

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Work from Home Diary 3: Upcoming Travel Plans (Cancel Now or Wait it Out?)

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Good afternoon everyone, happy Friday.  I started sharing my thoughts regarding working from home in a series of Work from Home Diary posts.  Feel free to share your work from home feelings in the comments section below.  For today’s update, I wanted to discuss upcoming travel plans and my plans for those trips.  As of today, I have 4 trips on the books.  These trips are not set in stone and could be cancelled by myself or the airlines before departure depending upon how things are going in the world.  We are taking things slowly and focusing on 1 day at a time.

Trip 1 – Mother’s Day Weekend

My next trip is in mid-May for Mother’s Day Weekend.  I was planning on flying down from San Francisco (SFO) to Orange County (SNA) to visit my parents and grandparents.  I have flown down for Mother’s Day weekend for the last few years and enjoy seeing my family.  This trip was booked with Citi Thank You Points for basic economy travel on Alaska Airlines.  If the situation in California remains the same (all Californias are told to stay home to prevent the spread of coronavirus), I will probably cancel my trip and hold onto travel funds for a future trip.

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Mother’s Day dinner in St Kitts (2017)

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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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