Good morning everyone, I hope your weekend is off to a great start. A few days ago, I wrote about my July App-O-Rama and my approval process for the American Express Delta Platinum SkyMiles Credit Card. Since my application was not instantly approved, I called American Express. I was told that I had too many credit cards with American Express and I needed to close an existing American Express credit card to open up a credit card slot. I closed my American Express Hilton Honors Business Credit Card and transferred the credit limit over to my new American Express Delta Platinum SkyMiles Credit Card. The American Express rep also offered to expedite the delivery of my new credit card. Yes please! My new credit card arrived via UPS Next Day Air and here is the unboxing post that shows the card art, welcome documents, and the card benefits. Here is the front and back of the American Express Delta Platinum SkyMiles Credit Card:
Tag Archives: Delta Airlines
My July App-O-Rama Credit Card Results (Spoiler: 4 out of 5 Approved)
Updated on 7/20/2019 at 8am: I added the Barclays rejection letter to the bottom of this post.
Good morning everyone, I hope your 2 day Prime Day shopping spree is going well. Even though I didn’t buy much on the first day of Prime Day, I did pick up a few new credit cards. My last App-O-Rama was in March, so I patiently waited 3+ months until my July App-O-Rama. As a reminder, I was approved for 3 out of 4 credit cards in my March App-O-Rama, including the American Express Gold Card, the US Bank Altitude Reserve Visa Signature Credit Card, and the Wells Fargo Business Platinum Credit Card. With those minimum spending requirements completed and the sign up bonuses redeemed, it was time to focus on these 5 credit cards. Here is a quick summary of my July App-O-Rama:
- Citi Premier Credit Card – instantly approved
- American Express Platinum Delta SkyMiles Credit Card – pending, then approved (I called AMEX and had to close an old card to open up a credit card slot)
- Barclay AAdvantage Aviator Business Credit Card – pending, then declined (too many recent inquiries)
- Banco Popular Avianca Vuela Credit Card – instantly approved
- Wells Fargo Propel World Credit Card – instantly approved (I called Wells Fargo to apply for this credit card over the phone)
Citi Premier Credit Card
I currently have a Citi Premier Credit Card that I have had for 4+ years, but I wanted to get another one since the sign up bonus is currently 60,000 Citi Thank You Points after spending $4,000 in 3 months. If I was approved for a second Citi Premier Credit Card, my plan was to downgrade/convert my old Citi Premier Credit Card into a Citi Rewards+ Credit Card.
My Oversold Delta Flight: $700 AMEX Gift Card, Hotel Voucher & Morning Flight
Good morning everyone. Last week, I was flying back from Salt Lake City (SLC) to Oakland (OAK) on Delta. The flight was oversold, so the gate agent was looking for a few volunteers to take a later flight (depart SLC at 10:30pm, land in OAK at 11:30pm) in exchange for a $700 gift card. Since I didn’t need to get back to OAK right away, I asked the gate agent if I could take a morning flight into OAK (depart SLC at 8:30am, land in OAK at 9:30am – I would then take BART into SF for work) and I also asked for a hotel voucher for the night. The gate agent said that was possible, so he added me to the volunteer list, and I waited near the gate for all passengers to board. After all passengers boarded the flight, the gate agent called me up, changed my flight to the new morning flight, printed out a hotel voucher, and showed me the list of gift cards that I was eligible to claim. I didn’t take a photo of the laminated sheet on the counter, but I believe these were the same gift cards that were offered. I decided to go with an American Express gift card since that was basically cash to me.
How Right (or Wrong) Were My 2018 Travel Predictions?
Good afternoon everyone. In mid January 2018, I wrote My Unlikely, But Entertaining 2018 Travel Predictions. I did not look at that post until yesterday, so it was fun to look at the predictions I had made. I will go through my 2018 predictions and see how well I did. Since my memory is not that great, please correct me if I am wrong on any of these. In a few days, I will share my probably equally as unlikely but equally as entertaining 2019 travel predictions, so check back for that post. Without further ado, here were my 2018 predictions and the results:
Airlines
- After the Virgin America merger, Alaska Airlines will add new routes to Mexico, Canada, and the Caribbean (Correct! According to Alaska Airlines’ website, they did add several new routes of Mexico City from SFO, LAX, and SAN. Unfortunately, there were no new routes to Canada or the Caribbean.)
- Delta Airlines will introduce cash and miles award tickets, then American Airlines and United Airlines will follow suit (Wrong! Looks like none of the big 3 airlines added “cash + miles” award tickets.)
- Southwest Airlines will increase their Transfarency by automatically keeping track of travel funds in each account (Wrong! You still need to manually track your travel funds.)
- JetBlue will add new routes along the West Coast and maybe to Hawaii (Wrong! JetBlue did add new routes along the East Coast, but nothing new on the West Coast.)
- Singapore Airlines will allow you to book United Airlines awards online (Correct! Singapore Airlines added the ability to book award flights on United Airlines in February.)
- British Airways will bring back the 4,500 Avios award price in the United States (Wrong! Sadly, the 4,500 British Airways Avios pricing band is still not available in the US.)
Delta Joins The Holiday Party: Portal Shopping, Easy Miles!
Delta is late to the party in offering us their holiday shopping bonus miles deal. But better late than never! If you like to shop and like to earn miles and points when you shop, then this is the sweet spot time of year! With the holidays upon us, take advantage of this shopping sweet spot and use airline shopping portals to earn miles and points for shopping you’ll do anyway. Here’s Delta’s bonus promotion, as well as reminders from the other airlines offering holiday bonus miles. Continue reading