Tag Archives: Spirit Airlines

a woman holding her hands up with a man in front of him

August 2016: Which Annual Fees did I Pay & which Credit Cards did I Close?

Good morning everyone, I hope you all had a great weekend.   I quickly wanted to thank everyone who joined me at my Mountain View meetup yesterday – it was great speaking with you all and I will set up another Mountain View meetup soon.  Last August, I wrote July App-O-Rama Update: Several Reconsideration Calls Required to be Approved for 6 New Credit Cards.  In that post, I shared my successes and failures of applying for the following 7 credit cards:

July App-O-Rama Final List

I was eventually approved for the following 6 credit cards:

  • AMEX Everyday – 10,000 AMEX Membership Reward points
  • Citi American Airlines Business – 50,000 American Airlines miles
  • US Bank Cash+ – $100 cash back
  • Bank of America Alaska Airlines – 25,000 Alaska Airlines miles
  • Bank of America Spirit Airlines – 15,000 Spirit Airlines miles
  • Ebates Cash Back – $10 cash back

Of the above credit cards, 3 have annual fees that just posted recently:

  • Citi American Airlines Business – $95
  • Bank of America Alaska Airlines – $75
  • Bank of America Spirit Airlines – $59

I also have a US Bank Club Carlson Business Credit Card that just posted a $60 annual fee (originally opened in July 2014).  Of the 4 credit cards with annual fees, which ones are worth keeping and paying the annual fee?  Which credit cards did I decide to close?  Continue reading

a close up of a credit card

Spirit Airlines Credit Card Holders: Find Off-Peak Award Tickets & Avoid Award Booking Fees

Good afternoon everyone, I have another award booking post that might interest some of you. This is a follow up post to my Spirit Airlines Credit Card introduction post.  If you have a Bank of America Spirit Airlines Credit Card, like myself, you might be sitting on a handful of Spirit Airlines miles.  The Spirit Airlines “loyalty” program is tricky, since miles expire within 3 months if you do not earn or redeem miles during that period.  Having the Bank of America Spirit Airlines Credit Card allows you to earn 2x miles on all purchases and makes it easy to keep your miles from expiring.  I have a $5 monthly Amazon auto-reload set up on this credit card to keep the miles in my Spirit Airlines account from expiring.

The main perk of the Bank of America Spirit Airlines Credit Card is the ability to access off-peak award tickets, starting at 2,500 Spirit Airlines miles for short one-way flights.  That sounds like a pretty good deal, right?  Yes, but there are a few pitfalls to be aware of first.

Spirit Airlines Award Chart

Continue reading

a woman holding her hands up with a man in front of him

July App-O-Rama Update: Several Reconsideration Calls Required to be Approved for 6 New Credit Cards

Warning: if you are just starting out with rewards-earning credit cards, please do not apply for several credit cards at the same time.  You are responsible for your credit history and credit scores.  You have been warned…

Good evening everyone.  Last month, I wrote July 2015: My 8 Credit Card App-O-Rama Game Plan and I shared my plans/reasoning for applying for the below 8 credit cards.

App O Rama July 2015

After listening to your feedback and suggestions, I decided to make some changes to my App-O-Rama plan.  The table below shows the 7 credits that I ended up applying for.  Here are my reasons for not applying for a few of the credit cards:

  • The Barclays Arrival Plus Credit Card was not available for new applications on my App-O-Rama date.
  • I couldn’t get the targeted 75,000 offer on the AMEX Business Gold Rewards Charge Card, so I decided to wait for a better public offer.
  • I forgot that Citi’s “8 Day Rule” applies to personal and business credit cards, so I decided to apply for the Citi American Airlines Business Credit Card instead of the Citi Hilton HHonors Visa Signature Credit Card.
  • I decided to go for the Bank of America Spirit Airlines Credit Card instead of another Bank of America Virgin Atlantic Credit Card.

July App-O-Rama Final List

Continue reading

a close up of a credit card

App-O-Rama Update: Overturning Bank of America’s Spirit Airlines Credit Card Denial Letter

Good morning everyone.  As part of my 8 card App-O-Rama in July, here is an update to my Bank of America Spirit Airlines Credit Card application.  Before I share my success story about denial letters and reconsideration calls, let me explain why I would ever want to fly on Spirit Airlines, let alone get a Spirit Airlines credit card.  The answer is quite simple.  Spirit Airlines has a distance-based chart (accidentally mislabeled as a region-based chart) and by having the Spirit Airlines credit card, you are able to book off-peak award prices.  This distance-based chart does not matter if the flights are non-stop or not.

Spirit Airlines Award Chart Off Peak Prices

Since I live in the Bay Area, Oakland Airport is my closest Spirit Airlines airport (I’m not sure why they mention San Francisco since it is 100% in Oakland.  I crossed out San Francisco so no one would get confused.)  They offer non-stop service from Oakland to Chicago (ORD not MDW), Dallas (DFW not DAL), Houston  (IAH not HOU), and Las Vegas (LAS).  I would never want to be on a Spirit Airlines flight that has 2-3 stops, so Myrtle Beach (MYR) and New York City (LGA) are out of the question.  I like the 4 non-stops to Las Vegas, but there are no non-stop flights after 2:32pm.  Come on Spirit, add some evening flights to Vegas!  It is interesting that Spirit Airlines does not fly OAK-LAX, since only Southwest Airlines flies that route.

Spirit Airlines Routes from OAK

Continue reading