Frequent Miler on the Air - Amex doubles down in the ultra premium card race | Ep106 | 7-10-21

Episode Date: July 10, 2021

00:21 Giant Mailbag: Is the AT&T Access More card worth keeping? 6:11 What crazy thing....did Amex do this week? 9:52 Mattress running the numbers: Marriott stay once or twice, get one or two free nights. Deal or no deal? https://frequentmiler.com/targeted-marriott-stay-once-get-free-night-award-stay-twice-get-2-free-night-awards/ 14:24 Main Event: Chase and Citi concede the ultra-premium card race while Amex doubles down https://frequentmiler.com/citi-dumps-the-prestige-card-no-longer-accepting-applications/ https://frequentmiler.com/new-platinum-live-disappointing-restrictions-monster-offer-for-some/ https://frequentmiler.com/the-amex-platinum-coupon-book-review-on-my-mind/ https://frequentmiler.com/documents-reveal-changes-coming-to-your-favorite-rewards-cards/ 1:03:47 Post Roast https://frequentmiler.com/citi-premier-complete-guide/ 1:06:52 Question of the Week: Can I spend toward an Amex welcome bonus via gift cards from GiftCards.com and will Amex charge a cash advance fee? Join our email list at: https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ Music credit: Annie Yoder

frequent miler on the air starts now jason city can see the ultra premium card race while amex doubles down we'll get into that today nick uh first of course we have a giant mailbag and today i'm here with giant mail oh you actually have the giant mail i do i have the giant mailbag and today I'm here with giant mail. Oh, you actually have the giant mail. I do. I have the giant mail. That's exciting. And because it's so giant, I'm only going to read part of the email that came to us. I see.

This is from Lauren. She says, oh, I need to give some background first. So this is about the Citi Access More AT&T card that is no longer available to new applicants. You can't get it if you want it. You can't product change to it. It used to be a favorite of ours because one of its features is it gets 3x points for online purchases. And you used to be able to do things like buy gift cards online and get 3x but then that kind of went away and uh and so on anyway so that's that's some background lauren says i've been contemplating canceling my city access more card before the annual fee is due because the card is becoming less and less useful when more often than not online shopping purchases

do not earn the 3x bonus. And figuring out which ones do needs a spreadsheet and macros. And as an aside, I mean, this is true. Like, Citi has made it easy to see with some of their cards, like the Prestige and Premier and a couple others, whether you're getting bonuses on your purchases. But Access More, they've left out in the cold. And it's really, really hard to figure out. All right, back to the show. She says, even if taking into consideration the 10K extra points for 10K spend annually, it's still just a little better than a 2X Everywhere card, but with an annual fee of $95. So I've had it with this card and I'm ready to move on. Yeah, you know, I think that's fair.

I've questioned keeping it also because I'm not using it as much as I once did. And it is such a pain. I mean, I think if it were easier to tell which transactions were earning the 3X, I'd be more excited about keeping it. At this point, I've kept it and definitely questioned it myself, though, because it's such a pain to know. And things that you expect will be 3x aren't always 3x. And there's no recourse when they're not. It's just like, you know, Citi just throws their hands up in the air like, you know, oh, I'm sorry, it's online shopping, but it's not online shopping. And there's no real way to know. Yeah, yeah. So I've already switched my wife's access more card to the no fee AT&T card.

And I'm thinking about doing the same for my own. And it's, it's crazy for me to ponder that because I've, I've sort of long held that when you have a card that's no longer obtainable, it, you know, it can be worth keeping just in case that's some thing. So, for example, if some service comes out that lets you sort of manufacture spin online and night as we record this, I guess. So Wednesday night that stockpile.com is, which is basically like a little brokerage, online brokerage, was allowing funding with a card, with a credit card. And so without a fee. And so that made me wonder. Yeah, it made me wonder.

It is craziness. And so I saw mixed reports in the comments as to whether a credit card worked or didn't work because they've gotten rid of the fee. And I haven't had a chance to look into it yet. But that was one of the things I had in mind was, I wonder if the Citi card would earn 3x because it's online. And so I thought about that. And there are other opportunities like that where maybe it could come into play and be useful. But yeah, it's definitely a lot of guesswork. And then if you do multiple transactions,

I mean, good luck figuring out which ones are in the three X. So I, but I've held it for the same reason as Greg, you can't get it. I can't get it back. So I can't change my mind later on. So that's been my major hesitancy, which is probably not a good reason to keep paying the $95 annual fee. Right. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, maybe because of our line of business, maybe we should be keeping them just in case. I don't know. I mean, it's not like it's going to be relevant to all that many of our audience. Just those people who

like us kept it because you can't get it anymore, right? And Lauren. And so, yeah, Lauren, I'm sure that there are some gift card opportunities out there that persist, but very likely few and far between and hard to scale and perhaps not worth it to you. So I totally get it. I don't know why Greg downgraded one to the regular AT&T card. Why did you do that instead of product changing it to a more useful Citi card? Is there a reason to have the AT&T card? This was on my wife's account. She already had all the useful ones. So there wasn't the, the, this one allowed me to change it without

it changing the number. And when the number changes, it can count as opening a new card and might interfere with getting a new bonus in the future. That makes sense. And retention offers that, I mean, that's the other reason you might want to keep it. Lauren is city has been great about retention offers in the past. They have very frequently in the past and that card offered an additional two X on up to like $17,500 spend or something ridiculous like that. So then you're looking at three X everywhere, plus the extra 10,000 points if you spend $10,000 a year. So then it could work out to be a great point generator. So it's worth calling Citi and saying that you're thinking about canceling and see if you can get a retention offer before you just product change or cancel it. That's a really great point. Yeah.

Downside of doing that, which I know from firsthand is then you keep it and forget to cancel it the next annual fee. True, true. Good luck with that, Lauren. Better organized than I am. All right. So I guess that brings us then to what crazy thing did Amex do? What did they do? Yeah. So when I log into my Amex account, and this is still happening,

I noticed it July 1st when all those amex platinum changes happened but um this is still happening i log into my amex account look at my regular amex platinum card and down below like the or i should say above amex offers there's a little section that's like an ad for referring friends. And it says I can get 30,000 points. Plus, there's like this added 4x points per dollar part of the offer. If I refer friends and they get 125,000 points for the Platinum card, which would be amazing if it wasn't for the resi offer, but that's another story. So anyway, so just remember that that section said I could get

30,000 points for referring a friend. And then an inch below that is the Amex offer section. And then there is an offer, refer friends, get 45,000 points. What? So the friends get exactly the same offer. I get exactly the same plus four part of the offer, but I could choose either to get 30,000 points for referring friends or 45,000. And there's different links. They're not the same link. They're different links. That's nuts. That's crazy. Yeah. Ridiculous. So, you know, I guess we can do a segment working out the math on which one's better for me to use.

Are they testing that? What do they call it? Like A-B testing or whatever it is? Trying to test and see who clicks on which one and refers people. I mean, like that just seems nuts. It doesn't make any sense. It's totally nuts. You know, I, I can imagine though, people, the one that's 30,000 is more obvious, I think, because it's not mixed in with the other Amex offers. So I can imagine people clicking it and using it even if, even if they have both, but it's just kind of really weird stuff. It is. All right. The other weird thing is that they keep increasing these bonuses, 30,000, 45,000, and yet the cap is still stuck at

45 or 55,000 points per year. So, right. I mean, that's, that's such a frustrating piece of it, isn't it? You get 45,000 for the first person, but you're only going to get 10 for the next. Yeah. I don't, I don't get that. I don't get that. I mean, you know, they, they send, they send those 10 99s out now when you earn points for referring friends. And I used to think the 55 K cap was there as a way to avoid doing that because there, there are some things about, like, if you, if you give out like $600 or more, then it has to be reported. And so I thought that was the reason for the cap. Now, I mean, if that was the original reason,

they must've forgotten about it because they haven't eased up the cap. Yeah, well, I mean, because it looks like you get 45,000 for a referral, but you only get 45,000 if you do one referral on that card. If you do two, really, you got 27,500 per referral, right? I mean, you can trick yourself into the math being that it was 45, but it wasn't, it was 27,500. And that's kind of frustrating. It's a good point. The 30K offer and the 45K offer are equal if you refer two friends.

Right. You're going to end up with 55K total either way. But if you're only going to refer one person, for sure, look for the 45,000 point offer. Don't do the 30,000 point offer. All right. All right. Good. Okay. So that brings us then to mattress running the numbers. And this week, we're going to look at a promotion from Marriott that Greg received. So tell us what it was. Yeah. Yeah. And it wasn't just me. Some readers reported the same. Marriott sent me a nice email saying, I just enroll in this promotion and one stay will get me one free night for Marriott. Two stays will get me two free nights. Now I had to read this a few times because I thought I was going to get a

total of three free nights because it made it sound like the second night, the second stay would get me two nights for that second stay. But no, it's basically, you know, stay once, get a free night, stay again, get another free night. What? That's insane. Have you not stayed at Marriott at all this year or something? I mean, you've had Marriott stays, but a lot of redemptions. And this one, the email didn't say anything about it having to be a paid stay. But once I enrolled and looked at the terms and conditions, it does look like it has to be a paid stay to earn it. Still, basic idea.

Even if I don't have a good use for it coming up in the timeframe that's allowed, I could just go check into the cheapest Marriott I can find, get one free night, and then do that again. Just not the very next night because it would count as the same stay that way. No, what's up with the free night? I mean, it's not a free night anywhere, right? What's the limit on the free night? It's the standard 35K free night certificate. All right. So, and you've determined in the past that those free night certificates are worth about $200 or so, right? Which varies, you know, I mean, sometimes you're obviously going to get

much, much less, but I used one actually just this past weekend. We stayed at a hotel on the 4th of July and the hotel price would have been $331, used a 35 K cert. Boom. So, I mean, you can certainly get better value in the night before that particular hotel was like 485. We didn't stay that night, but same thing could have been booked with a 35 K cert. So, you know, you pick and choose, find the right situation. So 35 K certs can be valuable. How long is the certificate good for once you, you know, I, I didn't see see that detail but usually with marriott they're they're a year so that's what i'm assuming uh all right so is it mattress run worthy would you go and check into a cheap marriott just to get the 35k cert definitely you know i i've i've i have a

few hotels that i like um going to repeatedly and they're both uh frequently available for 35k or less. And so, and they tend to price in the $300 and up range. And it's kind of a no brainer to me that, that we get the certificate and I'll use it. The tricky part to using it though, like if I want to book a stay for next summer, which I, which I would love to do, um, using a certificate that's going to expire next summer is risky. If I don't know for sure, I'm going to be completing that stay. Cause I I'll, I'll go all the way till next summer thinking I've used a certificate. Then I'll look at the stay and say, Oh, you know what? I need to cancel that. And, and then I get that certificate back. It's only good for another two weeks or whatever. So, you know, so that's my only like, like it's suboptimal for that reason,

but, um, I still, I'm sure I'll be able to use it to good value. So, uh, I think it's a no brainer, you know, check into a sick, you know, whatever the cheapest I could find, but in the past I've been able to find about $60 a night around here. Yeah. I mean, that's nice. If you can find someplace that's 60 or 70 bucks a night, I mean, it would seem if you're willing to pay the $95 a year annual fee for one of the cards that comes with a 35K cert, then you must be willing to pay $95 a year for a 35K cert, right? So anything less than 95 bucks is a better deal than holding onto the credit card because the credit card doesn't have much use beyond the free cert unless you're spending a lot of money at Marriott, but that's either here or there. So yes, I think I agree with Greg. I think it's a mattress run worthy offer. I'm a little jealous. Really, that's all it comes down

to is I'm jealous. I wish I had the offer. I didn't have it. My wife didn't have it. Greg had it. I'm jealous. I want it. Marriott, if you're listening, send me the free nights. Right. Come on, Marriott. Throw me a bone, Marriott. Come on. I haven't done any paid stays this year either. Just like Greg, I've done a few less award redemptions, but no paid stays here either, Marriott. Come on, throw me a bone. All right. So then I think that brings us to the main event. Right, right. So the main event, again, is Chase and Citi conceding the ultra premium card race while Amex doubles down.

So what do you mean by that? Conceding? I mean, the Sapphire Reserve is still out there strong, fighting its way into wallets worldwide or at least Yeah, let's get Citibank out of the way first. So we've reported that Citi no longer marketing or making available to new applicants the Citi Prestige card, which was their entry into the ultra premium card race. And by ultra premium, we're talking about these cards that tend to cost $500 and up that range or $450 and up, I guess I should say.

And so Citi's just flat out pulled out. They seem to be concentrating all their efforts at the low end, like fee-free cards, actually. They introduced the custom cash card, which we were pretty excited about recently. And we even said when we talked about it, that that made the prestige card even less relevant than it already was because Billy earned five X dining with, with that fee-free card. And but now city is like acknowledge that they're just like, ah, we, we wave the flag. We're out of here.

Can't do it anymore. There's even, even city was like, you know, we can't sell the prestige anymore. Come on. I mean, there's, they couldn't even come up with an angle where they'd be like, yes, you should get the prestige. And, you know, I say that, and I know that there are six readers out there saying, I love the prestige. I was using it all the time because they came out and commented on my post about when city dumped the prestige card. But I mean, come on, come on, guys. There's just not that many people where the prestige was a good fit. And even Citi recognized that and got rid of it. But it's kind of interesting that they just seem to have flat out gotten rid of it rather than refreshing it in some way. Maybe that's their intention, but the language they used when we

confirmed with them that they were not continuing to accept applications led me to believe that this was probably not a temporary thing. So I'm thinking that they're just going for the fee-free crowd. They're going for the, I'm going to say, lower end of the spectrum, because I mean the fee-free cards and like the simpler sort of reward structure of rewards credit cards. And they're certainly not going after the travel crowd with their travel cards anymore, right? No travel protections, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. I think it's pretty simple. I think somebody looked at the books and said, the prestige card is simply not profitable for us. And the competition is such that we would have to make an even more unprofitable card in order to compete.

You know, that's my, my bet is that they've still got the city, a executive card, right? So that's their one ultra premium card that they have left. But I mean, if you want admirals club access,

that card can be a great deal, but right, right. It's a great deal, especially if you add a bunch of authorized users. So they each get the Admirals Club access if they want it. But they're not really competing for the same crowd of people that the MX Platinum card is anymore at all. No, correct. They're out.

Okay. So Chase, it's a more complicated story, right? So Chase is certainly not pulled away from the Sapphire Reserve in any way, but what they've done pretty clearly is focus all their attention on the Sapphire Preferred. So that manifests itself first and for quite a while in better welcome bonuses for the Sapphire Preferred than the Sapphire Reserve. They have seemed and continue to seem much more eager to get people to sign up for the $95 Sapphire Preferred instead of the now $550 Sapphire Reserve. That could be because a report came out a couple of years ago about how

the Reserve was costing Chase a lot more than they had expected when they first brought it out. The other reason that I'm saying this is because of the new changes that have been leaked about what's coming out with the Sapphire Preferred and the Sapphire Reserve. There are enhancements to both cards coming. We don't

yet know if those are coming with new annual fees, but we do know some things. And a lot of people, including I think me and you, looked at these changes and said, wow, the Sapphire Preferred is looking better and better. And it's not that the Reserve isn't better than before, but it's like the Sapphire Preferred has largely caught up. Right? Right. Yeah.

And so that's where the premise of the show comes from. But I think we need to dive into those changes. Let's talk about it. Right? So the Sapphire Preferred is picking up a whole bunch of new benefits, right? Yeah, it sure is. Go ahead. Run us down the list.

All right. Well, let's start with today, before these changes. It's a pretty simple card, right? You get 2X travel and dining, 1X everywhere else, and it costs $95 a year. That was exciting a long time ago, by the way. There was a time when it was exciting. There was a time when that was super exciting. Right, right.

People listening to it now that are familiar with the current rewards landscape are like, 2X dining and travel for 95 bucks. That's it. I know that's why Chase is doing something about it. But there was a time when that was exciting. Right. I mean, so back when it was introduced, you would get your United card or your Delta card because that would earn 2X for that specific airline.

And now all of a sudden with the Sapphire Preferred, when that came out, it was like, I could get 2X for any airline and any travel whatsoever. That was just so much better than anything else out there at the time. As you said, today's market makes that laughable. But that's the way it's been for a long time. They did, I will, I think it's worth mentioning

when they first introduced sever preferred they had a like a seven percent anniversary bonus something like that and so you earn tiny bit more than 1x and 2x on that card but um anyway they haven't had that anniversary bonus for a long time and uh so that's 2X travel and dining. That's basically what the card is now. But come August 15th, what we're expecting is 3X dining, 3X streaming, and 3X online grocery. So that's like ordering groceries online. And 5x travel through Chase. So that's matching what the Freedom Cards already have. But if you book your travel through Chase

Ultimate Rewards, get 5x. They're adding what they call a 10% annual bonus. It's a little bit deceiving because it's not really a 10% bonus on points earned, but rather 10% bonus on your spend. And so whether you were earning 2X, 3X, 5X, it's really 10% of the base 1X you earned. So it's really not going to come to that much, I don't think. Brand, brand new is a $50 hotel credit. So you book a paid stay through Chase Ultimate Rewards elite benefits and everything when you do that, you get 5X. And if you use your card when you're dining worldwide, 3X and no foreign transaction fees um i'm personally less exciting about the 3x streaming and online grocery because i just don't have a lot of those you know i mean have some but the 3x streaming yeah that doesn't excite me at all the 3x online grocery i don't know i'm curious

how it'll work out because like i don't use instacart or shipped i know some people use those and so you'll probably be able to earn 3x on that. But like, for instance, where I live, there's a localish grocery chain, like a Northeastern grocery chain that offers online ordering and store pickup. So you order online and then you just drive up to the store and they load it into your car. And so it's the same prices as paying in the store. I think they charge you five bucks for it, but it's a convenience. So we're willing to pay the five bucks for every now and then. So we don't have to spend the time walking around the grocery store. So I wonder if that will code as grocery for this. Of course, if it does, it would probably code as grocery at Forex on the gold card also. So if you're going to have

the Amex gold card also, then I guess this wouldn't be particularly exciting. But if you're not also going to be invested in the Amex ecosystem, then that could be a decent little benefit there for people who do that sort of pickup of grocery pickup. Maybe, maybe. I don't know if it'll code at 3x, but possibly. It seems reasonably likely that it will. I guess, yeah, you're right. Time will tell. Time will tell. Time will tell. But so in my perspective, the Zephyr Preferred isn't becoming a blockbuster card at this point, but only because there's so many cards out there that have these big multiples,

like you mentioned the gold card having 4X options and other cards have 5X options and so on. So it's not becoming necessarily a blockbuster but it's it's sure becoming um a lot better as as a go-to uh travel card i think because there's just a lot more opportunity for um point earnings with those different new options. And the $50 hotel credit could be a nice little perk if they don't raise the annual fee by $50. Yeah. I mean, I'd be really disappointed if they raise the annual fee by 50 bucks for these changes because most of those various benefits there in terms of the bonus categories are already available on the

fee-free cards or on other cards that are $95 a year. So I wouldn't want to see an increase based on any of those things. And then I certainly wouldn't want to see an increase based on that $50 credit because when you're booking through the portal, then you're giving away the chance to get elite benefits and hotel points and can't use your AAA discount or this or that. So, you know, a lot of ways that that won't work out to be worth 50 bucks. So I don't think that is a good reason to increase the fee. So Chase, if you're listening, don't increase the fee, but at the same time, it may save you something. And so that combined with the 3X dining, I don't know, I find this interesting as a catch-all solution for someone who's looking for one travel card to

do it all, so to speak. This is actually pretty good now because you get your one-to-one transfers to Chase's partners. You get your 3x dining, 5x when you're booking travel through Chase, which like you said, great for airfare. And I guess if you're getting your hotels reimbursed and you don't care about hotel points and that sort of thing, then, you know, 5X through Chase might be OK for you in terms of a rebate to get. So all of those things, I think, are pretty good enhancements. I think they're a long time coming here. I think they're overdue because they made the Freedom Card so much better comparatively for a bit. So glad to see that stuff come to the Sapphire Preferred. So overall, good news there, I think. And for all these people who have recently opened it for the huge 100,000 point offer

that has been available on it, I mean, fantastic news to get a much better card than they anticipated getting. Right, right. And I think it's just worth mentioning too that it is a good travel card and it's better now. And I say that because so many other banks have backed away from offering good travel protections. City Preferred, I mean, sorry, the Chase Sapphire Preferred, it doesn't have as good as the Sapphire Reserve, but it still has very good, when compared to other banks, travel protections. And now you're going to get 3X for dining, which is, you know, I spend a lot on dining when I'm traveling. That's sort

of inevitable. See, now this was going to be part of my post-drost, so I'm glad that you mentioned it. So I'll just skip right to the post-drost and then come right back. Because you said in the post, and you said a moment ago that the 10% annual like bonus on your spend shouldn't matter very much because who's spending that much on this card. And I was thinking to myself, you've said lots of times before how much you spend on dining, Greg. So, you know, if you spend a lot on dining each year and you spend a fair amount on travel, you know, you're through your three X on dining or two X travel, five X travel through chase, et cetera. I mean, you might spend a fair amount on this card and that 10% will add up, no? Well, I mean, so what you're talking about

is getting 3.1x instead of 3x. So it's a tiny fraction. That's up at 10% enough, right? I mean, every 10,000 bucks, that's like another 1,000 points, right? 1,000 points. It's like 10 bucks. Oh, come on. You know, it's 15, 1.5 cents. Come on now. But yeah, you're right. You're right.

It's not super cut squatchable. But yeah, but being able to spend on dining on this card worldwide and get the 3X without the foreign transaction fees, that's excellent too. And granted, it's probably worth mentioning that the city premier offers that also and offers three X at grocery stores, not only online grocery. So that's one area where I feel like Chase was a little behind there. I wish they would have made that match the three X in-person grocery rather than only online and online may be useful. Like I said, I'm maybe happy with that, but I would have preferred to have seen just three X grocery. They could have gotten rid of the online streaming for all I care that most people just don't spend enough money on streaming for streaming to be

a bonus category that is worthwhile. Obviously people don't realize that, or the banks think people don't realize that because man, they love to push these streaming bonus categories. Right. Yeah. I mean, that's what banks have realized is like, oh, we can offer pretty much any multiple for online streaming because people aren't going to go crazy with it the way they would with a grocery category bonus. Right. Right. Right. Right, right, right. And I guess it seems appealing because they know most people are spending something on online streaming services, or at least most millennials are spending something on online streaming services. So I guess it's a bonus category that seems universal, stream. That's how I like it. I like streaming gift cards. So yeah, there we go. Or if there's some, you know, entrepreneurial listener listening in today that wants to create a website that offers streaming gift cards, there you go. There's your million dollar idea.

Uh, yeah, that's not going to work, but let's not give people really bad ideas uh you know to start the show i think we need to talk about okay so so the safari preferred we've we've talked about all of its changes let's talk about the safari reserve now so the safari reserve also gets some new bonus categories um as a reminder the safari reserve currently gives you 3X for travel and dining. I want to say full stop, but it's not quite full stop because there's also like 10X for Lyft through March of next year or something like that. But what we're getting with the Sefa Reserve is 10X for Chase Dining. Does that sound awesome or what? 10X for Chase Dining. I mean, I guess if you're going to spend money on things available on Chase Dining, but Chase

Dining, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, isn't it just like talk restaurants that are on talk? Is that what it is? The Chase D dining is like super expensive restaurants, right? Right. Right. And well, and it only gets you any points if you can prepay for whatever the thing is. So for example, like one local restaurant, um, is, is on talk, but it's only during like, you know, special events that they let you kind of prepay for a fixed price meal um so there's very limited opportunities and at least in my area to to actually earn 10x so so yeah that's right that's kind of just that's almost like streaming it's just not something that um although i don't know maybe if you lived in new york and you and you fancy stuff a lot or something maybe maybe yeah i mean if you like if you like fancy food, I mean, I ate at the Alinea kitchen table a few years back

and kitchen table is extremely expensive and you have to buy the whole table out in order to eat at the kitchen table. And so it's six seats. And so you're talking about like $500 a person, basically. So like three grand to buy out the table. And so at 10X at three grand, I mean, if there were three grand at 10X, that's 30,000 points. And if you're getting reimbursed by people for the other seats at the table, then I mean, I guess that could work out

to be a nice little benefit if that's your style, if that's the meal you have regularly. So if I ate there 10 times a month, that'd be 300,000 points every month. Basically. And I got to start doing that. Hard to pass that up. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. Turn that away. Okay. So that's, that's my plan. So, but 10 X chase

dining, isn't the only 10 X category. They also have 10 X for hotel and car rentals, prepaid hotels and car rentals book through chase ultimate rewards so what do you think about that i mean i i guess that's that's pretty good right i mean especially for your car well i don't know car rentals can you get the best deal on car rentals through them i don't know you know there's probably times where it's decent but yeah i would bet auto slash beats them most of the time. Yeah. And I mean, I don't get excited about hotels either. No, same here. So the way I think about it, I think this is a very credible option instead of that hotels.com rewards program where you get, for every 10 stays, you get a free night with hotels.com for every 10 nights, sorry, you get a free night. So that's basic. It's basically a 10%

reward structure. This is 10 X ultimate rewards, which are, you know, better than 10%, depending on how you use them. So I, you know, I think if you like the hotels.com thing before and you have a Saffra Reserve, you ought to like this better, theoretically. Theoretically, yeah. It's going to depend on pricing in terms of whether or not it's a better deal, whether or not the Chase prices are any good. But I think particularly if you're somebody staying in independent hotels, boutique hotels, things that are not part of a chain, then if the pricing matches what you see elsewhere, I mean, great. Get your 10 X, right? Ding, ding, ding, you know, soup's on like get your 10 X if you can. But I also just

let me interrupt. I also, I hear Steven Pepper in my ear saying, but wait a minute, I get hotels.com gift cards by super stacking all these deals. I get them for like 20% of face value. So it's not even close, you know? And yeah. I didn't know we had a call-in show. So welcome to the show, Steven. I know what you're saying, Steven. So yeah.

True. So if you're one of those super stackers, then hotels.com probably still is a much better bet because you can do that kind of thing. Whereas through the Chase portal, there are no stacking opportunities that I can think of. No, but I mean, this is pretty good. Cause I mean, if you value the points at one and a half cents each, because somebody in your household is going to keep the Sapphire Reserve, like you, obviously if you're- Or you're going to transfer to

Hyatt or another program that's worth that much. Right. I mean, you're looking at at least one and a half cents per point, right? So you're looking at least a 15% return. That's not bad. If prices are close to equal, 15% is pretty good. I mean, that certainly may at least a 15% return. That's not bad. If prices are close to equal, 15% is pretty good. I mean, that certainly may at least match, if not beat whatever you're going to get back from the hotel broker. Right. And of course, if you're not into like elite programs, or if you stay often at independent hotels, then this could be a really great, great way to go. Whether it's worth the card's annual fee to have this feature, that's... I certainly wouldn't pay extra for it. I guess let's put it that way. I wouldn't pay extra.

They were like, okay, you could pay another 50 bucks a year for this. No, thank you. It's so rare for me to look at prepaid hotels at all. So to have to do that. Yeah. Okay. So... Me too. And that's a side tangent for just a quick second. I feel like maybe we are in the minority on that, though, because I because I feel like any time we've written a post about the gift cards, like getting Marriott gift cards, this to that, I frequently get people who are like, oh, but I can't use those online for prepaid rates. And I'm like, who's booking a prepaid rate anyway? But there's almost always a few people who are like, oh, but you can't use them online for prepaid rates. And I'm like, who's booking a prepaid rate anyway? But there's

almost always a few people who are like, oh, but you can't use them online. Can't use them for the prepaid rates, blah, blah, blah. I'm always like, who books a prepaid rate? I don't want to book a rate that's going to lock me in. But I think there are a lot of people that are like, hey, I can save a bunch with the advanced purchase rate. So if you're that type, get your connects. Right, right, right. And, you know, it should be noted that just because things are prepaid doesn't mean that they're not cancelable for free.

So, you know, I don't mind as much if they're freely cancelable, but, and really my bigger problem in that situation is about not getting like the hotel leave benefits and earning points from the hotel itself. So shopping for independent hotels, I have no problem booking through a service like Chase. about not getting like the hotel elite benefits and earning points from the hotel itself. Right. Agreed. Shopping for independent hotels, I have no problem booking through a service like Chase. I just rarely think to do it.

Yeah, agreed. Agreed. All right. But we're not done with the Sephora reserves enhancements. You also get 5X airfare booking through Chase. So that puts it on par with Sapphire Preferred and the Freedom Cards for airfare. And then you still get your usual 3X for all other travel and dining that wasn't listed above. To kind of summarize where we're at with the Sapphire Reserve, it's basically that all of its enhanced earnings are for when you're booking stuff through Chase, whether it's booking dining or booking travel. That's right. I mean, that's the only way. Hashtag disappointed. Like, I mean, come on, come on guys. Is this the best you could do? Yeah, that's it. They're clearly just trying to encourage you to book through Chase, which

I mean, Hey, it's nice. And I can understand and respect that they want to draw as much business for themselves as they can out of having this card and build an ecosystem that you want to be more involved in. But I'm not a fan at all. If that's really what they want, find a way to be able to offer it so we can get hotel points and hotel credit also, because this either or situation is not enjoyable for people. I feel like for a lot of people willing to pay $450 or $550 a year for a credit card, that's not going to be any sort of an enhancement because probably most people willing to pay that much for a credit card are at least aware of hotel elite programs and want to be able to get their points in elite status, right? I don't, I don't agree with you on that. I think there are lots of people who are high-end spenders that just don't pay attention to loyalty

programs. And so they've got the chase card, they get the ads for like earning chase points. And they're going to say, Oh, look, I can earn all these points by booking just by going this way to book instead of that way. And I think a lot of people would just see it that way and not even think about the hotel. Maybe that's true. Maybe that's true. I don't know. I feel like the people that would get drawn into a 450 or $550 a year credit card though. I mean, I gotta obviously be enough aware of rewards to even think that that card is worth 450 or $550. Right. Uh, otherwise why wouldn't you just get the Sapphire Preferred? Because the differences really are not all that significant. At least the way the cards are currently situated, you're talking about 2X versus 3X on a couple of categories, right? I mean,

before these changes. So the only benefits really on having the Sapphire Reserve are if you're using the one and a half cents, pay yourself back feature. And that's basically it on having the Sapphire reserve are if you're using the one and a half cents, pay yourself back feature. And that's basically it. And having the reserve or the better travel protections, et cetera. So I don't know, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe you're right that people aren't so concerned about that. I don't think these enhancements are much of a positive. I don't think it does much at all for the Sapphire. Oh, I absolutely agree with you. But we can agree on that. Yeah. I just, I know people who have the Sapphire reserve and they just, they're accumulating points. They don't know what the heck to do with them, but they're accumulating the points and it feels good, whatever. Um, and they're probably, uh,

they're probably people spend a lot on, on dining. And so the three X dining made sense before now with the Sapphire, Sapphire preferred getting it, it certainly takes away one of the reasons to use the Sapphire Reserve. Okay. So that was a long way of explaining why we feel like Chase is kind of conceding the ultra premium card market. Again, it's not that they've done anything to explicitly lower the value of the Sapphire Reserve, but what they've done is focus more on the Sapphire Preferred and making that better. I mean, they clearly made huge enhancements to that card comparatively and put it more on par with today's Sapphire Reserve in terms of getting the 3X dining and then adding the same

5X basically on flights through either one of them, right? So, I mean, if you're in a book, flights through the Chase portal, you're going to get the same 5X either way. So I just don't find the enhancements on the Sapphire Reserve to be any indication that Chase is fighting for those people who have now picked up an Amex Platinum card with 125,000 points and 15X on a couple of bonus categories, restaurants and small businesses for the first six months on up to 25,000 spend, the current huge offer on the Amex Platinum card and the big offers they've had on that card now, getting closer to a year. It's been since last November already that Amex has had monster offers on the platinum card and Chase has just been sitting with their typical Sapphire reserve offer. Nothing new, nothing really different. Finally sending out these notices that, Hey guys, you know, we said we were going to raise the annual fee to five 50, a couple of years ago. And we know we kind of said, okay, you know what, we'll do another year for 50, a couple of times already, but we're really going to raise the annual fee to 550 a couple of years ago. And we know we kind of said, okay,

you know what, we'll do another year of 450 a couple of times already, but we're really going to make it 550 here someday. So I feel like they're almost apologizing for their ultra premium card more than anything else. So they just don't seem to be fighting for those customers. They're fighting for the people who are also considering the other $95 a year carts. Right. So here's the story that I think is happening behind the scenes. I think in the around $500 market, a number of banks found this just isn't profitable to compete at this level because of all the perks they're giving out. And I suspect that has to do with, if you go further back in time, before all these points and miles blogs like ours became popular,

I think that Amex had a lot of luck selling this premium card to people just for the bragging rights. And I bet a lot of those people just didn't take that much advantage of all those perks. But now you have blogs coming out saying, here's how to get your $200 airline fee credits, even if you're not flying. And basically explaining to lots of people how to get these benefits. And so there's a lot less breakage in those benefits than there used to be. That's my theory anyway. And so all these banks are seeing, oh, these cards aren't all that profitable. So what does Citi do? Forget it. I'm out of here. What does Chase do? They say, well, let's kind of focus on our more profitable card our sapphire preferred

what is what does amex do let's charge more uh let's charge more yeah that's how we're gonna make it profitable we're gonna charge 6.95 now they know that they're gonna you know not be able to keep customers if they uh don't give additional perks so what they do is they load on perks that will have a lot of breakage, a lot of breakage, because they're so darn specific. I mean, they're super valuable for the people who sign up for Equinox anyway. They're super valuable for people who, you know, need one of those

four digital entertainment services that are available. But, you know, those kinds of things. But in general, even though there's something like $1,400 of rebates available per year to the card, most people are going to be getting far, far less than that back. And so I think Amex is making the bet. This is going to be profitable now that there's going to be

so much breakage and the 695 annual fee upfront. And we're going to encourage everyone in the world to get one of these because, and because we're going to give them outrageously big signup offers. And if that's not enough, we're going to give their friends outrageously high referral offers. So they're going to convince their friends to sign up for these cards. And that's, that's what Amex is doing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's amazing because, you know, and, and by the way, don't refer your friends to the platinum card offer because they can get a better deal with the resi card offer. I mean, I, you know, unless your friend is okay with getting an inferior offer. So you can get some points. Right. Refer your enemies so that you get,

so you get the referral credit and they get a suboptimal offer. Unless they want another card. If they don't want the platinum card, they want another card. Yeah, then great. Take advantage of your 45,000 point bonus if you're able to do that. But yeah, I mean, that's another huge glaring difference, right? I mean, Chase has offered the same referral bonuses on the cards that offer referral bonuses for years. I mean, it's like 10,000 points a card or whatever, 20,000 on the ink cards, I guess. But the Sapphire Reserve hasn't even had a referral offer, right? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think there's a referral offer at all in the Sapphire Reserve. There certainly isn't right now. I can't remember what, I almost feel

like, wasn't there a time where you could refer from the reserve to the preferred or something like that? Or am I getting confused with them? I don't recall, but it doesn't seem that they're encouraging you to refer your friends to that car. So, you know, that's another big difference between Amex and Chase. Chase definitely seems to be taking a much more conservative stance here in terms of not going after everybody, just the people who really want the Sapphire Reserve because they're not offering any big welcome offer on it. They're not offering flashy new perks. This is a really muted sort of an offering in terms of the new perks coming out on it. So yeah, they just don't seem to want to market it. Maybe that's good. Maybe they'll keep it more exclusive and maybe it

will have more of that status to it because people will be like, Ooh, you've got a Sapphire reserve. Eight people who found that card worthwhile. And people in our circles will be like, are you paying too much for your card? So, I mean, so would you be on, on the, the, I don't know, on the train to canceling your Sapphire reserve? I mean, is this enough to downgrade to the Sapphire preferred? Cause when I saw this, I was like, maybe it's time to downgrade that reserve to a preferred because man, there's a definitely a number of reasons to like the preferred over the reserve. Right. Right. Uh, yeah, I've been thinking a lot about this and, and I, I am very close to making that decision that, you know, and I'll probably, well, I was thinking I would wait until the next annual fee comes due, but I'm in a position where I could product change to a

freedom card and try to sign up for the SAFAR preferred and get that a hundred K offer. So that's what I really should do. Um, whether I will, because I'm, I'm still juggling a bunch of other like offers and things I've signed up for that are occupying that mental space that accumulates points. I do feel like that's what I should do. And I should move to your approach, which is using the Ritz card to book travel to get the same best in class travel protections. And I, you know, I think I'm going to be recommending to people who are, you know, in this game, um, that if travel protections are important to you and you don't have the Ritz card, you should be like, figure out how to get it. And, and, and when I say it that way, it's, it's because the way to get one is you have to have a chase Marriott consumer card. There's one of a few options there, but, um, getting the card could be hard to do if you don't already have one of

those chase Marriott cards. Uh, then you have to wait a year after getting it and then call chase and upgrade to the Ritz. So that's, that's the process you need to do. You have to be under chases five 24 to get the card. You have to be under Chase's 524 to get the card. You have to get approved for the Marriott card. Get approved for the Marriott card. Right. And then there's all these rules with Marriott cards about whether you can get the bonus. If you have an Amex Marriott card.

So we have multiple posts on how to know if you're eligible. And it's just complicated. So, but that's, that's a path I'd recommend for people who want to have those travel protections, keep the travel protections, but, but aren't ready to commit long, you know, have decided that the Sapphire reserve is not the long-term play. Well, you know, and it's, that's an interesting suggestion because the Ritz card still has a super high annual fee. So, you know, and it's, um, that's an credit to use in one way or another, then between that and the 50 K annual free night start, the card becomes a pretty easy win. And then it gives you

all the travel protections, which you give up when you move down to the Sapphire preferred though, is being able to book travel at one and a half cents per point, because are you going to book travel at 1.25 cents with the Sapphire preferred or pay yourself back at 1.25 cents with the Sapphire Preferred or pay yourself back at 1.25 cents? Right now, you know, if I do this, then, then the card will be exclusively for transferring points to probably Hyatt. I was going to say airline and hotel programs, but Hyatt. And that, that is, that is a, you know, that, that is something that, that makes me hesitate. And so I think that's really worth bringing up because of the pandemic and various things that have gone on. And when I say because of the pandemic, I have canceled, as you know, many, many trips. That includes Hyatt stays. And so I'm sitting on hundreds of thousands of Hyatt points. I don't near term need to, you know, transfer more to my Hyatt account. And so I'm also sitting on United miles, you know, I'm definitely not going to transfer United.

So what am I going to what am I going to use my chase points for if it's not to either pay yourself back at 1.5 or to book travel at 1.5, which is what the Safra Reserve lets me do. So there's my dilemma. Yeah, that's, I mean, and it is a dilemma. I think for most people, you have to just consider how often you use that feature, you know, and I used it more often than I anticipated in the beginning. But then of course, obviously through the pandemic, I haven't used it really at all. And so, you know, now I'm sitting in the position where I'm like, ah, you know, I saw the, there was a business class fair sale to Europe the other day that

was like $1,700 and change round trip. And I thought to myself, oh, you know, that's less than 120,000 chase points, 60K each way plus you'll earn miles. And so I definitely thought about it for a second or two, but I didn't book it. I just thought about booking it. So, you know, I look at it and I say, well, if I'm only going to think about it, then it's probably not worth paying year after year. And, and, you know, now that I look at, if we do get charged the 550 at the next renewal, boy, the Sapphire Preferred is looking better and better to me. It sure is. Yeah. Boy, the Sapphire preferred is looking better and better to me. It sure is. Yeah. But, you know, and, and I think the, the key is the platinum card is looking better and better too, even at the 695. I mean, I think six months ago had we said, okay, we heard that the platinum card is going to be $695 a year. I don't think either one of us would have assumed

that that would be a okay, run out and get it at 695 card, but boy, that changed, huh? Well, yeah, I mean, it sure did with the, you know, with the welcome bonus alone. I mean, I don't care if it has zero perks, I'm going to spend 695 to get 125,000 miles or points plus 15 X earnings and 25k spend over six months i mean let's compare this real quick the sapphire reserve is going to give you 3x dining or 10x if you book through talk or if you just go through american express you're gonna get 15x on all your dining right all right on all dining uh it's only for six months it's only for six months. It's only for six months, I guess. Right, right, right. Um, but actually it's, it's Amex is it's the Amex Platinum's fault also that I haven't been using chases pay yourself back that much because I've been doing all my spend on, on Amex Platinum

cards with the previous 10 X offer that was 10 X a grocery and, and, uh, gas stations. And, you know, so, so it's like, like, well, I couldn't really use my Sapphire Reserve at a grocery store just to get 1.5 cents per point back. I mean, you could some, but that's, yeah, Amex has been paying us an outrageous amount to keep top of wallet and they've been successful with that. And by us, you mean the general us, like people, card holders,

not me and Craig. Because we don't get anything from that resume. Those of us who have signed up, that's right. Those of us who have signed up for a platinum card with one of those best offers in recent times have been really milking it. What about you? So the welcome bonus

obviously is fantastic. What about the, the new perks you get, new rebates you get, the, the, the coupon book as a lot of people like to call it, is that a net win or net loss for you when you consider the new annual fee as part of that equation? The whole coupon book characterization to me is, I think, too much hyperbole. It's not a coupon book. I mean, come on. It's still got the $200 a year Uber credit, which is, I mean, for most people, that's easy, easy. It's difficult for me, easy for most people to use that up.

And then the $200 airline credit, the $200 fine hotels and resorts. I mean, the card is still a pretty good card. Now, in terms of the new stuff, Equinox does nothing for me and the streaming or the digital entertainment stuff does nothing for me. I know you subscribe, you said to the New York times. I just can't even imagine wanting to read a long form article on my phone or computer screen. Like that just doesn't even, probably some people are out there laughing saying, Nick, your posts are so long. It's ironic that you would say that, but I cannot read a long form. I love that you just risked yourself. But no, I just, I can't do it. I need a newspaper. My many years old iPad. It's, it's, its sole purpose in life is reading the New York Times in the morning and playing solitaire because I can drag the little cards around. So I enjoy that.

Can't do it. I like the newspaper. I get a local newspaper and I probably would, if it were possible, get the print New York Times. The only print New York Times I can get would be mail delivery. That's like a couple of days behind. So that doesn't particularly appeal to me. Here's what happened three days ago. Right. Exactly. Exactly. So at times in the past, we have subscribed when they used to have a different delivery service and you could actually get it same day or later that day, or I don't know what it was, but Wall Street Journal too. But I would only be interested in that if it were not digital. The digital part of it doesn't interest me at all. I don't use any of the other services. So yeah. So the streaming digital entertainment thing doesn't do anything for me at all. The fine hotels and resorts credit though does because I book something through fine hotels and resorts almost every year.

And I know that people have been looking at that credit and some have been saying, oh, the hotels are all outrageously expensive or blah, blah, blah. I think it just depends on where you're looking. I think definitely if you're looking in New York, for instance, the hotels are generally all outrageously expensive in New York. But if you look in smaller places, different places, particularly places in countries where luxury hotels are cheaper. So maybe Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, in the US, Las Vegas, Chicago, you can get some really nice hotels for under $200 a night. So you may even be able to get two nights out of that. Plus you're talking $100 credit, when you stay. The $100, yeah, property credit. It's not just where you look, but when as well,

right? So there's plenty of places in Vegas and Chicago are both good examples that I've encountered myself many times where there are times where those cities are very, very expensive for hotels, but they have so many hotels that there are plenty of times when they're dirt cheap because there's so much capacity and not enough demand. So find those lower demand times if it works for you. And Bob's your uncle, as they say. Yeah, I mean, that to me is closer to face value than it is for a lot of people. Now, I think you valued it at something like $75 because you'd pay $75 for that. I felt like that was an undervaluation because the fine hotels

and resorts booking itself comes with terrific value or terrific benefits also. So to me, that's better than a typical $200 free night, right? I mean, it's like a $200 Marriott night, for instance, wouldn't be worth as much to me because the FHR hotel comes with elite, usually elite credit and benefits and all the rest of that from your hotel chain. Plus the a hundred dollar, usually dining credit. Sometimes it's a spa credit, et cetera, 4 PM guaranteed late checkout, which, you know, you might have a hassle with some chains with even with your elite status, getting a 4 PM checkout, but you book through FHR and I've never had a problem getting my 4 PM checkout. So I enjoy booking through FHR without that credit. Now that they have that credit,

I'm definitely gonna look forward to a weekend stay where we put two of these back-to-back for $400 worth, get two nights and the $100 credits and the late checkout and the breakfast for two. To me, that's a great benefit. So I think that's- So how much do you value that benefit? So how much would you value that benefit? So how

much would you pay in advance for that $200 benefit? I mean, yeah, I mean, that's a good question. I know that that's your metric for it. And that's a good metric. I think I'd be willing to pay more like 125. If I were saving 75 bucks a year on that, I feel like that's a pretty darn good deal. 150, I feel like you're starting to push the boundaries of you wouldn't really spend 150 to save 50 to maybe save 50, right? But I think 125 is a more realistic valuation because I think it's a terrific benefit. So that puts me pretty close, right? Because if I value that at 125, the card is now $145 more expensive than it used to be. So if I can find $20 in value out of whatever else, then I guess it's a win. I mean, I told my wife about the new digital entertainment

stuff and she's like, well, if it doesn't cost anything extra, I guess I'd subscribe to Audible and blah, blah, blah. And so maybe we'll get $20 worth of enjoyment out of it. You know, I actually like Audible. I'm glad that we'll be able to get it for free. I used a different credit that I had from some other thing to prepay for a year of Audible already. So I can't use that right now. But I think that's really nice. It's great for driving trips to be able to download those books ahead of time. Sometimes my wife and I will actually just listen to books together and sit out on our porch, you know, listen to, listen to a good book. So, so that's, that's, that's a good thing too. So, okay. So you're, you're right. You're right at the edge, even without being able to use those other credits. I mean, without being able to get

much value from those other credits. Right. I mean, And when I look at that and I say, okay, Audible would essentially be free, right? And then still you'd have money for other streaming services. Audible would basically be free for the year. Yeah, you're still some Peacock TV. For that credit and get some Peacock TV too, right? So I could subscribe to those things for free. Now I'm not subscribing to them now. So they're certainly not worth anywhere near face value to me, but 20 bucks a year, $2 a month, would I pay $2 a month for those things? I mean, I don't know. Maybe I wouldn't pay $2 a month for them right now, but maybe I'll get more than $2 worth of enjoyment out of them. So I think it's

potential. It's got good potential. I think that there's a good chance I'll keep the platinum card around even at 695. Now, as you have noted, and lots of other people have noted, keeping multiple platinum cards around becomes a pretty questionable value. It sure does because those kinds of things, it's very hard to, you know, you don't want to sign up for the Peacock TV service twice. I can get value from that. So there is a sort of diminishing returns. You can use the fine hotels and resorts credit with both cards. So, you know, you could, if you have a two night stay, you could book one night with one card and the other night with the other. Or actually, I guess it just depends what you pay with, right? Oh, it is prepaid. So you would have to do it that way. Prepaid, you'd have to do it that way. Yeah. Yeah. But the nice thing is that it should be pretty easy to stack those one night

after another. Now I've tried to do that in the past. I've done it successfully, not tried. I've done it successfully in the past with bookings that are paid at the hotel, but it always does cause a little bit of confusion because I'm like, okay, I want to pay for this first stay on this card and pay for the second stay on this other card, even though you've kind of merged them together and it's all one thing on your end now, for whatever reason, I wanted them on the separate cards. And, and so this takes that out of it because it's prepaid, right? So right, right. So you don't have to worry about more straightforward, any of that front desk stuff. That's, that's actually nice. I find that any, any kind of things like that at the front desk

always ends up being like way more complicated than it ought to be. So buying Marriott gift cards at a Marriott hotel about a week ago, I had to come back every day until the day of checkout, until the assistant manager was there that could figure out how to do it. That's funny because I meant to try to buy one when I, cause I stayed at a Marriott the other night and they meant to try to buy one. And I totally forgot. And I didn't even think about it for two days later. I was like, Oh, I meant to buy a gift card at the front desk.

And now I feel a little bit better because there's probably a decent chance that whoever was working that morning wouldn't have known how to sell it because that does seem to be an issue for some reason at Marriott hotels. Right. Oh, I just realized. So regular listeners might be like, wait, what the heck? We remember, Greg, you telling us that your Amex offer for Marriott disappeared. And so you weren't able to use it at your Marriott stay. And that is true. But once I got back from that stay, I looked at my Amex account and those offers had reappeared.

So I loaded them up onto my cards and I had another Marriott stay coming up. Um, and I didn't have any expenses at that next Marriott stay, but I was able to at least buy gift cards and get the, uh, $40 back for every what? $200 I think that I spent. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Why not get the money back? All right. So I think that pretty much winds us down with the fact that chase and city have really just kind of given up in terms of they're not trying to fight with a new big bonus. They're not trying to fight with great new bonus categories. Although, you know, I say that in the Platinum card doesn't have great bonus categories ongoing. So that's perhaps a key differentiator there that Chase does have that and mx doesn't but yeah but at any rate very clearly mx is is

scrapping and clawing to get to get you to sign up for the uh their ultra premium cards and i say cards because we've also seen huge offers on the business platinum cards as well right um whereas the other guys are just hanging back that That's true. That's true. All right, my friends. Well, that then I think brings us to the post roast. Post roast.

You already did your post roast, right? Well, no, I mean, I lightly did. I got more like, you know,

yeah, it was, it was more like just a light barbecuing. So the, so the post, so I'm going to go back to this post you did about the changes on the chase cards, because you were talking about a couple of things. First of all, you said the who spends enough on the Sapphire preferred to turn the bonus

into big points. I already roasted you on that and said, you spend a lot on dining. I'll turn into some points. But then you continued on in that same paragraph and you were talking about the hotel credit. You said the $50 hotel credit is a pure net win for anyone willing to book a hotel online once a year. What? What?

If you're willing to book a hotel online at Marriott.com or Hilton.com, booking at Chase is not exactly the same thing. It's not a $50 win. It's a $50 win for anybody willing to book a hotel through the Chase portal, not just online. Anybody who's willing to book through the Chase portal and give up the elite credit, elite benefits, AAA discount, corporate codes. I mean, that's not a clear win for anybody willing to book online. It's a clear win for just like a very small percentage of people. It's not a $50 win. Come on. Point to Nick. Point to Nick. Okay. All right.

Those are poor choice words on. Point to Nick. Point to Nick. Okay. All right. That was a poor choice of words on my part, clearly. All right. So he already said that really, basically. So I just re-roasted something that he admitted earlier. He just didn't realize he was playing into my roast. Right. Okay. My turn? It's your turn. Absolutely. Your turn. All right. So you wrote, you published a city thank you premier guide. And I read the whole thing. Wow. And yeah, I read the whole thing. And under, down, way down, way down near the bottom,

there's a section on sharing points. And in there, there's an example. It says, oh, it said, why sharing points with others who have other thank you cards? Why? Why? It would be useful. And it said a friend or family member with a premier card can book travel for you in order to get the 20 percent point discount. It seems to me that that 20 percent point discount is an old thing. Premier feature that no longer exists so it sure is it sure is i copied and pasted that section from the post on on a city thank you the city thank you rewards guide so that guide needs to get updated as well because i copied that section over i didn't even didn't didn't double check that and i definitely should have so i will take the roast there that was my fault for not

rereading that section i didn't, didn't think of it. So one to one, you win. Okay. So one to one, I win. I like that. I, I, all games should, should be scored in that way. Oh, that's the way my son scores all games. In fact, he just says this game is called. I win. That's what he tells me all the time. This game is called I win. I love it. I don't want to. All right. So question of the week that brings us to the question of the week. And there we go. And so this week's question of the week comes in from from a reader on their post about the Visa gift card deal that happened at giftcards.com.

So this deal is done now, but over the 4th of July holiday weekend, they were offering 10% off on up to $750 in virtual visa gift cards. So after the activation fees, it came out to like $692 for $750 worth of gift cards. And the nice thing about it was that it was repeatable. And I don't know, I think it was, you could do up to $2,000 a day. You can only do $750 in order, but $2,000 a day or something like that. And then, you know, some people with multiplayer households were able to really take advantage and buy a whole bunch of Visa gift cards. They were virtual. So a little bit more limited, but a question that came in. Help me with math. What was the percent discount off the face value? If you add all up the fees

and everything and say, paid this much for this much money, basically. Yeah. Well, I don't know what the percentage is. You paid $692 and change for $750. So yeah, I don't know. I didn't off the top of my head, but I mean, it was a win. It was a $57 win. So easy money and then whatever rewards you earned on your credit card. So it's coming out $57 a head. And I had some things that I realized I could pay an insurance bill with these virtual visas. So I was like, oh, this is just $57 in pure profit plus the rewards. So I was happy to buy some and lots of other people were happy to buy some too. But a question came in and we've gotten versions of this question on posts

like this a number of times. So the question said, thanks for the great deal. Can I use Amex Delta card to get my signup bonus? Will Amex charge a cash advance fee? So the question was basically, can I get the Amex signup bonus when buying gift cards from giftcards.com? And will I be charged a cash advance fee for buying these gift cards? So those are kind of two separate questions rolled into one. So what's the answer, Greg? No and no. No and no. So when it comes to the welcome bonus, no because? Because Amex will not give you credit towards spend that is explicitly for gift cards. And they seem to have hard-coded some merchants like giftcards.com and Simon Mall, where they know these are gift cards. And so they're just not going to give in there that anytime there's a question of, can I use a,

you know, an Amex card for this, because it's some sort of a gift card, quasi cash sort of a thing. If I'm not sure, then I probably am not going to, to, to do that. And the reason I'm going to say this is I don't want to be checking my balance every day to see if Amex has clawed back my bonus yet. The welcome bonuses on cards are just too valuable. So, I mean, there are certain things where you might have a question, like if I buy a coin from the US Mint, will I get points or not? And people can probably help you with that. But when it comes to gift card purchases, the reason people are asking usually is because

they know that Amex has an issue with gift card purchases. And personally, I just don't even think it's worth it buying gift cards, even if you think Amex isn't going to find out. Because I've had people ask about what if I buy them at this grocery store or I do them at that store and I mix in some bananas and a Coca-Cola or whatever else. And my response is always the same. It's not worth losing a 100,000 point offer, for instance, over being able to buy these gift cards or whatever. Find another way to meet the spend. We've got a whole bunch of different ways. And Greg wrote a post recently about ways to meet Amex minimum spend. Don't do it on questionable stuff with Amex. Now, that's not to say ongoing you can't buy gift cards, because I think there's a

misconception that Amex is more sensitive towards ongoing gift card purchases than they are. They seem like they will not give you rewards if you're buying from giftcards.com or Simon Malls, if you're buying at a grocery store, that kind of thing. That seems to generally slide through the cracks, though I say generally, because not always. There were times when they clawed back points on that Hilton offer, for instance, of last summer where people bought gift cards. So there is some risk there, but perhaps less than what many people think, I would say in general. But again, for welcome bonuses, wouldn't bother. Cash advance, a lot of times people ask me that, have you ever heard of gift card purchases coding as a cash advance? Because people seem to ask about that quite a bit too.

Have you ever heard of any purchase counting as a cash advance on an Amex card? That's something I can, I can't remember ever happening to anyone for any circumstances. I mean, it's like they either approve it or not, and then they either give rewards for it or not. It seems to be, I could be wrong. That's true. That's a great, that's a great point. No, I haven't. But you're, but you're right in general, even with other issuers, I can't think of anyone getting a cash advance fee when buying gift cards. That's. No, I mean, I remember something at Simon mall that happened like for a hot minute at some point,

I think where people had gotten hit with a cash advance fee on like a U S bank card or something like that. Yeah. So there are some, some weird exceptions, but yeah, but I mean, even that it was like a short term thing that was only for like a week or something that there was a problem with it. And then it stopped coding as a cash advance, I think, if I remember correctly anyway. But yeah, generally speaking, no, buying gift cards is not going to incur a cash advance fee. I've not heard of that. Is there a chance that Amex won't give you points? Yeah, absolutely. And on a Delta card, if you're trying to make spend so that you can earn those status boost things that Greg could tell you more about than I will, they're not going to count that spend when it's clearly like giftcards.com or Simon.

They're not going to count that. Yeah. That's unfortunate. Yep. All right. That brings us to the end. I want to thank you guys for being out there with us today. We always enjoy and appreciate having you here.

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