Frequent Miler on the Air - New killer 2-card combo, the mask you own, big news brewing, and more

Episode Date: April 11, 2020

This week, Greg & Nick discuss: -A face mask you already own -Projects happening behind the scenes at Frequent Miler -The Citi Premier changes and how they position Citi to have a killer 2-card combo -Choosing travel protection or more points when booking paid travel All that and more! See below for timestamps and links: 2:16: Greg's DIY Face Masks 5:27: Reader Feedback 8:42: Subscribe, please 9:10: Team FM project: New Theme 14:45: A new challenge (Link to old challenge: https://frequentmiler.boardingarea.com/40k-to-far-away-news/) 19:34 A new competitor 21:29: Big changes coming to Pemier Link to read more about the changes: https://frequentmiler.boardingarea.com/citi-adding-grocery-stores-restaurants-to-3x-category-3x-travel-structure-changing/) 35:37: Greg's curses AA frequent flyers 39:32: Question of the week

Welcome to FrequentMiler On The Air. Today we're going to talk about the City Premiere card. There's some exciting new changes to that. Some love the changes, some hate the changes, so we'll dig into that. And we're also going to talk about, I think this is the first time ever that we've really opened up the kimono to talk about what goes on behind the scenes at FrequentMiler. We're going to talk a little bit about some exciting new changes that we're working on as a team. So let's get into that in a moment.

But first, how are you doing, Nick? Are you traveling the world right now? I wish I was traveling the world. I'm actually looking out the window past the camera right now at the snow flying here in upstate New York. So, yeah, it's a lovely, lovely winter day here in April. I'm definitely done with the winter. I thought I was. It's been nice all week. We've been taking like walks around the house outside because I live in the countryside in the middle of nowhere. And so, it's been nice to be outside and my son's been playing outside a bunch. So,

been great all week. And then, you know, this morning I got out of bed to like the ground covered in snow and I was like, we're done with that yeah it sounds just like our story we had the ground wasn't covered with snow but we had a hail storm yesterday and there was there was sort of a bit of hail and snow on the ground when we got up and uh so yeah that's that's made our um yeah it's just kind of disappointing because it seems so much like spring. There's all these flowers out and everything. And then that. Yeah, yeah.

Not the direction I like to go. And this time of year, when it's still like this, I really want to get away and go somewhere else. And obviously, we're not doing that anytime soon. So, I'm definitely feeling a little bit of the cabin fever. Although, I'm lucky because overall, I've got a lot of space outside my house where I can, uh, when the weather is nicer and it was up until today, I can go outside and kind of, yeah, you are lucky about that. So I'm still going outside in Michigan. They told us that exercising outside is fine as long as you're not doing it with other people. But I know some people get, you know irritated by that seeing people

out walking or jogging or whatever i just try to keep a safe distance from everybody wear a mask when i go out especially if i'm going to be near anybody and since you have a collection of face masks since i have a collection of face masks for anyone who missed it. I posted about using the eye shades from airlines. Well, or any eye shades you have, you could use as a, as a face mask. And it came out a few days ago that scientists were recommending when you're looking for materials to use to make your own, they gave one tip. They said, look for one that doesn't let much light through as a potentially good one. And you were like, I nailed it, guys. It seems to me like eye shades have that covered, right? It seems that way. They're not very good if they don't. Right, right.

You probably threw away the ones that don't do that. My next invention is a little harder to pull off, which is I want to go outside and feel safe and to be able to actually interact with others safely. What I want is a giant hamster ball that I can just run around down the street and bump in other people who have their own hamster balls. It'd be a lot of fun. I mean, they make those. I've seen those before. I haven't been in one, but I've seen them like at the fair and stuff like that.

So, I mean, not necessarily a crazy idea, Greg. That might be like a hot thing this holiday season, your own personal bubble. I mean, we could brand that with Frequent Miler on the side of it. Make a fortune, Greg.

Think of the possibilities. We'll get the product team on that right away. Definitely. The private label product team will be right on that one. Coming soon to an empty shelf near you, the frequent miler bubble. That's right. The stores could fit them all in the toilet paper aisles since there's nothing else in there. Right. Who would have known? Who would have known? See, an opportunity out there. Somebody else listening to this is going to take advantage of that. You're welcome.

What I find really surprising with all the ingenuity and productivity of the United States of America, that we can't ramp up production on toilet paper enough to... Somehow can't meet demand. Yeah. It does seem like a mystery, know, a lot of people were surprised that it was out of stock everywhere. And I get that because, you know, most people are in an office all day long. So now, you know, they're going to be at home. So they're going to need it more at home than they typically would since they typically be out all day. Okay, there's that. But you would think that somehow that that would be able to shift over to, yes, and you know regular size non-commercial roles you would think that those companies would sense the opportunity and filling the shelves right i

would think those sherman bears would be working over time and you know with their face mask on but right gloves and everything but we don't even know that bears catch this yet so it could be totally safe for sure it's totally safe for the sherman bears so get back to work sherman bears but everyone else stay home, stay safe. Yes. Yes. So that's what we've been doing and staying home and staying safe.

And along with that, then has come some creativity. There has like what? Well, I mean, besides the fact that we write posts, there's been the frequent miler team working in the background. Oh,

that's what you're talking about. Yes, there has a little bit. So you didn't, you didn't want to do feedback time. Oh my goodness. Did I skip reader? No, no, no, no. I definitely, I was looking forward to this. Everybody's favorite segment. If you're not familiar, you threw me off there a little bit. I'm sorry. I apologize. Yeah. Okay. So, so today's feedback is, is a little pat on the back to me. Because what happened was last week, I made a

silly video of me hiking the England's Southwest Coast Path. And I made it using Zoom with a virtual background. The virtual background was the path as I was walking around. And I stood in front of it and and pretended i was walking so it's totally ridiculous but i thought it was fun to make and everybody i talked to liked it except for nick and so since everybody except me nick hated it i was the hater yep nick absolutely hated it and and was so nauseated by it he pe peeped twice. That might be a slightly firm characterization of it. But go ahead. Go ahead.

It was roughly what you said. So. Might have been what I felt. I felt like I said it nicer than that. But no, I'm just kidding. I enjoyed it. But not as much as whoever it is that reviewed it, apparently. Well, anyway.

No, Jan. She has some suggestions, too. So she says, love this. So she says, love this. But she says, maybe move the treadmill so you're walking on one side of the screen. Then you wouldn't have to duck down for the title. So just for anyone who doesn't know what that means, there were captions in the middle of the screen. And because of how Zoom works, I was in front of those captions, hiding it basically. And so it was part of the shtick of the video.

I was ducking down and pointing up at the captions and trying to get out of the way of them. And so I thought it was kind of funny, but it was also potentially a little bit nauseating for people with all my bobbing and weaving around. So she suggests me moving the treadmill to the side. I think that's a good idea, Jen, but I think I would just move the webcam to the side. Actually, it'd be a lot easier. Probably. Yeah, the treadmill, but a little heavier, a little heavier than the laptop, right? Although, you know, getting exercise in these times is all good. So maybe I'll try that. In absence of your bubble, you'll get some exercise doing the heavy lifting of the treadmill. Right.

Anyway, Jan says, otherwise great photos and narrative was just like you were talking to me. I'm sharing with friends, so we may recreate some of your walks. Thanks again. So I thought that was very nice. It is. That is very nice. She didn't have to leave any feedback, but she just reached out with that. It was great.

That was nice. That was good. And good suggestion for her moving the camera a little bit i mean another suggestion might be just you put the titles at the top i mean that yeah i think i think that would be what i would try because then i could point and the hardest part was knowing which hand to point with because it was it was mirrored for me and so it was like being a weatherman and and the weathermen know how to do that and weather women but uh i didn't so i was always pointing the wrong side and i think that added to the i mean i think it did ridiculousness of it a little bit to make it fun to watch so yeah look for it on our youtube channel if if you haven't seen this i'm not gonna last time i think we we tried really hard to encourage people to go to our YouTube channel.

Subscribe to it. So I don't want to push that too much this time because, you know, there was enough of that, but go there anyway and like our channel. And hit the subscribe button. Subscribe button, please. You can turn on the notifications if you want. That's on YouTube.com. Right.

Yeah, I think they've heard of that. Okay. right at that yeah i think i think they've heard of that okay so yes you were talking about our creativity and what we're excited about what the team's been working on what so which part we have two sort of topics to talk about which one are you more excited about right now oh more excited about i know i think that the part that i'm you know i hate to say that because then if i pick if i pick one it's like picking a favorite child right and if you admit that to everybody then then they're not going to be as excited about the other part so i so i don't think we should pick a favorite i think we should go in order okay of when they're going to happen because because probably by the time people are seeing this video there's at least a chance

that the sort of the fruits of the labor will already be out there for them to see. That's right. That's right. So we're super excited. Carrie has been working on moving us to a new WordPress theme. And that project has included recreating our homepage and some of the graphics. And we think it looks awesome and that it's, I mean, it's, it's beyond the looks though. That's awesome about it. So for example, the part that one of the parts that I'm most excited about is the fact that our multimedia is front and center now. So you come to our homepage and with the new theme, you'll see right in the middle of the

page links to our, the podcast platforms where we're at and a YouTube window showing the latest YouTube video and links along the side of other recent YouTube videos that we've published. And so I think that's awesome because today, if someone comes to our homepage and doesn't know exactly where to look, there's no way they're going to find anything about those different multimedia options. And by today, he means the day that we're recording this, because it's possible that this could be live by the time today you're watching it, though we don't necessarily know for sure yet that it's going to be changed over. So at any rate, the old frequent miler, which maybe is still the current one or maybe not anymore. Yeah, you couldn't you wouldn't have found our multimedia very easily at all. But the new FrequentMiler homepage, yeah, it's front and center. Easy buttons to watch videos, listen to the podcast if you're into that. But of course, obviously, the content is still front and center.

And we're doing a good job of featuring the key content that we spend a lot of time doing for the posts that go out each day. And then you can still easily find our quick deals. And then the most recent ones will be scrolling at the top of the screen. I really feel like the new design I'm super excited about. I was excited about redesigning it in the beginning, but I didn't really have any sort of a vision for what it would look like. And then once we got the vision, I still didn't imagine it as good as it's turning out. I'm super excited about the new thing. Yeah. No, me too. It's beautiful. It's just something to be proud of. So I can't wait to see it in the wild. Yeah, definitely. Definitely. A lot of credit to Kerry and a lot of credit also

to Greg and Steven, because both of you guys have had lots of good suggestions along the way. You found a lot of things to be able to enhance it and make it a little bit better for readers. So it's been a really collaborative effort. It's been really nice to kind of see that. And I think there's probably credit to Nick, too. I just... Somewhere in there. No, I mean, I feel like it has certainly come together as a team project.

Absolutely. It's been a big positive. Actually, my wife. Because she's been giving feedback along the way. Well, you know what? Just a few days ago, the multimedia section was not there in the new theme. I excitedly showed her the new theme, the new homepage. And she was like, huh?

I was like, what? Don't you think it's pretty? She's like, yeah, but where's the podcast? Where's the videos? And I was like, oh, you're right. Your wife and my wife sound very similar because I was kind of the same. Sort of, yeah. And then when she didn't ask where those things were, but when she saw the new theme initially, she was like, oh, that looks nice. And I was like, that looks nice. It's awesome. I was really excited about it. And then when I showed her just this morning, actually, the day that we're recording this, what it's going to look like with the YouTube and the podcast, she was like, Oh, wow, this looks really good.

Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. So I imagine there'll be some people that, you know, sort of just don't like change and, and we'll miss the old one. But I don't think too many people, I think it's a net positive. And I hope it'll make it easier for people to find what they're looking for too, because now we're also going to display the tags within posts so that you can easily find other related posts. So if you're looking, you're reading a post about Delta and you're looking for other posts about Delta, you'll be able to easily click a link for Delta and see the other similarly tagged posts. So that I think is going to be a good feature for readers. And also it's going to be a little more obvious where the major content is and where the quick deals are

to kind of split that off so that you can easily find exactly what you want. Yeah. Right. All right. So that's half. So the other thing. The other thing. Also very exciting. I think we have to, I, what I want to do is explain why we were meeting today. Okay. We had this meeting that why, and we is the whole team. So all four of us.

So me and Nick, Stephen, who writes our quick deals and the, and the weekend, um, deals post and Carrie, who's fairly new to our team. She's doing, she's the, our creative director, but she's doing a lot of miscellaneous things for, for the, for the blog and for the site, for our, for Frequent Miler, basically. I can't really call it a blog anymore now that we're more and more into video and, and podcasts. Anyway, the reason we had this meeting scheduled was months ago, we had come up with a plan for our next annual challenge. So last year, we did the 40K to far away challenge where we each had 40,000 points and $400 to try to go as far away as possible. And we each had different currencies to use and we flew all over the place, had a great, great time.

And if you don't know about it, just Google 40K to far away and you can read up on what happened and where we went. Or see the link in the video description if you're watching online or or we're in the podcast description because i'll put a link in there for you too oh great yes uh so anyway so um what was i saying oh so we had come up with what we thought was a great idea for this year's and if i did seem like a great idea it did it seemed like a great idea and if i remember at least part of it had to do with each of us using Miles to send the other person to somewhere in Europe. And then we were going to have a series of sort of treasure hunt type of challenges, different challenges each day. Where sometimes we would be all converging together and other times off doing our own thing. But let's not give away too many of the details here.

No, no. I may use some of those. Right. I'm not going to go further than that. But we were pretty excited about that. Yeah. And then something happened. Something happened.

Something indeed. Yeah. So in the early days of that something that otherwise known as COVID-19, we were pretty sure we'd have to change our plans. At that point, it didn't seem like a bad idea to travel within the United States at that point. But it certainly seemed questionable going to Europe because Italy had had a big outbreak already at that point. But it certainly seemed questionable going to Europe because Italy had a big outbreak already at that point. So we set up a date to meet to basically, it was a checkpoint to say, are we going to go forward with this challenge or not? Now, I forgot all about this meeting until today and then saw it on the calendar and, and we held the meeting. And obviously we didn't even have to talk about, are we actually doing the challenge as planned?

Obviously we weren't. Right. Right. I mean, I had totally forgotten about the meeting too. And when I saw your email, I was like, oh, that's right. I hadn't even looked at my calendar for the day. Cause I just hadn't thought about having a meeting, but I was like, oh yeah, that's today is the day that we decide whether or not we're going to Europe next month. Guess that's off the table. So yeah, so obviously, we knew we weren't going to do that. But we all had the time blocked off. And so we decided to get together anyway. Right. So we came up with a new plan. We did. We did. And that's kind of exciting in and of itself. The fact that we came up with a new plan at a time when none of us can go anywhere. And we obviously had to completely throw out the plan that we had and just ignore all of those different ideas that we had come up with because they were all centered around traveling. And we still want to keep some of the spirit of travel, but obviously we're all at home.

Right. We had to come up with a totally new, unique challenge. And we're excited about that. We're excited. So is there anything we can tell them now without giving away too much? Oh, I don't know. I think that's enough. So there is another challenge coming. So you might have thought, okay, well, Frequent Miler sounded like they were going to do it every year. But now, obviously, this year, they can't do it, or at least they won't be able to do it until later in the year, blah, blah, blah. You're wrong. We can do it, and we they can't do it or at least they won't be able to do it until later in the year blah blah blah you're wrong we can do it and we're gonna do it it's gonna happen we're gonna be kicking it off soon i don't want to make any promises so we can make sure that everything

comes together the way that we we planned as far as timeline but you're gonna find out soon about the new challenge and and you're gonna help us once again pick the winner and this is my chance to redeem myself because obviously last time around i had a couple of mishaps if you followed along with with the way things went and so i need to redeem myself here and come from behind and snatch victory so vote nick reyes this time around i'm gonna say that right now for those who don't know last last time Nick came in last, dead last of the giant pool of contestants. He's hoping to claw his way up from last to... Up from the bottom. And we're adding a competitor this year. So now it's not even just three, there's now going to be another competitor. So there is something more we can tell them about the contest.

There is. There is. There's four contestants this time. And if you've been paying attention from the beginning of this, you probably know who they are. That's all we can say. That's all. That's all we can tell. We don't want.

We don't want to give away too much. It's coming. That's what I can tell you. It's coming. Be ready. Let's what I can tell you. It's coming. Be ready. Let's just say we're excited about it. We think it's going to be a ton of fun. We,

unlike the last one, unfortunately, I don't think we're going to uncover a lot of great award travel gems like we did before. So that's a downside, I guess. It is. That is. But I think we're going to have have the fun who cares about that stuff right right exactly right now right now we're all just looking to have a little fun right you know so we're gonna up the fun factor on this one so if you've enjoyed listening and reading and watching and and following along with our

adventures i think you're gonna like it yes in fact you you going to like it. Yes. In fact, you are going to like it. I promise. There you go. Okay. Craig promised. We're going to hold him to it. You're going to definitely like mine. I can tell you that much. So I can't guarantee anybody else's, but you're going to like mine more than anyone else's. So here's how I know that you're going to like this. You as whoever I'm talking to right now now because you got this far in this video or podcast you haven't turned it off yet you haven't turned it off yet whatever we do for the contest is going to be better than this right it's got to be it's got to be we've settled very low bar so it's all getting better from here so watch out for that keep your eye out if you listen regularly

and don't necessarily read every day you may want to keep your eye out for, you know, any kind of announcements that might be coming soon. Oh, yeah. Good point. So, I mean, I'm sure we'll mention it on the show, but you should also be checking out our blog. I mean, because that's where all like the real information appears, not just our blabbing. Right. Thefrequentmiler.com. Check it out.

Good site. All right. So we got those two things out of the way. So we've had the creative juices flowing behind the scenes. The Frequent Miler team is working to make things better, both aesthetically and the site and creatively and coming up with a new challenge for 2020. And then all of those things aside, there was some big news this week. There was. So while every other bank is tucking their heads in the sand with regards to credit cards and rewards, Citi is like, I know, I'm going to make big changes now. Yeah, it's kind of like we talked about last week, how everybody else was like, okay, no, we're kind of pulling back and slowing down. And Citi's like, okay, no, guys, pedal to the metal.

Here's a new offer. Same kind of thing. Two weeks in a row, they've come out with something that just didn't really follow everybody else's logic. So this week, the Citi Premier, of course, is what we're talking about. They announced that benefits on the Citi Premier are going to be changing. And they're going to be enhanced and they're going to be enhanced. They're going to be enhanced quite a bit. So I think it's an enhancement anyway.

I don't know. What about you? Well, why don't you first explain what a summary? Yeah. Tell everyone what's going on. So the city premier card, $95 annual fee card from city. It's kind of like their Sapphire preferred competitor, the little brother card to the city prestige. So the Premier is going to be getting some new bonus categories, or at least modifying

the bonus categories a little bit. Right now, that card earns 3x on all travel, which includes things like, of course, flights and hotels, but also things like cruises and parking and Uber and tolls and stuff like that. And it earns 2x on dining and entertainment, right? Yeah. and it earns 2x on dining and entertainment, right? Entertainment, yeah. But going forward, starting in August, starting I think August 23rd, you'll have to check the link below for the post about this,

but I believe it's August 23rd, it's gonna start earning 3x on groceries and dining. So 3x at supermarkets, grocery stores, and 3x on dining, uncapped from what we've seen so far. It sounds like there's not going to be any limit on that. So 3X in those categories, and it's still going to earn 3X on some travel. It'll earn 3X on air, hotel, and gas. So I mean, that's quite a bit of travel, though it won't still include 3X on things like rideshare, cruises, et cetera. So you you're gonna be losing those things.

And then it's gonna still have 2x on entertainment, right? Or is it? No, it's losing. Losing that one. It's losing. So 3x groceries and restaurants were the big ones. And then, of course, there's some other ancillary stuff, like it's going to have a credit once a year, where you can get $100 statement credit when you book a hotel through thankyou.com. It's $500 or more, you get $100 back. So that benefit to me is not huge, but it might work out for some people sometimes. Right, right. And that was my reaction too to that benefit. I was like, I'll never use it.

But you know what, as I thought about it a bit more, there are times, I think that people who travel for business, like my wife does, you know, often go to places. Sometimes you're staying in a place that isn't a chain hotel anyway. So you're not worried about earning points or getting elite status benefits. And so when that happens. Oh, and if you're allowed to use your own credit card in those situations, which my wife is. Yeah, I think every time that happens or no, let me put it differently. Once a year when that happens, I would gladly book the hotel through the city premier.

Thank you, Portal, and get $100 back. Yeah, I mean, I think that that's probably good, although you've written a post in the past about how the prices of hotels to the city. Thank you, Portal. We're not always competitive. So you're going to have to comparison shop a little bit to make sure that you're getting an OK deal. But yeah, actually, I think that this benefit, to be truthful, is more useful than the fourth night free benefit on the prestige card.

Now, I say that maybe there's a little hyperbole in that because if you are staying at a really expensive independent place where you don't care about benefits and that sort of thing, then the fourth night free benefit could be worth a lot more than $100 from the city prestige card. But I look at it and I say, well, with the premier now, you don't have to be staying four nights. It could be one night, it could be two nights, it could be three nights. So a little more useful for me there. And when you look at the fact that the prestige fourth night free is 25% of the room rate, not including the taxes, blah, blah, blah. That fourth night free benefit on the prestige card isn't necessarily all it's cracked up to be. prestige fortnight free is 25% of the room rate, not including the taxes, blah, blah, blah. That

fortnight free benefit on the prestige card isn't necessarily all it's cracked up to be. I mean, you could buy discounted hotels.com gift cards and, uh, and you stack that with welcome rewards and potentially get almost as much of a discount, especially when you consider that the discounted gift cards are discounting your taxes to, uh, almost as much of a discount that way. So I think this actually might be a little better for me anyway, because I don't always stay someplace for four days. But yeah, I think you're right. I think for the average traveler, it's probably better. The fourth night free lets you do it twice a year now twice a year. And this is going to be

one right? This is twice a year. Okay. And this will be once a year. So and both benefits, you have to book through thankyou.com. So both of them, you'll be giving up elite credit and hotel points and any elite benefits that you might otherwise normally enjoy. So you are going to have to give those things up. So I don't think that the $100 credit is the big headline, though. I think the big headline here is 3x groceries and 3x dining at a time, especially right now where everybody is at home.

3x groceries is huge. Now, of course, come August when this begins, whether or not it's going to be still as much of a benefit for people, I don't know whether or not it will in terms of buying groceries. But of course, for manufacturer spenders out there, 3x uncapped groceries Sounds like a pretty nice deal. And, and two or three X dining also on a card with a $95 annual fee with a couple of good transfer partners. That's pretty terrific. I mean, that's going to be three X on basically all my food, which is a big part of my expenditures. Right. So for people who don't know that the premier card earns city thank you points, which the thank you program on its own is not that great. There's a, there's a lot of

things you could buy with thank you points. Usually you're getting one cent per point value at best. Um, and there are tricks for cashing out at, at one cent value if you just want cash back. But, um, the, the real value, the big value in Thank You Points is the transfer partners. You could transfer one-to-one to a whole bunch of different programs, including Turkish, which we've talked about endlessly here. So I won't say too much about it, except that Turkish has amazing award prices when flying themselves or their partners. And so that means you can fly United Airways super, super cheap. So that's the thank you program. The Premier Card today, the big downside to the change is that the Premier Card today has one other thing that's better than one cent per point value, which is you can pay for travel through the thank you portal and basically get

a 20% discount, which amounts to a 1.25 cent per point value. Um, and so that's going away. Well, it depends when you get the car. If you already have the card, it's going away later.

If you get it now, it's going away sooner. Um, if you had the card by it's going way later. If you get it now, it's going way sooner. If you have the card by April 9th, then you'll keep that benefit until April 10th, 2021. So if you had the card before April 9th of 2020, so if you're an existing cardholder, I suppose probably when you listen to this video or podcast, then you're going to keep that benefit until April 10th of 2021. But now new applicants starting April 10th, 2020 are going to lose that benefit in August. So that benefits. Right. So I think there's a number of customers who see that as a big loss because they looked at

the, let's say the three X categories that they already had. And in their minds, they probably thought of it as getting the equivalent of 3.75% back because they're getting three points per dollar and each one's worth 1.25, right? So now that won't be the case. But the reason Nick and I don't care about that is we're always going to use the thank you points to transfer to airline programs where we're almost always getting far better than 1.25 cents value. And so the addition of new 3X categories, especially one as easy to generate spend in as grocery stores, is pretty darn exciting. Right. I mean, legitimately spending at grocery stores is easy enough right from the get go. I mean, I feel like probably most people spend enough just on groceries every year

that they could probably get a couple of round trip tickets on United every year just off their grocery spend. Right. I mean, you know, in economy class. Yeah, easily. Right. Right. Right. So So not only that, Citi has really rounded out their portfolio now to where I think it's sort of the cheapest, best option. You could get just two cards, two Citibank cards, and have really good rewards for all your spend. So just have the Premier and the Citi Double Cash. The Citi Double Cash gives you 2% cash back everywhere for all spend, but it allows you to transfer those rewards that you got in pennies to points. And so then you can use them, as long as you have the Premier card, you could use them to transfer to partners just like you can with the premier card so those two cards for only 95 a year total because the double cash is free you're getting 3x grocery 3x dining 3x for most travel and 2x everywhere else yeah and 3x

gas we should mention because i mean usually we don't assume gas but gas is part of the travel you know yeah 3x gas too yeah yeah mean, like that covers basically anything you're going to spend money on. You're going to get two or three X on for $95 a year, like with credit cards. That's super easy. Now, I know that there's at least a few people screaming out there, hey, but you can get the Sapphire Preferred for $95 and also get the Chase Inc cash and get 5x on Visa gift cards at Staples and use those Visa gift cards to pay for all of life's expenses. And while that's kind of true, I mean, you could do that. It's not necessarily super convenient to always have Visa gift cards to pay for everything.

Not everybody's going to do that. This is a really simple two card solution for $95. And I want to be clear that we're recording this at a time when I, well, the premiere anyway, when I wrote about it the other day, we didn't have an affiliate link for that or anything. It's not like we're, we're, we're saying this is an awesome deal because we want you to sign up for this. And we're desperate for you to sign up for this one credit card right now. It's not it at all. It's just a great deal.

Right. Right. And true with the double cash too. Right. I don't think we have any kind of affiliate. I don't think we do. Yeah. I didn't double check before we recorded this, but I don't think we do.

No, we don't know. Yeah. I mean, we don't memorize that kind of stuff, but that's part of how we operate, right? We don't, we don't, I mean, you know, at the time you set up the links, but, um, when in our day to day, we don't know because we don't even look at it. So anyway, so, um, yeah, so, so I had written a post, um, I feel like it's a few months ago now that's the single best travel card or something like that. And I think I put the venture rewards card as top. And as my second one, if my memory serves, I, I cheated a little bit and said the combination of the Sapphire reserve and the freedom unlimited and i gave a lot of reasons for that but i think now this combination if i'm gonna cheat and add

in a add in two cards all right i think this this combination is better for more people i think it is too you know and and even people who are kind of interested in manufactured spending but don't want to go crazy in manufactured spending, this still could yield a lot of points without very much MS. I mean, you look at it, and with Turkish's sweet spot within the United States, 7,500 points one way in economy class, you're talking five $500 gift cards at the grocery store gets you one way, right? I mean, that's pretty easy to do and of course obviously not right now let me be clear for anybody who's going to be like oh you're telling people to go to manufacture and spend at a time when there's a pandemic no i'm not like not suggesting that at all please like right now we're suggesting you get in your hamster bubble ball right roll to the grocery store now no but you know if you're gonna if you're going to the grocery store and of course i'm i'm looking

at this through the lens of you know this is a long-term change and this pandemic isn't going to last forever. At some point a, now was the time to, to, to apply so that you could lock in the existing card benefits for a year, uh, and get the new benefits. But by the time you're seeing this, that of course will have passed still though. I think still the premier and double cash is a killer combo. And I'm curious to see, and I brought this up on our live broadcast, uh, and I don't think we necessarily answered it, but I'm curious to see, will Citi introduce an increased offer on their Premier with the new benefits? I don't necessarily think they need to because the new benefits are really good for a $95 card. I mean, I don't think there's another transferable currency card that earns 3x for $95 on such good categories. So I don't necessarily think they need to, but do you think they will? I mean, they didn't need to do this either. No, I mean, the only thing that I'm thinking might happen is waiving first year annual fees. And I can't remember whether they currently do or not. They don't. They don't right now. So yeah, that might happen. But I'd be shocked if they... I think the grocery... Greg's saying that if you haven't applied yet, wait.

Because if his predictions this year hold, then you know that opera is going up tomorrow. That reminds me of a topic. Are we done with this topic? Because that reminds me of a topic that we didn't discuss talking about. But I just need to mention this one thing. So a week or two ago, I guess it was about two weeks ago when the Hyatt news broke that they were extending the status for a full year. I said, I said, American airlines is going to do the same. This was before any airlines had done that.

You did. And I said, the reason they're going to do the same is because I didn't go for Hyatt status last year. So I didn't get the match to American Airlines Executive Platinum. And so therefore, they're going to extend for a year to- Just to punish you. To sort of rub the salt in the wounds, but it's going to be really good for Steven Pepper. Right.

I said that. And what I didn't realize is by saying that, I was dooming Steven Pepper, who did have Hyatt Diamond last, or Globalist last year, did get matched to Hyatt, I mean, to American Airlines Executive Platinum, and so is hoping for the extension.

So anyway, what happened in the meantime well hyatt extended their status first we knew that we knew that when we talked about that but what happened in the meantime is delta delta came out and said oh i'm gonna delta said i'm gonna extend everybody for for all through next year. And then, of course, United and American always follow whatever Delta does. So United quickly said, I'm going to do it too. And American said, I would do it. But Greg predicted I was going to do it.

So I'm not going to do it. So that's why we haven't heard anything yet. That's why. Yeah. I didn't see where that was going right from the beginning. Would that make sense? It was a long, it was a long,

uh, when you Delta announced, I knew United did. I was like, did American announce something I didn't know about? I was, I didn't see where you were going with that, but now I do. So you're right.

So, so yeah. So, you know, all the American airlines status holders, because now, you know, they,

they might, they might be waiting until our audience forgets that i predicted it to announce it that must be it must be but by by reminding people just now we just extended the delay for at least a couple weeks i'd say right right right which means that tomorrow they're gonna announce it means probably while we're talking they've announced that we just we've been in meetings for like the last few hours so yeah i haven't even looked i don't know maybe it already happened right you don't even know yet oh boy i said that could be and then this will seem ridiculous that we had that we wasted everyone's time talking about what do

you mean they did such nonsense yeah well sorry about that so sad sad. All right. So the city premiere, definitely awesome. The status extensions, also good news that we haven't really talked a bunch about yet because, of course, those just happened, Delta and United. But good news there and good news also for Marriott, right? Marriott extended status for another year. Yeah, they did. It obviously already did.

So, I mean, basically, everybody's extended status except for America, more or less, right? Which just proves my point. I mean, why else would it, they have not announced it except for my prediction. And we did also see, by the way, the certificates are supposed to be updated by the end of April with Marriott. So if you're sitting on free night certificates, the new expiration dates should be updated by the end of this month. Right, right. So that's important.

If anyone's been trying to make schedule, you know, their stays, if you can wait till the end of April, then you won't have to call in to try to get your certificate extended so that it can be applied to a later stay. Right. So I actually have that situation with one with one thing in november so yeah yeah um so that's good news uh do we have a question of the week we do have a question of the week yeah so and and this this one came on the post that i wrote about the uh the premiere about why i'm gonna dump why i did dump the prestige in favor of the premiere um but the question actually isn't necessarily confined to being about the premiere. So now I have to scroll back to, to pick it back up. Uh, I thought it was a good question and, and sort of this topic came up, uh, also on our, our live broadcast. So if

you haven't been following along and subscribed on YouTube, you want to do that. So you can see our live broadcast where we have that quick, quick fire question and answer with readers every week. We've been doing that on Thursdays. So you'll want to check that out Thursday at 4 o'clock, I think, again this week. 4 o'clock Eastern every week. 4 o'clock Eastern. Thank you. Yeah, very much.

So I'm going to have to control F because scrolling is taking too long. Next F-bomb of the week is control. Of course, there we go. Okay, so this was a sco asked this question so sco that asked this question and and he specifically said this is a tangent uh so a good tangent to be on because i think that this applies to other stuff this is a geometry question you're right you're ready for the geometry yes i'm ready okay good so the question here actually sprouted from the fact that within the post or maybe within the comments on the post is what it was. I talked about the fact that I don't usually book travel on my prestige card.

I haven't. And I wouldn't on the Premier either because they don't have any of the travel protections that Chase cards do. So the Chase Sapphire Reserve has excellent protections. The Sapphire Preferred has similar ones, just slightly lower thresholds and longer delays for delay protection. But the Sapphire Reserve and the Chase Ritz card have equal protections. And I mentioned that I put some of my travel purchases on the Ritz card and other ones on the Sapphire Reserve card. So when I'm traveling alone by myself, I usually put it on the Ritz card and other ones on the Sapphire Reserve card.

So when I'm traveling alone by myself, I usually put it on the Ritz card. And when I'm traveling with the rest of my family, I put it on the Sapphire Reserve. So Sko asked about that specifically. And he said, is always putting your travel on your Chase card for the insurance benefits really rational? He said, looking at the Prestige, which earns 5x, of course, on airfare, versus the Sapphire Reserve, which earns 3x on travel, on things like flights, and assuming both points are worth about one and a half cents each for simplicity, you're giving up points worth 3% of your purchase to have insurance benefits. I'd be surprised if you'd be willing to pay that 3% for travel insurance as a separate

product. Certainly, there are times it's worth it to use the Chase card for taxes and fees on award tickets, blah, blah, blah. But there would also be others where the Prestige would make more sense, like a one-way direct flight from your home airport with no baggage. So he was asking, basically, does it make sense to put your purchase on the Sapphire Reserve and only get 3x when you could instead, if you have the Prestige or you have the Amex Platinum card, you could earn 5x. So essentially, you're giving up two points per dollar by booking on the Sapphire Reserve, for instance. And if we value those points at a penny and a half each, you're giving up 3% in order to have travel insurance. Is that a rational decision, Greg?

Yeah. I thought that was a great question. I saw that too. And it's hard to answer. So I think Sko is right that if you had a way to, when you're purchasing the travel, to just say, I'm going to pay 3% and be covered in all the ways that the Sapphire or the Ritz card covers you. So the lost baggage, all those things, would you pay it? And the truth is usually, I don't even think about, I mean, everybody's different on this, but I think you and I are probably similar on this. I don't know, but I don't even, I never even think about paying for insurance. I like long ago decided that insurance was a bad bet. Like any kind of, I mean, except for insurance, it's mandatory, of course. But, you know, like extend a warranty. That's not really insurance, but it's very much like insurance, right?

Similar idea, talking the uh, extended warranty. That's not really insurance, but it's, it's very similar idea insurance, right? I think of it as like, I'm the only that it's a bet I'm placing a bet. And the only way to win that bet is for my product to break. So something bad has to happen for me to win. And that's, that's the way it always is with insurance that, that the only way to win, if you're paying more for it for it and placing that bet is for something bad to happen. And then you win by being protected. Right. So it's sort of the opposite of how most people think of insurance. Most people think of it as a safe thing to do or something like gambling.

So anyway, so that's why. But it's an interesting perspective. I mean, you're right. I mean, that's certainly the way that it is. And anybody who pays for like health insurance or life insurance or car insurance, I mean, that's the way it is, right? You're flushing money down the toilet unless you have a disaster. Right, right, right, right.

And there is value to the peace of mind, though. So, you know, and so if that peace of mind value is worth it to you, then it's worth paying. And obviously, if something bad does happen, you'll be very glad that you won that bet, obviously. So then following that logic, do you book all of your flights on a Prestige or a Platinum card for 5X? I don't. Why not? But it had me thinking about it.

I do value the peace of mind that booking with the Sapphire Reserve gives me. And so, but I hadn't, you know, thought through that aspect of how much I'm giving up, which is funny because I had thought through it in the exact same way that you had in your comment which was with cell phone coverage i i uh pay all my cell phone bills with my ink plus which is gives me 5x for cell phone but doesn't have the coverage whereas i could get 3x uh with a ink business preferred and and be covered for cell phone damage. So I made the decision there that it was the same calculation that Sko came up with. It was just basically that it wouldn't take me very long earning 2x more each month to basically pay for repairs myself if it should come to that. And so we

could be saying the same thing with travel. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you, I guess if you have the money to be able to pay for, you know, the expenses that you're going to incur if and when you have a delay, then yeah, I mean, I guess, I guess that's true. And, and when I looked at it, specifically the point he made about for flights, one-way flights from your home airport where you don't have any check baggage, I book most of my flights as two separate one-ways. I very rarely book a round trip. So that's frequent for me to be booking a one-way from my home airport because the way back is a one-way also. And so he's right. I mean, if it's a one-way from my home airport, the travel insurance, the trip delay insurance, I don't think will cover me because if you're at your home airport, I don't think they'll pay for

a hotel. At least that's my understanding of it. I don't know exactly how they define what your home airport is or what the travel radius is on that. So that I'm kind of curious about now. But yeah, so on those types of flights, yeah, I mean, I guess I should have all along been booking on the card that earns the most number of points because the travel insurance really isn't doing me any good except for maybe trip cancellation. If I had to cancel the trip, I guess then it would come in handy. I don't honestly pay for that many flights with for that many paid flights. It's usually award tickets. For me, the vast majority of my travel has been award tickets. So usually I'm looking at just paying taxes. And it's usually not that much because I usually don't fly carriers that charge high fuel surcharges. So

usually it's pretty cheap. So it really doesn't make a huge difference to me. I don't think in the overall scheme of things, but at the same time, if I was paying for a flight, would I pay an extra 3% for insurance? I mean, I never even have done the math to figure out how much, what percentage they're charging when they offer you travel insurance through the airline. So maybe it is 3%. I wouldn't even know because I don't even look at it. So no, I probably wouldn't pay 3% cash out of pocket. So yeah, I don't know. Maybe I should be booking them that way. I also made the point in there that I look at it almost a little bit differently because in that case, I guess the way I've justified it to myself is that I don't spend that much on flights. If I spend $1,000, $2,000, let's say I spend $3,000

a year on flights, which I know I probably haven't spent $3,000 in almost any year of my life on flights. But let's say that I spent $3,000 on flights. So I'm giving up what? 6,000 points by booking at 3X instead of 5X and taking the travel insurance. 6,000 points is pretty easy to generate if you're a manufactured spender at all. It's not going to cost me that much to make up 6,000 points. So I figure I get the peace of mind, like Greg said. I know that everything is taken care of. If something happens, disaster happens, I don't have to sit there and debate, should I just sleep on the floor instead of paying $500 for the hotel room? I just know I'm going to go get the hotel because the credit card is going to pay for it. So I kind of feel like in my case, I'll probably continue booking on a card that's got

travel insurance because I'm not spending that much on flights anyway. But I think Sco's point was right. Yeah, no, I think you had a great point. And I think there are other aspects, as you pointed out, like knowing if you always use one card, you also have that sort of peace of mind of knowing where to look if anything goes wrong, you know, where, you know use one card, you also have that sort of peace of mind of knowing where to look if anything goes wrong, you know, where, you know, what card you book the travel on is just good to know. It's worth pointing out to our audience that the Sapphire Reserve is your wife's card. And that's why you book your own travel when you're not with her on the red card, because I found that really confusing when you said

that until you explained it to someone. Yeah. So I booked the flights that only I am on, on the Ritz card, because then my wife doesn't have to call in order to file a claim if she needed to, I can just make the call myself and file the claim if I need to, if it's going to be all of us on the trip, then usually that means we're paying a little bit more because we're paying for more passengers. And so then I don't really want to give up three ultimate rewards points in exchange for the Ritz Marriott points. So then we do book it on the CSR if she's on the trip too, because that is going to earn better for the couple hundred dollars in taxes that I'm going to pay.

So I'd rather earn the higher return on that. And she'll have to deal with the inconvenience of calling and making the claim. But if it's just me on the trip, it's usually a domestic flight, $5.60 in taxes. So I'm not giving up that much in terms of the number of points I'm going to lose by booking on the Ritz card instead. So I use the Ritz card for my personal travel. But yeah, I think keeping it on the same card, even if you do one card, does make it easy in the sense that you don't have to try to figure out, which card did I use to pay for this? Because I've been in that situation before where I've had a bunch of travel booked and I've been like, oh man, which one did I pay

for if I get delayed or I get to the airport and they want to see the card that I used to book it. I haven't actually run into that, but I have read stories of people getting to the airport and being asked for the credit card they used to book their flight. So sometimes I don't carry all the cards. So a couple of times now I've been like, oh shoot, which card did I use for which flight? Do I have the risk card? I don't know. And now I just know what I need to have in my wallet. So I think there's value there. There are other factors besides how rewarding it is. And what you were pointing out with, sometimes you have to show the card that underlines or underscores how important it is if you're booking travel a lot lot book with a card that you're

not likely to cancel anytime soon true true good point yeah i think about it from that you know the prestige card and the platinum card are always in my mind of like do i really want to keep this or not and so uh that's another reason i at least so far have been happy with this effort reserve and plan to keep it but that could be an argument for always putting everything on the Ritz card, even less rewarding. Um, because I don't plan to ever cancel that unless they, uh, reduce the benefits from it. Yeah. I mean, I think that's not a bad idea. And again, if you're mostly booking a word travel, then you're not giving up that many points or else new things. And if you're any kind of a manufacturer spender and you're mostly booking award travel, then the difference between earning 3x Ultimate Rewards points and 4x Marriott on a relatively low amount of spend probably doesn't matter that much.

That's right. Yeah. All right. Cool. So there we go. So that brought us all the way to the question of the week. So that brings us to our goodbye song. It does. So I want to thank everybody for being out there with us today. If you want to learn more about what we've been talking about, if you've been listening and you

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That'd be nice. We'd appreciate it. It's too much homework for listeners. You know, i hope it's doable i hope they can handle it so yeah if you don't mind do this if you don't mind and of course have all your family and friends do it too everybody you know everybody can have their own youtube account probably everybody you pass by in your hamster ball right right make sure they subscribe thank you guys very much all right see you again next week bye everybody