I love credit cards so much! v6.0 - 2023 (see first page for add'l details)

[afan]

FM reporting big changes to Aspire and Surpass. Some might be favorable changes but for me, I'll probably let it go next cycle.

More happy or indifferent on r/amex and churning than not. Which given how most of them travel doesn't surprise me. But the $250 flight credit being gone and going to a $50 per quarter credit is a deal breaker for me. It's easier to use but I don't buy that many flights and I don't fly SW. And with my travel sorted for next year I'm ready to cancel.

I need my fnc to post since I just paid my af it's still a few weeks out. But if I cancel do I get any af back?

 

[mmmears]

Thanks for the heads up about the Aspire card. I think I fall into the indifferent camp. The airline credits are going to be much easier to use since I don't have to play games to use them. The resort credit will be harder. Just used up our 2 $250 credits for the year this month - once a year was much easier than twice. I have plenty of other ways to access Priority Pass. Clear looks good although I think I may have that benefit on another card already. Clear has been really helpful to me in 2023 since they use it at the local airport and I've been flying more than usual.

 

[GZanta77]

FM reporting big changes to Aspire and Surpass. Some might be favorable changes but for me, I'll probably let it go next cycle.

Got in just in time. Applied last week for P2 so will have a full year to evaluate changes - but should be able to make out on some of the credits in the meantime.

 

[platamama]

FM reporting big changes to Aspire and Surpass. Some might be favorable changes but for me, I'll probably let it go next cycle.

I was just coming over here to report the changes I saw this morning when I logged into my Amex account. I haven't read the FM article yet, but I just spent $250 on SW airfare 3 days ago (and at that time my Aspire was still showing $250 of credit available!), arghhh. This card is going to be axed, my AF is coming up in the next couple months sometime.

ETA: FM says the $250 airline credit is good through the end of this calendar year, so I think I'll be ok.

 

[Psychodisney]

I was just coming over here to report the changes I saw this morning when I logged into my Amex account. I haven't read the FM article yet, but I just spent $250 on SW airfare 3 days ago (and at that time my Aspire was still showing $250 of credit available!), arghhh. This card is going to be axed, my AF is coming up in the next couple months sometime.

ETA: FM says the $250 airline credit is good through the end of this calendar year, so I think I'll be ok.

My airline fee dashboard changed to the $50 per quarter. My AF was in September. I had spent some of the $200 but not all, I'm pretty sure I hade over $100 remaining since I figured I had until the end of the year.
Clear is a repeat from Platinum. Change of resort credit to twice a year is unappealing to me. May benefit from the extra free night with $30k. I can pay my estimated taxes and get a FN. Having two FN makes for a nice long weekend to the Keys.

 

[wanderlust7]

More happy or indifferent on r/amex and churning than not. Which given how most of them travel doesn't surprise me. But the $250 flight credit being gone and going to a $50 per quarter credit is a deal breaker for me. It's easier to use but I don't buy that many flights and I don't fly SW. And with my travel sorted for next year I'm ready to cancel.

I need my fnc to post since I just paid my af it's still a few weeks out. But if I cancel do I get any af back?

No AF refund if you cancel after 30 days. You could get a prorated refund if you downgrade to the no fee. In the past, I'd say that locks you out of the bonus if you haven't had it before. But I don't know what it means anymore with the change to the "may" language.

I was just coming over here to report the changes I saw this morning when I logged into my Amex account. I haven't read the FM article yet, but I just spent $250 on SW airfare 3 days ago (and at that time my Aspire was still showing $250 of credit available!), arghhh. This card is going to be axed, my AF is coming up in the next couple months sometime.

ETA: FM says the $250 airline credit is good through the end of this calendar year, so I think I'll be ok.

Both the $250 airline and $250 resort credits are available through end of the year for exisiting card members.

I still have 2 Aspire resort credits to use. Thinking about changing some plans to use them. The $50 Surpass any Hilton credit will come it handy. Have a stay planned for 1 night at a Hilton Garden Inn, x2 Surpass, will be almost free.

Guess I'll be using the $50 airline per quarter on SW. Is there any other airline that has transferable flight credits that don't expire in a year?

 

[afan]

No AF refund if you cancel after 30 days. You could get a prorated refund if you downgrade to the no fee. In the past, I'd say that locks you out of the bonus if you haven't had it before. But I don't know what it means anymore with the change to the "may" language.

That's what I thought. I'd rather not risk it since I haven't had the no fee.

What if I changed it to another Surpass? Would I still get part of the af? I know their af went up too but I think I'd get more out of getting my money back than keeping it a year.

 

[jujubiee4]

Ok so I have been looking for 2 months for Flights in May for Barcelona (pre cruise).
So far not finding any good point redemptions. I read in someone's post they booked
Iberia with Avios through British Airways. (read several reports Iberia CS is awful) lol

Any drawbacks to transferring Amex MR? What if you cancel? What happens to points
and fees?

Would like to book United but they aren't budging from 70k for ECONOMY.

 

[iujen94]

Ok so I have been looking for 2 months for Flights in May for Barcelona (pre cruise).
So far not finding any good point redemptions. I read in someone's post they booked
Iberia with Avios through British Airways. (read several reports Iberia CS is awful) lol

Any drawbacks to transferring Amex MR? What if you cancel? What happens to points
and fees?

Would like to book United but they aren't budging from 70k for ECONOMY.

I booked Iberia using Avios through the Iberia website. I don’t have answers to your questions (curious to know them though!) but just wanted to let you know that Iberia releases exactly 2 seats in Biz and 2 in PE for each flight for award bookings. Not sure about economy numbers.

 

[wanderlust7]

That's what I thought. I'd rather not risk it since I haven't had the no fee.

What if I changed it to another Surpass? Would I still get part of the af? I know their af went up too but I think I'd get more out of getting my money back than keeping it a year.

That would work too. You'd get a prorated refund and then charged the $150 after your usual anniversary.

 

[jujubiee4]

I booked Iberia using Avios through the Iberia website. I don’t have answers to your questions (curious to know them though!) but just wanted to let you know that Iberia releases exactly 2 seats in Biz and 2 in PE for each flight for award bookings. Not sure about economy numbers.

Have you flown with them yet? I have read or heard stories about not getting the seats you paid for.
This happened to my coworker last summer. So Im hoping it is just flukes. Im looking at PE. For my
dates the business seems to be gone.

 

[wanderlust7]

Ok so I have been looking for 2 months for Flights in May for Barcelona (pre cruise).
So far not finding any good point redemptions. I read in someone's post they booked
Iberia with Avios through British Airways. (read several reports Iberia CS is awful) lol

Any drawbacks to transferring Amex MR? What if you cancel? What happens to points
and fees?

Would like to book United but they aren't budging from 70k for ECONOMY.

BA Avios cancellation fee is $55/ticket or the taxes/fees, whichever is less. You'd get the Avios back.

 

[platamama]

Both the $250 airline and $250 resort credits are available through end of the year for exisiting card members.

I still have 2 Aspire resort credits to use. Thinking about changing some plans to use them. The $50 Surpass any Hilton credit will come it handy. Have a stay planned for 1 night at a Hilton Garden Inn, x2 Surpass, will be almost free.

Guess I'll be using the $50 airline per quarter on SW. Is there any other airline that has transferable flight credits that don't expire in a year?

There's the United TravelBank, those funds expire 5 years from purchase. But other than SW's transferable flight credits, no, I don't know of any.

For my travel habits, the Aspire resort credits were almost useless since it could only used on the 307 properties that Hilton deems resorts and I don't have any decent ones (well, ones that have availability) nearby. I did force us to use it and the FNC at WA Monarch Beach in August after dropping kiddo off at college, and DH said he hated the place and would never go back (our 1 night was during the hurricane that hit SoCal so there's that extenuating circumstance lol...).

Actually I find the Surpass's $50 quarterly credit at any Hilton more appealing. I can definitely see spending a night at a Hilton property at least 3 out of the 4 quarters of the year, so that would cover the AF. And with Hilton Gold status from my Schwab Plat I wouldn't be giving up the F&B credit either. Seems to me that the Surpass would work better in our situation, but even so it doesn't really offer much over the no fee Hilton card that DH has. Except the current SUB! It might be worth it just for that.

Since I only value a HH at $.004 and have a hard time ever getting above that, Surpass's new 4x online purchases works out to 1.3% so that's not a big deal to me. The BBP + Schwab cash out gets 2.2%, and BoA's online shopping 3% cash back is even better (5.25% with Plat Honors), so that's my baseline comparison.

You probably know all this anyway, I'm just typing my thoughts down to work through them myself lol.

 

[wanderlust7]

There's the United TravelBank, those funds expire 5 years from purchase. But other than SW's transferable flight credits, no, I don't know of any.

For my travel habits, the Aspire resort credits were almost useless since it could only used on the 307 properties that Hilton deems resorts and I don't have any decent ones (well, ones that have availability) nearby. I did force us to use it and the FNC at WA Monarch Beach in August after dropping kiddo off at college, and DH said he hated the place and would never go back (our 1 night was during the hurricane that hit SoCal so there's that extenuating circumstance lol...).

Actually I find the Surpass's $50 quarterly credit at any Hilton more appealing. I can definitely see spending a night at a Hilton property at least 3 out of the 4 quarters of the year, so that would cover the AF. And with Hilton Gold status from my Schwab Plat I wouldn't be giving up the F&B credit either. Seems to me that the Surpass would work better in our situation, but even so it doesn't really offer much over the no fee Hilton card that DH has. Except the current SUB! It might be worth it just for that.

Since I only value a HH at $.004 and have a hard time ever getting above that, Surpass's new 4x online purchases works out to 1.3 cpp so that's not a big deal to me. The BBP + Schwab cash out gets 2.2 cpp, and BoA's online shopping 3% cash back is even better (5.25% with Plat Honors), so that's my baseline comparison.

You probably know all this anyway, I'm just typing my thoughts down to work through them myself lol.

I didn't remember if you can do $50 with United TB. Just checked and you can. Think I'll wait for some DPs if I decide to do that though. Would be ironic if it now doesn't count lol.

I've been able to use the Aspire resort credits, but it takes some work and luck. Too bad they didn't change that to any Hilton. Looking at how I can use my 2 resort credits before the end of the year and nothing is appealing to me yet.

ETA: Just realized it's 3 resort credits if I use it after mid-December. I usually plan way in advance for these, so it's quite the challenge!

 

[iujen94]

Have you flown with them yet? I have read or heard stories about not getting the seats you paid for.
This happened to my coworker last summer. So Im hoping it is just flukes. Im looking at PE. For my
dates the business seems to be gone.

Not yet - we are booked for next June. Although we may end up not taking that flight after all. RDU added a nonstop to FRA and I was able to book RDU-FRA-BCN through Aeroplan. More miles, but now we don’t have to reposition to ORD, which was the plan with our Iberia flight. For now I’m hanging on to both flights though.

 

[SleepyatDVC]

So my parents just got back from a multi-country trip to Asia that I used points to book business class on many of the legs. They are thinking of a return trip to HK/Taiwan next October and I have to accumulate points for them again.

We just applied for the CIU for my Dad (P2 for my Mom) and it went into review... So, we wait...

In the meantime, my Dad finally got approved for GE a few weeks ago. He applied in January!! So, now we need to apply for my Mom. Any cards that give reimbursement for GE applications?

Mom has CSR and Dad has CSP. (We used up the GE credit on Mom's CSR already for Dad).

Dad has a traditional Gold card grandfathered from the 1970's.

I was thinking about applying for a Capital One Venture X for Dad...

They have some major spend coming up (insurance premiums) and may not be able to wait until the CIU gets sorted out...

Any advice? TIA

 

[wanderlust7]

I did force us to use it and the FNC at WA Monarch Beach in August after dropping kiddo off at college, and DH said he hated the place and would never go back (our 1 night was during the hurricane that hit SoCal so there's that extenuating circumstance lol...).

What did he hate about it? Thinking about using the resort credits there. But the rate is expensive, so I'd use FNC or points and the resort credits on food.

@mmmears I think you've been too? How's the food?

 

[calypso726]

FM reporting big changes to Aspire and Surpass. Some might be favorable changes but for me, I'll probably let it go next cycle.

Yup. DH and I each have 2 Aspires. We will likely each let one of them go.

 

[Duckbug.Ducktales]

Ugh, I had told myself no more cards until next year... but just got instant approval for the AAdvantage Red Aviator card, lol. I want to put those 75K AA miles to use for Japan instead of transferring Amex MRs.

 

[platamama]

What did he hate about it? Thinking about using the resort credits there. But the rate is expensive, so I'd use FNC or points and the resort credits on food.

@mmmears I think you've been too? How's the food?

I think it was just the overall vibe. Granted most things were closed due to the hurricane (pool, golf, beach access, outdoor dining, etc.) so that did play a part. We were there on a Sunday and saw the guests were mostly wedding or conference attendees, lots of social drinking, and a noticeable um "lack of diversity" was evident. The kind of place where people with lots of money would feel more comfortable (haha not us). But what did we expect, it was a Waldorf Astoria. Our first time at one. Just not our scene. The staff were quite pleasant. The food was expensive, even with the $250 resort credit and $50 F&B credit, we still had a balance after a 1 nt stay (unavoidable valet parking is $70) and we didn't even eat at the expensive steak place. What we did eat was good though. It's a surprisingly small-ish property, or maybe it just felt that way because so much of it was closed. Anyhow, I also feel once was enough.

Last year we used the resort credit at the Hilton Santa Barbara on our road trip down the coast, and I wish we could have stayed a little longer just since there's more to see/do in that area. It's a more casual place and more our style. But we've only done that road trip twice in 33 years and otherwise don't go to Santa Barbara, so I don't need to keep the Aspire for that.

Any other place you're thinking of using your credits?