Too much news for our Patreon Podcast this week, so we broke the following out into this No Annual Fee Episode. Enjoy!
0:26 JetBlue News Roundup
- Boston to London service begins this summer (Link)
- Bids for Spirit (Link)
- Has service recovery issues (Link)
04:11 Marriott Bonvoy Dynamic Pricing Goes Live
- Seems to be a mixed bag
- Booked Ritz-Carlton Maldives for 335,000 now 385,000 (not bad)
- JW Marriott Bonnet Creek was 60k weekends, 50k weekdays, now < 50k each night which makes it a target for 50k certs
- And will be a target for up to 15k cert top-off when that starts “some time in April”
09:54 Bilt Rewards Mastercard Widely Available, Issued By Wells Fargo
- Now issued by Wells Fargo and open to all (no waitlist)
- 3x on dining, transfers to AA, Hyatt and others
- No AF, but no welcome bonus yet
- Referrals are 25,000 per 5 referrals, can refer even if you just have a Bilt Rewards account without a card (I’d wonder if you could sign up for Bilt Rewards account, refer P2 for Mastercard, and then refer back if you wanted two of the cards, but that seems like overkill for the overall value)
- I hear there are no such things as AUs with this card, so if you’re getting this for P2 when you’ve been shutdown by AA they’ll need to get their own in order to transfer to AA
- Discuss: Pretty wild to see this right on the Wells Fargo site. What’s stopping Wells Fargo from taking the Bilt Rewards relationships and rolling out a very compelling bank point card/program?
15:15 Targeted Chase 5x Promos
- Link to check: https://chase.com/mybonus/
- Ex: 5x Travel, Gas, Grocery on United card (capped at $1,500 spend in Q2)
- Reminder: Other Q2 2022 5x categories
- Chase Freedom: Amazon.com and Streaming Service
- Discover: Gas Stations and Target
- Citi Dividend: Drugstores and Grocery
16:57 [Targeted?] Bank Point Transfer Bonuses
- Amex Avios 40%
- Amex Marriott Bonvoy 25%
- Chase Air France 25%
- Citi Avianca 25%
19:55 AA Expiring Miles Again (TPG)
- Louses–they’re not even giving you 18 months from the announcement–they seem to be backdating to the last activity which means miles could expire SOON.
- Miles for minors do not expire, thankfully.
- Book and cancel (can do the whole thing online). I found a 7,500 Mile Main cabin LAX-SJC and booked–canceled right after ticketing and miles and money came back without needing to do anything (took about 2 days).
- Write-up from 2018 on this process.(link)
21:55 Alila Maldives Open for Booking (OMAAT)
- Category 7 (from 30,000/nt +/-)
- Excluded from Suite Upgrade Awards (from Beach to Overwater)
- Would love to split time between here and Park Hyatt, not sure whether that would be be possible without going back to Male
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