I love credit cards so much!

[calypso726]

I have a couple questions about the Marriott card. Since my husband is a non-traveler, would he need to be present to use his free night if we did both get the card? Could I transfer his points to my account. I was planning to keep my CSR and PC his later. Which freedom card might be the better choice?

Marriott allows point shares up to 50,000 points per year but charges a fee. I think it is $10 or so. The workaround is to transfer your DH's Marriott points into SPG points. Then, have your DH transfer his SPG points to your SPG account. Then you can transfer your SPG points to Marriott.

 

[elgerber]

Marriott allows point shares up to 50,000 points per year but charges a fee. I think it is $10 or so. The workaround is to transfer your DH's Marriott points into SPG points. Then, have your DH transfer his SPG points to your SPG account. Then you can transfer your SPG points to Marriott.

Yep, this is what I have done, more than once

 

[GPC0321]

Marriott allows point shares up to 50,000 points per year but charges a fee. I think it is $10 or so. The workaround is to transfer your DH's Marriott points into SPG points. Then, have your DH transfer his SPG points to your SPG account. Then you can transfer your SPG points to Marriott.

Calypso, which are worth more, SPG or Marriott points?
If one were considering trying to travel hack her way to some free nights at the Swolphin, would she be better off with an SPG card or a Marriott card?

 

[CyndiLouWho]

Calypso, which are worth more, SPG or Marriott points?
If one were considering trying to travel hack her way to some free nights at the Swolphin, would she be better off with an SPG card or a Marriott card?

Not Calypso, but free nights at Swolphin are more quickly earned with SPG points. Plus SPG allows transfer to partners as well. That said I have both cards as I can transfer back & forth (although the 100k points I got from Marriott is only 33k Starpoints). Additionally Marriott offers a free night oncea year (some near WDW). Either SPG or Marriott program/cc or both, will be going away since they are merging programs. I'm keeping both until they decide

 

[tink1970]

Not Calypso, but free nights at Swolphin are more quickly earned with SPG points. Plus SPG allows transfer to partners as well. That said I have both cards as I can transfer back & forth (although the 100k points I got from Marriott is only 33k Starpoints). Additionally Marriott offers a free night oncea year (some near WDW). Either SPG or Marriott program/cc or both, will be going away since they are merging programs. I'm keeping both until they decide

LOL...was just typing to respond to this but you put it better than I did

 

[calypso726]

Calypso, which are worth more, SPG or Marriott points?
If one were considering trying to travel hack her way to some free nights at the Swolphin, would she be better off with an SPG card or a Marriott card?

SPG definitely worth more overal as they transfer to over 30 airlines. Each time you transfer 20,000 SPG points to an airline they kick in an additional 5,000 miles. This was crucial for us when we transferred SPG points to the Singapore Kris Flyer program. I needed 500,000 Kris Flyer points to book the suites class. Every 80,000 I transferred, SPG kicked in an additional 20,000 so it saved us a LOT of points.

WRT Swolphin I'm still going to say the SPG card. Current Marriott card offer is 80k for $3K spend and an $85 AF not waived. After spend at 1x you have 83,000 points. Transferring those to SPG leaves you with 27,600~ SPG points and enough for 2 nights at Dolphin. Current SPG card offer is 25k SPG points for $3k spend and a $95 AF waived the first year. That leaves you with 28,000 SPG points at 1x. More than the Marriott transfer to SPG plus you will be able to take advantage of Amex offers or use the SPG points for airline transfers which are a far better value. Either way, I think the SPG card is better. None the less, my advice will always be to get both of them.

DH and I each have both cards and use SPG for airline transfers and Amex offers. The Marriott card we use to stay at one of the 3 Marriott properties every year in WDW as a free weekend with our annual night.

 

[calypso726]

Not Calypso, but free nights at Swolphin are more quickly earned with SPG points. Plus SPG allows transfer to partners as well. That said I have both cards as I can transfer back & forth (although the 100k points I got from Marriott is only 33k Starpoints). Additionally Marriott offers a free night oncea year (some near WDW). Either SPG or Marriott program/cc or both, will be going away since they are merging programs. I'm keeping both until they decide

LOL...was just typing to respond to this but you put it better than I did

HAHAHA looks like we were all responding at the same time

 

[GPC0321]

Thank you to all three of you!

I'm not as familiar with AmEx's travel and awards program as Chase's. I'm off to do some reading about them.

 

[Happy_2_B]

I'm not as familiar with AmEx's travel and awards program as Chase's. I'm off to do some reading about them.

Starpoints have been among the 'king of currencies' for many years. They have consistently been one of the best valuations available over time in an ever changing game. All good things eventually come to an end, and I do see devaluation on the horizon once the details of the merger between SPG and Marriott are finalized- so now might be a good time to jump on the bandwagon. I am not so sure I would even recommend waiting until the next time the sign up bonus goes back up (usually 25k- but has been going up to historic 35k offers recently), as we are (possibly) nearing the end of when the SPG cards will be available. If you see a use for the points- it might be wise to get aboard now, as none of us has a 'crystal ball' with the ability to know if/when the cards are going to disappear.

 

[platamama]

I have wondered about the freedom cards. Because the Southwest companion pass is so valuable to me, I was thinking that I may need to slow down. I can do one more and then be prepared to try for the Southwest cards again in 2019. I was thinking I may even save the Southwest business card for that time just in case the sign up bonuses aren't very good. I can sign up my husband for others. The Hyatt points seem like they will be good for me because of the stay park fly option. I can get my husband the Hyatt once my next bill posts and I can send referral.
If I get business cards will they count against my 5/24 and affect my SW companion pass for 2019? I don't have much use for united points at this time or Marriott.

I've gotten huge value out of Marriott points in regards to the SW companion pass for the past 3 years. I got my last and current companion pass (til end of 2018) through their travel packages, but alas they got rid of that avenue this past March. Still, getting 120K RR points + 7nts Cat 1-5 hotel for 270K Marriott points is a pretty good deal. I figure the value of those RR points is a bit over $1700 alone, and if you have the CP and use all of those RR points with CP that's worth $3400. You can't beat the flexibility of Southwest and their RR program.

You'd probably want to play in 2player mode to reach 270K Marriott points (I had to anyway), and utilize SPG transfers to Marriott or UR transfers to Marriott to help that along. SPG points are on sale right now too. Marriott allows transfers >50Kpts to a spouse account IF it's to reach a travel package redemption. You don't need to have a Marriott card to do this but that's the quickest way to build up your account balance. Same for the SPG card.

The consensus is that business cards don't count against 5/24. I too am thinking ahead to SW cards in 2019 for CP (RIP Marriott Travel Pkg --> CP) and I'm only applying for business cards now.

 

[havaneselover]

Remember to tweet for Marriott Rewards points

 

[Albort]

don't forget, @MarriottRewards @NFL 11 #RewardsPoints

 

[amalone1013]

Setting up a Marriott rewards account for DH (which I've meant to do for the last two sundays, but keep forgetting...). Was just thinking, I set up twitter accounts for MIL and FIL for AMEX offers. Is it terribly wrong of me to set them up Marriott accounts?

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

Marriott allows point shares up to 50,000 points per year but charges a fee. I think it is $10 or so. The workaround is to transfer your DH's Marriott points into SPG points. Then, have your DH transfer his SPG points to your SPG account. Then you can transfer your SPG points to Marriott.

FYI - Marriott in practice does not charge that fee in my experience.

 

[amalone1013]

Just when I get used to navigating the UR site for hotels, they change it.

 

[Lain]

don't forget, @MarriottRewards @NFL 11 #RewardsPoints

Thanks! Just got my points. Took about an hour from post.

 

[wendow]

If I get business cards will they count against my 5/24 and affect my SW companion pass for 2019? I don't have much use for united points at this time or Marriott.

You need to be under 5/24 to qualify for Chase business cards but they do not count against 5/24. And that makes sense, if you are planning to go for SW CP again in 2019, then hold out on the SW business card.

 

[CyndiLouWho]

FYI - Marriott in practice does not charge that fee in my experience.

Interesting because it does list a fee and a yearly limit for points transfers.

 

[belle1986]

Is there any way to change a departure flight on American that’s a basic economy ticket?

I bought my ticket planning a solo weekend at WDW next month to see Christmas stuff. Dh then decided he wants to go too, which is great, but he wants to stay an extra day.

I’ve done some googling but can’t come up with much.

 

[platamama]

Interesting because it does list a fee and a yearly limit for points transfers.

The two times I've done it there was no fee. I think the yearly limit for point transfer is 50K, which is what I did this year (DH to me) in January. But in the past there wasn't a limit if you were doing it to redeem a travel package. A few years ago, you could get 140K points for a Ritz-Carlton Visa so DH and I each signed up for it and combined our points for one travel package.