Tag: Centurion Lounge

Stop Falling In Love With Travel Credit Cards!!

I’ve admitted that I have an irrational attachment to certain travel credit cards. You know, the cards that I’ve had for a while and keep paying the annual fee even though the benefits aren’t worth what the card cost me every year. I tried to rationalize why paying for the card made sense. My arguments were convincing but eventually, I took a step back and gave a long and hard look at the money I was spending. I realized that I was giving away too much value to the “possible uses” for the card instead of looking at the actual value I was getting.

I give the credit card companies credit; they were able to make me think I was winning at this game. I had all these perks, got statement credits for expenses and my out of pocket cost whittled down to almost nothing. It’s like they were paying me to keep the card. Wait, I know that’s not true. No bank is going to pay you to keep a card for the long term. They’d eventually go out of business.

So how’d the person who is so proud of not being loyal to any airline, hotel or rental car company end up in an unhealthy relationship with some credit cards? Here are just a few of the traps that I fell into that lead to making irrational decisions.

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What To Do When You’re Getting Credit Card Application Denials, Why Centurion Lounges Will Get More Crowded, How To Get 15% Off at Target, & More!

Happy Sunday to all of our travel friends, both near and far! Here are some articles we’ve read from other bloggers (and other sources) that we think you may like, as well, so we’re passing them along.

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Credit Card Review: American Express Platinum

The American Express Platinum Card is one of the “Big Three” premium travel cards. The AMEX Platinum, along with the Citi Prestige and the Chase Sapphire Reserve all earn flexible award points which you can transfer to many different travel partners.

You can sign up for the American Express Platinum card by using our referral link and we receive a bonus for everyone who gets the card. Thanks!

Since the Sapphire Reserve has kept the same benefits since its introduction and Citi is acting bipolar with their offerings, what about the Platinum Card. Time to give it a look once again.

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What’s The Best AMEX Card To Add An Authorized User To Open Up Points Transfers To Partner Programs?

As of September 1, 2019, American Express is only allowing cardholders to transfer Membership Rewards to partner accounts of authorized users and those authorized users need to have been added at least 90 days ago. What does this mean?

You still are not allowed to transfer (or pool) Membership Rewards between accounts, even with your spouse, family member or authorized user(s). This rule is more restrictive than Chase and Citi, which both do let you send points between accounts.

What you can currently do is transfer Membership Rewards points to the partner accounts of people who are authorized users on one of your American Express cards that earn Membership Rewards. For example, I can transfer Sharon’s Membership Rewards to my Delta SkyMiles account. I can also send my Membership Rewards to my dad’s ANA Mileage Club account, which is exactly what I did to help them have enough miles to book their trip to Bali and Thailand. When I did this, I added him as an authorized user to my account and a day later I could transfer the points. That’s no longer possible due to the 90-day hold period before you can make transfers to new authorized users.

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What Airport Lounges Can You Get Into With The American Express (AMEX) Platinum Card?

The American Express (AMEX) Platinum card is designed for the jet setter crowd. While the personal Platinum card carries a steep $550 annual fee, if you want to learn more about the benefits of the Platinum card, you can check out our full review HERE.  While the card is marketed to those who can afford the luxury items advertised in the Departures magazine that’s included with your card membership, many benefits of the Platinum card can help travelers who aren’t in the top 0.01 percent. One of those benefits is access to several different types of airport club lounges. It can be hard to keep track of which lounges the card will get you into and the requirements for each, thus the need for this post. To clarify, access to lounges is a perk of the Personal Platinum, Business Platinum and variants of these cards.

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Heads up that other American Express Cards with platinum in the name, like the Delta Airlines Platinum or Optima Platinum, don’t get the same lounge access.

American Express does have a very handy lounge locator on their website. If you type in the airport, they’ll tell you all the places you can get into and which type of lounge that location is. If you have several lounges at an airport to choose from, here’s a link to our article about a website that provides reviews of over 2,500 lounges in 850+ airports worldwide.

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