Delta SkyClub Archives - Your Mileage May Vary

Credit Card Review: Gold Delta SkyMiles Business American Express Card

Delta offers several co-brand credit cards through their partnership with American Express. The Gold Delta cards are the mid-level entry point of the card portfolio. These cards have an annual fee but also provide some excellent benefits if you’re an occasional Delta flyer.

This review is for the business version of the Gold Delta SkyMiles American Express card. If you decide that you want to sign up for this card, or any of the Delta American Express business credit cards, we’d appreciate if you use our link. We receive Delta SkyMiles for each referral and that helps us keep Your Mileage May Vary HQ going strong.

So what type of benefits does this card provide upon signing up and does it make sense to keep this card for the long run?

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Pro Tip #7 – Spend Your Points Already!

I use examples from my own life in this blog to serve as an example to everyone else. Whether it’s a silly mistake that I’ve made when booking a flight or a great redemption, I feel there’s always something to be learned. So when I had the same thought go through my head twice in the same week, it has to be something that others have pondered over as well, right?

For example, say that you find somewhere you can redeem miles or points for a free flight, hotel room or rental car. You get ready to finalize the booking but there’s a voice in the back of your head telling you this isn’t the best redemption and you should just pay cash and save your points. You’ll even earn points if you pay cash. These points are worth X and you’re merely breaking even. Save your points for later.

You know what you need to do with that voice? Imagine that your brain is made of tiny boxes, and find the box that’s saying you shouldn’t redeem your points and CRUSH IT!! OK? (Brownie points to anyone who gets the reference and posts in the comments!)

Maybe it’s not even your inner voice but a post on some website or a Facebook group comment that told you you’re using your points wrong. Know what?

Here are the two instances I had where I had to just take a deep breath and spend my points or miles:

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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.

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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Perk For Delta AMEX Cardholders, WDW Closes Loophole, Extending Clear Membership & 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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What Happens When Everyone Is Elite?

“… and when everyone’s super, no one will be.” – Syndrome from “The Incredibles”

Not the quote you’d think would inspire me to write a travel blog, is it? However, it popped into my head when reading Nick’s post on Frequent Miler about how having Diamond Hilton status may or may not have helped him out on a recent stay. He has top-level Hilton status because he holds the Amex Hilton Aspire credit card, with an annual fee of $450. He mentioned a comment from a reader introducing the idea that when everyone has access to something, be it status or superpowers, that thing no longer becomes important because anyone can have it.

There was a time, not too long ago, that to achieve top-level status with any travel company, like an airline or hotel chain, you actually needed to use their services and use them a lot. This meant you either had to be a true road warrior, spending much of your work time staying in hotels and flying from worksite to worksite, or a dedicated travel hacker who spent days or more likely weeks making mileage and mattress runs trying to rack up credits for the least amount of money possible.

Those days are gone.

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