Listen To Bloggers But Think for Yourself!

First, the United 55,000-mile bonus with $50 statement credit is supposed to expire today. It doesn’t get better than that. Grab it now if you can (remember the new 2-year bonus rule).

Second, yes, I know the title of this post might sound ridiculously obvious, but bear with me for just a moment.

A couple of days ago, Drew from Travel Is Free wrote this post:

Please, Stop Listening to Bloggers and Getting Crappy Rewards Cards!

You should read the post and the comments to it, but here are some pointers he made that I have to comment on.

1. The Amex Delta 50K-miles offer is sh*t.

2. The Chase Marriott 70K-offer is sh*t, also.

No, he didn’t put it exactly the same way, but I’m citing by memory. 🙂

To that, I politely told him that he was fundamentally wrong.

To that, he graciously replied that we’d have to agree to disagree.

Fair enough.

Before I continue, though, let me say this: I absolutely love Drew’s blog and his writing style. He dissects loyalty programs, studies and experiments with their clandestine and Byzantine rules, and reverse-engineers them to make them–no, not easy to understand–but explainable to normal and lazy people. Just like yours truly here.

That means one thing; if you have time for only one blog to read, read TIF. Yes, even at the expense of my own. 🙁

So, now I hope you realize that when I said to a blogger who I like and respect, that he was fundamentally wrong, I wasn’t just throwing cheap punches. Let me explain.

The American Express Delta 50K-Miles Offer with $50 Statement Credit

My opinion is this. It [almost] never gets better than this and you must grab it while you can.

If you think for a moment that I am a Delta SkyPesos fan boy, you might’ve never read this:

Delta Smacks United

And this:

SkyClub Comedy Club. Delta Rocks Again!

And this:

Delta Airlines, Hotel, and Casino

Or this:

Delta Stole My Five Tiers Ideas for Their 2015 Redemption Chart

So, after everything is said about Delta, how dare I steer my unsuspecting readers to apply at my non-affiliated Delta credit cards link?

Here are seven reasons how.

1. You must diversify.
2. Delta miles are hard to get.
3. This is the second highest public bonus I’ve ever seen (the one-time 70,000-mile offer was never public).
4. Low $1,000 spending requirement.
5. Delta allows a domestic stopover.
6. Delta has good availability to London.
7. Delta is introducing one-way awards starting next year. That alone might be a game-changer.

But forget about all seven reasons. Here is the eighth and more important reason why Sky Pesos are in reality worth more than you might think. I’m borrowing this from my next post (because it is an interesting topic that warrants more digging into).

There is this shadowy group of people and travel agencies that will buy your miles and points from you to book travel for their clients.

Just to answer the question you haven’t asked yet, no, it is not legal. I mean, selling your miles and points won’t land you in jail, but it is against the policies of all loyalty programs that I know of. If you are caught, you can lose your frequent miles account and your miles will be forfeited. It’s that simple.

But this is not about legalese. The facts are simple. Those miles brokers routinely pay 1-1.2 cents for SkyPesos. Not much? Maybe not, but they pay the same price for United miles, too.

In what world, you might ask, SkyPesos are worth as much as United? Well, apparently, in the world of hard, cold cash. These brokers are not a sentimental bunch. If they weren’t sure they would be able to fetch a business class ticket for your SkyPesos, they wouldn’t be doing that.

I don’t have an explanation for this because redeeming Delta miles is indeed a big headache. Maybe, the demand for Delta flights is higher than for United due to better planes, better amenities and better service. Or it might be that the brokers expect that redeeming SkyPesos would become easier in the future with the introduction of one-way awards. In any case, if these guys don’t shy away from Delta miles, neither should you.

Just saying.

There are currently two Gold Amex Delta 50K-offers for Personal and Business cards. They are valid until September 8. I would grab both. There is also a Platinum 50K-offer, but the AF for the first year is not waived.

The Chase Marriott 70,000-Point Offer

Drew makes a valid point that this is a Chase card, and you can never have too many great Chase cards. That is true, so if you are just starting with Chase, skip the Marriott until you have better ones: United, CSP, British, Ink, Southwest, and Priority Club. I would not apply for Hyatt and Fairmont unless and until you have firm travel plans to use the free nights from these programs within the next 12 months. So. in my opinion, your Marriott application should precede these two.

But if you are good with Chase and can afford one or two more application, let me tell you why the Chase Marriott card makes perfect sense to anyone, at least for now. That’s because you can double down on another great offer: the Chase Ritz Carlton 70,000-point card. I wrote about that phenomenal (and phenomenally underrated) product a little while ago here: Just Got My New Chase Ritz Carlton Card–Is It the Best Reward Card Ever?.

Simply put, if you have both, Marriott and Ritz Carlton (which are practically the same program), that’s 280,000 Marriott points bonus for two apps. That will buy you a week (with a 5th night free) at the most expensive Marriott hotel in the world. And Marriott points are not easy  to get by. Explain to me how this card is not a worthy sign up again?

Are you holding too many Chase credit cards? You shouldn’t. With the recent policy changes, you can get another bonus after 24 months, but you shouldn’t be holding the same card at the time of the application. So, trim your collection and start all over again.

So what is the point I’ve been trying to make here? I forgot. Oh, yes!

Bloggers are opinionated folks. Take whatever we say with a grain of salt and do what works for you. Including doing the opposite or nothing at all?

What say you? Makes sense?

Image By: Mike Licht

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