Milenomics ² Podcast - No Annual Fee Edition

0:25 Stop & Shop Rewards can now be used for Groceries (Milenomics Slack) 1 point per dollar earned Redeem 100 points for $1 (1 cpp value)2,000 max per transaction (ie, max $20 off)Fuel Rewards is 100 points for $0.10/gallon up to 20 gallons (Up to 2 cpp of value if you can fill a 20 gallon tank)But how much gas can you realistically use?You need to log in to your account (on desktop or app) and opt in to GO Rewards. You can’t opt to go back into the old program, but the new program still allows you to redeem for gas so I don’t see a downside in opting in.Also check out Saverocity Observation Deck Ep 141 for more about Fuel RewardsAnd MSP Ep 7 on Kroger’s program specifically 4:10 Amex Offer: 10% Off Staples up to $40 Back (Milenomics Slack) Only on my account (business card) 5:20 iTunes GCs Can Now Be Used to Buy Apple Products (MacRumors) What effect does this have on resale prices? 7:40 Targeted Amex Personal Platinum $100 Back on $100 at Dell Great way to capture this is a buyers group 9:50 Park Hyatt Mallorca De-flagged (Milenomics Slack) Hotel isn’t set to re-open due to Covid until 2021The build quality is really incredible here, such a shame to see it wasn’t a financial success (perhaps even before Covid).Would you still seek this property out, once it’s an independent hotel?Less loyalty leverage, concerns about food & beverage quality (was so high before), and overall experience.Could rates and packages make this even more compelling as an independent hotel?Sweet Spots: The Most Seasonally Miscategorized Hyatt Hotels 16:30 7-Eleven to Acquire Speedway Stations (CNN) Sam: My bad!MSP Ep 6 on Speedway 19:50 Fee-free VGCs at Staples 8/2-8/8 (FM) Limit 5YMMV Want more podcast content? Head over to our Patreon page. There, you can subscribe and get a special link to listen to all three shows in the Milenomics Podcast Network in your preferred mobile podcast app. In Episode 87 of the Milenomics² Podcast we discuss: Heightened credit card welcome offersTightening approval standardsThe utility of Amex authorized users

Today we're back with a standard No Annual Fee episode.  We do the news, and then talk Personal Finance and Amex Small Business Credits. 0:30 GiftCards.com joins giftcardmall with $2k monthly portal cap Rakuten lasted until 7/7 at $60k/mo Showing $2k cap as of 7/8 1:50 [Targeted?] Chase Marriott/Ritz cards: 10x on Gas + Dining (DoC) 7/15-9/15 $3,500 cap Must register: Link 3:15 Discover 20% off Amazon when Using 1 point (DoC) Just wanted to mention it’s smart to keep some Discover rewards clanging around rather than draining the rewards to be able to take advantage of these promos Discover is 5x on PayPal Q3 2020 so a good time to use Discover cards in general 5:00 Stop & Shop/Giant: 3X Fuel Rewards for VGCs 7/10-7/16 5:30 Hyatt 15-25% Point Rebate on Award Stays + Free Parking (Direct Link) Register by 9/1/2020 Stay from 7/8/2020 - 10/8/2020 15% back for all, 25% back for Chase Hyatt cardholders Stacks with a promo for 2,500 for those with elite status + Chase card (Dans Deals) Example: 30k Hyatt is 22.5k after 25% back, potential 20k after 2,500 back promo  8:55 Chase Sapphire Reserve Only Earned 5x at Restaurants 7/1-7/5 (DoC) Still, 3x + Pay Yourself Back is pretty great Still getting 5x on Gas through the end of September So Random  11:25 Flexible Spending Account Covid Changes (Wirecutter) FSA Healthcare You can increase, decrease, or stop your health-care FSA contributions altogether. You have more time to spend your health-care savings from 2019. In the past, you had a two-and-a-half-month grace period after your plan period ended in which to spend your remaining balance, but your employer can now opt to extend the grace period through December 31, 2020. You can roll over up to $550 into your 2021 health-care FSA, a $50 increase over the previous $500 limit. FSA Dependant Care You can increase, decrease, or stop your dependent-care FSA contributions altogether. You now have until December 31, 2020, to spend your dependent-care savings from 2019 (rather than the usual two-and-a-half-month grace period). The same weird scenario from above applies. If you think you’ve lost your unused DCFSA contributions from 2019, contact your

A couple months ago we launched the Milenomics Podcast Network which now includes three shows: Milenomics² Podcast with Sam Simon and Robert DwyerMilenomics Second Podcast hosted by Garth GrawburgThe Manifesto with Gideon The Free-quent Flyer Subscribers gain access to these shows as well as a thriving Slack community, the ability to attend meetups, and more. Today we're releasing a free preview of recent episode of the Milenomics Second Podcast where Garth and I talk about wine. Pursuing points & miles tends to coincide with being a bit of a deal hound, and here we'll apply that to navigating online wine deals... 0:00 Intro with Sam and Robert 4:15 Where/how do you buy wine? 6:45 The importance of wine storage 11:00 Determining which wines to buy 12:55 Tools Delectable AppCellarTracker 15:15 Deals Amex OffersWine.comCashback portal (Ex: Wine.com on Cashback Monitor)Promo codesWine AccessFirst BottleBenchmark Wine 27:30 Flash Sale Sites WTSO.comLast BottleWine SpectatorWine-searcher.com 31:00 Winery direct opportunities Cakebread Cellars restaurant/retail mixWinery direct offer 36:45 Wine travel Napa (Cabernet)Sonoma (Pinot Noir)Italy Robert’s Wine Blog Wellesley Wine Press Want more podcast content? Head over to our Patreon page. There, you can subscribe and get a special link to listen to our podcasts in your preferred mobile podcast app. We're up to Episode 83 where we discuss: Terrible ideasBanging on Bank of AmericaCruising after Covid

We're back with a bit of a stretch for our 'short cut' topic.  Robert and I sat down to have a quick chat about our upcoming summer travel plans, both of which revolve around vacation rentals. Along the way, as we tend to do, we took a bit of a deep dive into price variances between booking channels, how does the current Chase 1.5 cpp cash out method play into paying for vacation rentals, and the importance of flexible cancellation policies. 0:15 Summer Travel Plans: Robert: Newport, RI road trip Sam: Lake Tahoe (almost certainly flying) 2:59 Preference for private homes vs hotels with Covid 6:52 Chase 1.5 cashout as an enabler (Ep 79) 8:56 Price fluctuation depending on dates, fees, duration of stay. 16:10 Puzzler of staying longer costing less per night, but how long do you really want to stay, and how many really nice properties are available for say month-long rentals in peak season at this point?  17:17 Comparing prices on same/similar unit across multiple platforms Lack of granularity in viable options Internet sleuthing for precise location, comparable units in same building/area (often same host), even Zillow estimate as an arbiter of relative value 20: 17Any angles to reduce prices? Portals? BofA Offers? British Airways / Delta https://www.deltaairbnb.com/ https://www.britishairways.com/en-us/executive-club/collecting-avios/hotels/airbnb Split payments either by guests or over time to double dip on BofA/Chase offers. 23:52 Importance of cancellation terms 28:09 Mental block/puzzler over laying out cash vs funny-money-points 31:30 Is a point and miles lifestyle compatible with owning a vacation home? (Ep 82) Want more podcast content? Check out our Patreon Page where we discuss topics more fully: Earning From HomeFailures and Successes in this spaceThe Above Mentioned Vacation Home Discussion Subscribe to the No Annual Fee Edition Subscribe below to the Free, No Annual Fee Milenomics² podcast on Apple Podcasts: Or on Google Play Music: And NOW also on Spotify:

Update: Here's link to the Instagram Live video Last week Emirates greatly reduced taxes + fees on awards on their metal using their Skywards miles. That's great for those who want to fly Emirates metal, especially since we can transfer bank points to Skywards 1:1 across so many programs. But the place a lot of us immediately went with this was to wonder... Did Emirates also reduce fuel surcharges on partner awards? That curiosity led to more questions... Can partner awards (like Japan Airlines) be booked online? (looks like "no")Can taxes + fees be accurately estimated online? (also "no")The Emirates chart for travel on JAL from North America to Japan is pretty favorable. 125,000 pp roundtrip in Business, 185,000 pp roundtrip in First. Can partner awards be booked as a one-way for half the miles of a roundtrip? ("no")Partners like JAL open their schedule at 360 days. How far out can you book an Emirates partner award? (330 days)How good is Emirates call center? I called Emirates a couple times last week and got conflicting answers. The first rep said their systems were down and she couldn't estimate taxes + fees for partner awards. Call back tomorrow. I called right back a moment later and a second rep said he could estimate taxes + fees on JAL parner awards, but said it wasn't possible to use Emirates miles on North America to Japan routes. I pointed out that their site has a table for the route and he came back and agreed it was possible after all. And that the cost of a roundtrip flight from Boston to Tokyo on JAL in Business Class would be 125,000 pp roundtrip + just $60 in taxes and fees. That's pretty tremendous, if true, because when Spencer Howard checked it in September 2019 it was $360 in taxes + fees. What happened? Did JAL decrease the fuel surcharges? Did Emirates reduce the amount of fuel surcharges they collect on partner awards? Was the rep I spoke to mistaken? I frequently come across articles Spencer has written when researching foreign carrier frequent flyer program awards so I thought it would be informative and interesting to discuss this and more. Instagram Live I'm planning to appear on Instagram Live with Spencer to discuss this, award travel, and more. Where: Instagram Live https://www.instagram.com/straighttothepoints/ When: Wednesday, June 3rd, 2020, 7:30p eastern In the mean time, I hope you enjoy this snippet from our paid show here on the No Annual Fee version of our podcast. The Emirates topic is just 5 minutes out of an hour and twenty minute show this week. The breaking news we discuss is a Chase 1.5 cent per point cashout opportunity, along with a dozen other topics. If you'd like to hear more of the show head over to Patron and subscribe... Listen: Milenomics² Episode 79 on Patreon

Check your Business Platinum and Personal Gold cards for 20,000 referrals We’ve been seeing [targeted] heightened 20,000 Membership Reward “Blue Star” referrals come and go on Amex Business Platinum and Personal Gold cards. Right now they seem to be “in season” with a high percentage of these cards showing heightened referral bonuses. Update: Others are reporting seeing this one Personal Platinum and Business Gold as well. In this write-up and Milenomics Short Cut podcast episode, we’ll cover how how to maximize this referral opportunity. If you’re new to Amex referrals, have a look this post: Generating and Using an Amex Referral To check whether you’re targeted, go here and click through each of your cards especially the Business Platinum and Personal Gold cards: americanexpress.com/refer Here are the topics we went over: You can refer a wide variety of Amex cards from either of these cards Don’t think you’re limited to referring for just these two cards. With Amex universal referral, your friend can sign up for a wide variety of Amex Membership Reward cards, plus co-branded cards like Hilton and Delta. With Amex the referral bonus is based on the card you refer from Regardless of which card your friend signs up for, the referral bonus is based on the card you refer from. That’s pretty unusual if you think about it. Amex has high signup bonuses for their flagship cards with high annual fees. But referrals are based on which card you refer from. This means your friend can sign up for a lowly no annual fee card, and you can still get 20,000 Membership Rewards if the card you’re referring from has been targeted. These 20,000 Membership Reward Referrals are Targeted Some people are targeted and some are not. Some cards are targeted and some are not. You can have two of the exact same card and you may see one targeted with 20,000 point referral capacity and the other card remains at 10,000 points. It even varies from day to day. If you see this offer, you may want to pounce on it. But you don’t necessarily need to use it immediately. More on that below. They can be “squirreled away.” We’ve heard that some people are temporarily blocked from generating Amex referrals. We call this a “penalty box” which is usually a timeout that heals itself after time, but it’s unclear what causes it and how to get out of it. The welcome bonuses are often better (on some cards) if you go incognito “Going incognito” to see better offers (or at least different offers) is definitely a thing. Amex is notorious for displaying different welcome bonuses depending on how “come at them.” Take for example the 40,000 point welcome bonus associated with the Amex Personal Gold card in the image at the top of this post. When I click through that referral link I sometimes see 40,000 and other times I see 50,000. First, compare notes with others on what the best current bonus is for a given card. Then try to get that offer to come up. You can check desktop or mobile. Chrome or Firefox. Try going incognito/private. Try connecting to a VPN in another part of the country. Any of these can cause the welcome bonus to change. Crazy, right? In some cases, referral welcome bonuses are worse than public non-referral offers It stinks when a bank makes a referral offer worse than a public offer. It happens from time to time, but I don’t think it’s necessarily malice on their part. Offers through various channels just vary, or in some cases lag one another. For example, we recentl

This episode was originally released last July 4th for our Patreon members. We’re releasing it here for all readers and listeners of the Podcast. Maybe you’ll find it a nice 38 minute distraction from everything going on right now.  Original Show notes are as follows: Today we’re taking a break from the regular show format to have a little fun. Both of us have a bit of a guilty pleasure: reading 1 star TripAdvisor reviews of hotels. Robert came up with the idea for today’s show, where we read an anonymous 1 star review of a hotel, and each try to guess the hotel. Along the way we got into a bit of a serious discussion about what should it take to make a 1-star review, and what causes higher end hotels to earn 1-star reviews. Play along by pausing the show and trying to figure out the hotel, and share your worst hotel experiences in the comments of this post! Posts referenced in this episode: Robert’s Review of the 4-Seasons Nevis Sam’s [Old] Review of the Grand Hyatt Kauai Subscribe to the No Annual Fee Edition Subscribe below to the Free, No Annual Fee Milenomics² podcast on Apple Podcasts:     Or on Google Play Music: And NOW also on Spotify:  

Welcome to another episode of Short Cuts on our No Annual Fee Podcast. I recently applied for a Home Equity Line of Credit and noticed that my FICO score was a bit lower than I expected. It got me wondering whether it is still important to monitor my credit report and check my credit score, and if so – how? In this episode we mention these services: Credit Karma Credit Sesame Experian.com See also: The Monetization Of Your Credit Score; Or: How Travel Is Not Free Want more? Check out Episode 70 of our paid podcast where we discuss: Advanced maneuvers in credit card applications Spring cleaning How sometimes it seems that nothing works Subscribe to the No Annual Fee Edition Subscribe below to the Free, No Annual Fee Milenomics² podcast on Apple Podcasts:     Or on Google Play Music: And NOW also on Spotify:  

Welcome to another episode of Short Cuts on our No Annual Fee Podcast. Today we talk about where the points & miles game fits in the context of a pandemic like we’re currently experiencing. We discuss the importance of demand schedules. Check this link for more on that topic. Want more? Become a Patron to Unlock 1+ Hour Weekly Shows Support Milenomics on Patreon where you’ll get: A weekly podcast episode for subscibers only Access to a robust Slack community And more… Subscribe to the No Annual Fee Edition Subscribe below to the Free, No Annual Fee Milenomics² podcast on Apple Podcasts:     Or on Google Play Music: And NOW also on Spotify:  

Welcome to another episode of Short Cuts on our No Annual Fee Podcast. Today we’re talking about opportunities for travel deals surrounding Coronavirus. Not necessarily for travel in the near term, but where we see angles to book award travel further out with flexible cancellation terms. Want more? Become a Patron to Unlock 1+ Hour Weekly Shows Check out Episode 67 of our Paid Show where we discuss: Converting bad bank points into airline travel bank credits A low fee way to pay certain mortgages online with a credit card A recent trip to Japan with reviews of the Park Hyatt Tokyo and Kyoto And much more… Subscribe to the No Annual Fee Edition Subscribe below to the Free, No Annual Fee Milenomics² podcast on Apple Podcasts:     Or on Google Play Music: And NOW also on Spotify: