Milenomics² Podcast Episode 266: Rabbit Holes, Hotel Instruments and Vacasa Woes

0:22 New: Redeem JetBlue for Condor (DansDeals)

• Also Alaska Bookable.
  

• Route map is interesting for getting to Europe:
  
  
  

• Pricing is better on nonstop than 1 stop
  

• 60k-70k on some routes in Business. 
  

01:55 My Experience Getting Denied an Alaska Summit Card

• Applied right at launch, pending
  

• Called and had the most human/thoughtful conversation with a credit analyst as to why “it was a no” for them
  

• Too many inquiries, too many new cards, too many existing BofA cards - I look like too aggressive a credit seeker. Can’t argue with that! I thanked her for her thoughtful consideration, and she thanked me for making her job easy. No hard feelings.
  

• Related: Prior to this, BofA phone rep accidentally closed my Alaska Business card rather than the Business Cash Rewards card I asked her to close. Doh!
  

10:04 Citi Strata Elite: How is it going so far?

• Splurge Credit
  

• Blacklane credit
  

• 6x Dining
  

• AA transferability (premier as well)
  

17:38 Keep or Cancel? AA Citi Business 

• This card was a darling to me because it earned AA miles so inexpensively (2 miles per $1 in Fluz categories)
  

• 2 miles per dollar at a little over 3%. Paid back with 1.5% when you pay by phone
  

• Eccept now with Citi TYP being transferable to AA is there any need for this card?
  

• Some kind of companion certificate each year 
  

• Loyalty point earning 
  

• Thoughts?
  

• I think it needs to go to try to get a larger Credit Limit on the Strata Elite. 
  

25:12 Wells Fargo Autograph Journey Denial Reasons

• Too many inquiries or applications for credit
  

• Number of trades opened in past 24 months
  

• That’s better than a mark on my record, will keep trying
  

• Tip: 25-50% back on Entertainment (capped at $100 cashback)
  

29:37 Fluz Moment

• Payment order changing to pull from Cash Balance First 
  

• Synchrony bonus 
  

• Loss of cash out coming? 
  

• The loss of cash out will hurt my liquidation options due to some address issues I continue to struggle with. 
  

• Bill payment into checking account? Tried one, failed, will keep trying. 
  

• WU seems to be alive still, might need extra volume there if things do get limited. 
  

36:58 Strata Late show Update

• Many are seeing issues upon login
  

• Duplicate applications? Related to 100k apps?
  

• Citi requesting 4506 forms
  

• Many reports of similar requests.
  

• Needs more follow-up
  

40:39 Vacasa-Goes South

• File this in very bad news
  

• The new owner of Vacasa, the confusingly called Casago is looking at a different model 
  

• Franchisees would own geographic area.
  

• This means independent management of a patchwork of property portfolios 
  

• Some of these are already online 
  

• And the bad news is once these are spun into a franchisee as it is right now, they're not able to be booked with Wyndham points 
  

• That's bad. 
  

• There's a page with all of the different locations they are trying to franchise out 
  

• Reports in in the east coast and West Coast that this is live now 
  

• Probably coincides with wanting to limit the number of Wyndham bookings with the 6-month booking window from last week so that new franchisees aren't heavy in point booking. 
  

• Bad news all around. I've stopped spending on my Wyndham earner until this shakes out. I'm sitting on 6 to 12 months worth of points
  

• There are other release valves for Wyndham points including Wyndham's own timeshare and vacation rentals….. which are actually owned by… vacasa.
  

• What a confusing mess
  

47:11 Puzzler: Etihad Miles Expiring, what to do?

• Miles now expire after 18 months without crediting a flight to Etihad (OMAAT)
  

• Other account activity like transferring in bank points, redeeming miles, etc do NOT reset expiration
  

• To their credit, they emailed me a month ahead of time that the miles were expiring (rather than quietly letting them expire under the cover of night)
  

• The reason I had them here was some hairbrained AA First transcon flight (that itself was devalued some time ago)
  

• Not a ton of miles we’re talking about here, so I redeemed them for $120 in Amazon eGCs
  

49:07 Booked: Boston - Vienna on AirFrance Business Class w/Virgin Atlantic Miles

• Award Tool alert popped up for BOS - CDG - VIE for 48,500 pts + $316 pp one-way
  

• Or 60,000 AirFrance + $261 pp one-way
  

• With no better use in mind for the 250,000 Virgin Atlantic miles I’ve had clanging around for some time I pounced on it
  

• $100 cancellation fees w/Virgin Atlantic
  

• Only things better I might flank to are Lufthansa First with a connection -or- the nonstop of Austrian (which we’ve already booked on the return)
  

50:46 State College - Boston

• Most on-time experience I’ve had to date
  

• Connection time was so perfect we didn’t have a chance to visit any lounges
  

• Observation: Bars have taken over the gates at PHL terminal B (should have taken a picture, it’s wild)
  

• Priority Pass Restaurant on Arrival
  

• Discuss: So many ways to book, so many OneWorld loyalty programs potentially involved (AA, Alaska, Qatar)
  

55:19 Homework: Exhaustive list of all Hotel instruments and credits

• Amex Hilton Aspire: FNC and $200 Aspire x2 each 6 months (5 between us)
  

• Amex Platinum: $300 Per 6 months (2 night min, or 1 night Fine Hotels & Resorts) (2 here, 
  

• Amex Business Platinum: Hilton $50 credit per quarter (4 here)
  

• Amex Delta Business Gold: $150 Delta Stays credit (2)
  

• Chase The Edit: $250 credit every 6 months (2 nights x 2, 4 nights) (3 of these cards)
  

• Citi Strata Premier: $100 off of $500 
  

• Citi Strata Elite: $300 off a 2 night stay booked through cititravel.com once per calendar year
  

• CapitalOne Venture $300 credits booked through portal (can also be used for airfare)
  

• CapitalOne Venture 4th Night Free (at “select Premier and Lifestyle Collection hotels”)
  

• Free Night Certificates that come annually with credit cards: Hilton, Marriott, Hyatt, IHG
  

• Gift Cards: $50 Hiltons from when they sold them online, Hotels.com gift cards
  

• IHG OneKey Rewards (can’t be combined with GCs)
  

• Shopping Portal cashback (sometimes quite lucrative)
  

• Amex/Chase/etc Offers