It’s May 21, and you just realized you want to go to Europe this summer. You’re not alone–that’s probably the most common request my Award Booking Service is getting right now.
The good news is that finding award space to Europe this summer is still possible, especially if you are flexible.
Which routes have space? Which airlines will open up more award space?
Disclaimer: I use the word “upgrade” a few times in the post. I am not referring to buying a cash ticket in economy and trying to use miles or cash to get it into business class. I am referring to using miles to change an award from economy to business. The first type of upgrade is almost universally a bad deal. The second type is a fine deal.
United has a litany of award fees. Booking by phone is $25. Cancelling is $150. Changing the origin, destination, award, type, cabin, or anything within 21 days of departure is $75.
But I’ve had some pretty good luck changing United awards without incurring the stated fees. I wrote about the way I figured out to Save $100 or More on Cancelling United Awards.
And I once changed an award from Europe to the US without incurring a $75 change fee or having the 20,000 extra miles for my upgrade from economy to business class deducted from my account. (That was a fluke caused by the fact that fees seem to be manually applied by agents over the phone.)
I’ve figured out another way to save up to $75 per ticket in certain circumstances.
I continually fail to enforce a moratorium on award booking for myself. I want to finish flying all the awards I have lined up and have no more scheduled. Not only would I have the freedom to spontaneously plan my next trip on a moment’s notice, but I could take advantage of last-second-only deals like Lufthansa First Class with United miles.
But sometimes I can’t help myself. Four months ago I booked my favorite award to date, using 100k US Airways miles to string together 4 longhaul business class segments and four continents. Add in the trips I plan to take in South America over the next few weeks, and I had my next five months of travel planned.
from gcmap.com
But then a chance to book new oneworld partner Malaysia Airlines First Class on an A380 presented itself, and I jumped on it, even though the date is in the middle of my planned time in Europe. Then I thought, “Well I really have to book another award to get back to Europe to continue that trip.”
from gcmap.com
This is the story of that last award: 65,000 United miles for 12 hours in First Class on a Thai A380. This award describes segment-by-segment searching, which is the hallmark of many successful award searches, and maximizing region-based miles in an advanced way.
The second you move abroad, you become a lot more popular! That far flung country looks a lot better to family and friends as soon as they know they’ll have a free bed and tour guide. My sister wanted to come visit me in Argentina in mid-May, so we set out to find her the best award ticket possible. Only one minor problem. As of two months ago, she had zero miles.
We ended up booking her n roundtrip from Los Angeles to Buenos Aires for a weeklong trip for 60,000 United miles. We even added a free oneway to Hawaii for next year for no extra miles and only $2.50 in taxes. This Anatomy of an Award should illustrate how to get from zero miles to a dream trip in two months, United free oneways, United’s hold policy, and the secret United award space open to United card holders.
Posted in Anatomy of an Award, Chase, Rookie Alli, United
Tagged Anatomy of an Award, United
EVA Air–Taiwan’s second largest carrier–has announced that it will join the Star Alliance June 18, 2013. This is welcome news that will provide another option to Asia via EVA’s Taipei hub with Star Alliance miles.
EVA is already a non-alliance partner of United, so you can already use your United miles to book EVA, which may be United miles’ best option to Asia. Continue reading
Reader Christopher emailed me an exciting tip the other day: free oneways are possible on United awards within the continental USA and Canada. I already knew free oneways were possible on international United awards and awards to Hawaii, but this was news.
He sent me some screenshots, and I was able to replicate his findings and add some more of my own. I learned four things:
Free Oneway on Roundtrip Economy Standard Awards
United has two prices for award ticket: the Saver price and the Standard price. I think of the Saver price as the “real” price and the Standard price as the “double” price. Saver space is heavily capacity controlled, and Standard space is almost always available.
Within the upper 49 US states and Canada, United charges 12,500 miles each direction for economy Saver awards and 25,000 miles each way for economy Standard awards.
That means a roundtrip Standard economy award is 50,000 miles, which I consider to be a horrible deal in the vast majority of cases. Why? I value 50,000 United miles at about $900, which is quite pricey for a domestic roundtrip.
But Christopher sent me screenshots of free oneways on domestic roundtrip Standard awards.
Here’s an example:
LAX-Orlando, Orlando-LAX, LAX-Chicago for 50k on all Standard space
In the example above, all the space is Standard economy space, denoted by the YN in parentheses at the end of the Fare Class line.
That means that
Los Angeles to Orlando on December 23, 2013
Orlando to Los Angeles on January 2, 2014
alone should cost 50,000 miles as a roundtrip Standard economy award. But in fact, the whole award costs 50,000 miles total including the third segment from Los Angeles to Chicago in economy. That means Los Angeles to Chicago added zero extra miles, and Los Angeles to Chicago is a free oneway.
Or if you prefer, you can think of this trick as getting three oneway trips for 50,000 miles, meaning 16,667 miles for each one. That’s a 33% premium over the Saver price, but it could be worth it in some cases.
Do the math for each potential award. Just because there is a free oneway doesn’t mean the award is a good deal, and just because Standard space is involved doesn’t mean the award is a bad deal.
For instance, the three segments above would cost $748.70 if purchased with cash. Plugging the award into the Mile Value Calculator, the award only gets about 1.3 cents of value per mile.
But just because my one example isn’t a great award doesn’t mean great uses of this trick don’t exist. This trick seems to encompass any three oneway Standard itineraries. If you are looking to book three very expensive oneways, 50,000 miles could be a good deal. Possible uses:
Charlottesville, VA to Las Vegas roundtrip plus Charlottesville to Houston oneway in Standard space for 50k
Cheap Oneway on a Roundtrip Mixed Standard/Saver Economy Award
The foregoing example makes theoretical sense to me: you can get a free oneway on a Standard roundtrip economy award within the US. But I can’t explain this second one.
If the outbound of a domestic roundtrip is in Saver space and the return is in Standard space, you can add a oneway to the end in Standard space, and the total award will price at 42,500 miles. I have no idea where that price comes from.
LAX to Orlando in Saver, Orlando to LAX and LAX to Chicago in Standard
The roundtrip from LAX to Orlando should cost 37,500 miles since oneway is in Saver space and oneway is in Standard space. The oneway from LAX to Chicago should be another 25,000 miles.
But instead of 62,500 miles, the price is 42,500 miles total. This is getting to the territory where I could see a lot of itineraries making sense. If I really needed a domestic oneway ticket as a Standard award, I would make sure to ticket that award using this trick.
Cheap Oneways on Roundtrip Saver Economy Awards
Most of us probably book Saver economy awards within the US if we book domestic awards at all. A roundtrip Saver award is 25,000 miles.
You can add a oneway on to that for 10,000 more miles. That’s not a huge discount–2,500 miles–but it’s nice to know.
Chicago to San Francisco roundtrip plus Chicago to Tampa oneway for 35k
Cheap Oneways on Roundtrip Saver Business/First Awards
A roundtrip Saver award in domestic first class costs 50k miles. I can’t imagine that ever being a good value for me, since domestic first class is just a slightly wider seat, seven extra inches of leg room, and a meal worth maybe $10.
But 50k miles is also the price of a roundtrip on flat beds on United’s p.s. flights from JFK to LAX and San Francisco in business class. That’s a price I might actually pay since those flights exceed six hours, and a bed is a big upgrade over an economy seat.
In another price I can’t explain, the price to add a oneway in domestic first class to a roundtrip in domestic first or business class is 60,000 miles total.
JFK to LAX roundtrip in flat beds, LAX to Chicago in domestic first for 60k miles
LAX to Dulles roundtrip plus LAX to Chicago, all in domestic first for 60k miles
Why do these four tricks work?
I assume these are glitches.
Any way to get more out of the tricks?
The tricks that maximize the value of Standard space are useful for very few awards, namely awards where the equivalent cash ticket would be very expensive. Unfortunately on those flights, even Standard awards might not be available because Standard awards don’t have “last seat availability” for the general public.
But if you have the United Explorer card or United elite status, you can get any seat, any time for the Standard award price. That means three super expensive oneways can be had for 50,000 miles, which could be a great deal.
I got an error message when I tried to replicate the methods in this post.
That happens a lot on united.com multicity searches, which is the only way to search for free oneways on United. Ordinarily I recommend calling in to piece together the award when you get an error on united.com. But since I think these prices are caused by a glitch, I would say that an error message just means you are out of luck.
The only error messages I’ve gotten on these searches are when I tried to string three flat bed p.s. flights together like JFK-LAX//LAX-JFK//JFK-SFO, and when I tried to take the free oneway back to where the roundtrip went like ORD-SFO//SFO-ORD//ORD-SFO.
Recap
A reader tip sent me to explore free stopovers on United domestic awards. I found:
There are a lot of cool things you can do with miles. One of the coolest things I’ve thought up, and one which I am strongly contemplating booking, would turn 57.5k United miles and 10k Avios into:
The center piece for this plan is the Island Hopper route, which I became obsessed with last week and read everything a google search could find. Three times a week, United flies from Honolulu to Guam with five stops along the way in the Marshall Islands and Micronesia.
The 4,365 mile route takes 14:30 to fly west; crosses the international date line; and requires an extra pilot, flight attendant, and spare parts. It takes you across the remote Pacific with all the takeoffs, landings, and souvenir photos you can handle.
Image from gcmap.com showing Island Hopper route. From united.com: Time on the ground in Majuro, Marshall Islands (MAJ) is 45 minutes. Time on the ground in Kwajalein, Marshall Islands (KWA) is 41 minutes. Time on the ground in Kosrae, Federated State of Micronesia (KSA) is 40 minutes. Time on the ground in Pohnpei, Federated States of Micronesia (PNI) is 41 minutes. Time on the ground in Truk, Federated States of Micronesia (TKK) is 41 minutes.
The Island Hopper is a famous and historic route that has connected the Pacific atolls to the rest of the world for decades. It was originally flown my Air Micronesia (Air Mike!), then Continental Micronesia, and finally by United after the United/Continental merger.
Here are a few trip reports that got me excited:
Reading those got me very excited about flying the Island Hopper route from Honolulu to Guam. From Guam, United flies daily direct flights back to Honolulu with award space in economy class every day and business class most days.
Award space Guam to Honolulu direct is wide open.
But a direct return seems boring when I would be so close to Asia, plus the Guam to Honolulu 777 has recliner seats in business class, which I don’t want to fly.
I looked into other options. Guam has more flights that you might imagine, and four choices jumped out at me: Seoul, Tokyo, Cairns, and Taipei.
Image from gcmap.com
Since my brother and I just scuba dived the Great Barrier Reef from Cairns a few months ago, I ruled that out. Taipei and Seoul are interesting choices, but Tokyo caught my eye. Japan Airlines is a oneworld member airline that flies the route, and that means Avios can be used on the route. When I think short, direct flight, I usually assume the best deal will be an Avios award.
From searching ba.com, I learned that Guam to Narita has wide open availability in economy and business class on a Japan Airlines 767, which features recliner style business class seats.
Economy class on the 3:50 flight costs 10,000 Avios and $96. Business class costs 20,000 Avios and $96. That’s not much of a premium for business class, but it’s a short flight, and the business class seat isn’t great, so I haven’t decided which cabin I’d select.
or
Then when I was ready to go back to Hawaii from Tokyo, I would fly United business class. Business class awards between Japan and Hawaii with United miles is a major sweet spot at only 32,500 miles oneway for seven hours in a flat bed. That’s only a 10,000 mile premium on economy class.
Plus premium seats are widely available on the route.
Some days have both United space and All Nippon Airways space.
Perhaps surprisingly to some, United offers a way better product on this route than its Japanese partner. United flies to Tokyo on a 777 with flat beds in business and first. ANA has an angled lie flat business class.
Having flown United BusinessFirst (business) and Global First (first) before, I don’t think the 15,000 mile premium for seven hours is worth the price to fly first class between Japan and Hawaii. The business class beds are plenty comfortable, so I would return in United BusinessFirst class.
Putting the Trip Together
I’ve talked about three parts of the trip:
This would take two awards to ticket. One roundtrip, open jaw United award and one Avios award.
Since we are booking a roundtrip United award from Honolulu to Guam, returning Tokyo to Honolulu, we can take a free stopover.
I haven’t researched all the stops on the Island Hopper yet, but I would take the stop somewhere on that route, continuing on the next Island Hopper two days later. That would mean two days in the Marshall Islands or Micronesia, plus however long I want in Guam and Japan.
This would be a unique trip and the coolest thing I can think to do with 57,500 United miles and 10,000 Avios.
Image from gcmap.com
But you don’t live in Hawaii.
Not living in Hawaii doesn’t make this trip impossible, just a few more miles. You’d have a few options. Between the mainland and Guam, it only costs 32,500 United miles in economy, and you can definitely route on the Island Hopper.
Since the Island Hopper leaves at 5:00 AM, you won’t be able to connect to it without overnighting in Honolulu. You have two options for the time in Honolulu.
1. You can fly in to Honolulu the morning before the Island Hopper and spend close to 24 hours in Hawaii without burning your stopover. (Layovers of under 24 hours don’t count as a stopover.) This is a great option to get some beach time and save your stopover for somewhere along the Island Hopper.
2. You can fly into Hawaii and hang out for a few days or more before the Island Hopper. This will count as your stopover. That means no stopover along the Island Hopper, but you can still spend as much time as you want in Guam and Japan.
Then on the return from Japan, you can fly directly home instead of going through Hawaii. Unfortunately a business class trip from Japan to the mainland US with United miles is 60,000 miles, and first class is 70,000–quite a bit more than the Japan to Honolulu route.
I would anticipate that attempting to book this award would cause error messages on united.com, so find the space for each segment then call 800-UNITED-1 to book.
That means a mainlander would need 92,500 United miles plus 10,000 Avios to fly the Island Hopper, United business class home from Japan, and Japan Airlines between Guam and Tokyo. That’s well within reach.
Getting the Miles
The ideal currency for this trip is Ultimate Rewards points from Chase. Ultimate Rewards transfer instantly at a 1:1 rate to United and British Airways. The best Ultimate Rewards cards to get would be the Chase Ink Bold and Chase Sapphire Preferred, which combined offer 98,000+ Ultimate Rewards just for meeting their minimum spending requirements. You can apply for them at the same time.
Personal: Sapphire Preferred with 40,000 Ultimate Rewards after spending $3,000 in the first three months
Business: Ink Bold with 50,000 Ultimate Rewards after spending $5,000 in the first three months. Many people don’t realize they qualify for a business credit card.
Two Other Things about the Island Hopper
The Island Hopper as I’ve described only flies Monday and Friday. The Wednesday version skips the stop in Kosrae.
I haven’t seen any business class availability on the whole thing, though there seems to be space on the shortest hops individually. I wouldn’t want business class anyway, since it’s just a recliner.
Recap
I’m currently contemplating booking a trip that would get me onto the famed Island Hopper route, which hops between seven Pacific islands. I would combine that trip with an Avios award to Japan and a return in a flat bed. All that would cost only 67,500 Ultimate Rewards and $150 or so from Hawaii. From the mainland, it would be 102,500 Ultimate Rewards and $150.
Racking up the Ultimate Rewards for this ultimate trip is easy by getting these two cards at once:
Application Link: Sapphire Preferred with 40,000 Ultimate Rewards
Application Link: Ink Bold with 50,000 Ultimate Rewards
Posted in Avios, Award Booking, United
Tagged Air Micronesia, Island Hopper, Japan Airlines, United
Elite members of United’s MileagePlus frequent flyer program get access to extra Saver award seats in economy class. (Platinum and higher members also get extra business and first class seat availability.)
While helping my friend who has no United status book an award with United miles, I saw that extra economy class award seats popped up when she signed into her account. That confused me, since she has no United status. The only thing I can think of is that her United MileagePlus Explorer Card is conferring her the extra space.
If so, that would be one of the biggest benefits of the card, and one that is completely unadvertised and possibly unintentional.
What I’ve Seen
My friend Megan wanted to book an economy award from Houston to Buenos Aires in the second half of May. The award calendar looked bleak, showing few options when I did a quick search on united.com.
Second half of May 2013 has very little award space IAH-EZE
I signed into her account to take a look at her balance to figure out the options. Here’s my friend Megan’s account.
Megan’s account. No elite status with United. She does have the credit card though.
I performed the search again while signed in to her account, and the space had changed dramatically!
Dramatic improvement in economy class IAH-EZE when signed into a non-elite account.
If you look closely at the new calendars compared to the ones I saw before singing in, you’ll see that only economy space has opened.
Tons of white days turned yellow, which means that days with no Saver space are showing economy Saver space when she signs in. And three blue days turned green–May 3, May 10, and June 13. Blue meant there was only Saver business space. Green means there is saver business space and saver economy space.
As an example date, before signing into her account, May 17 had no Saver award space.
Before signing in…
After signing into her account, Saver economy space magically appears!
…and after
By continuing through the booking process, it became clear what had happened.
The Saver space is fare class XN.
If she continues to book May 17 at the Saver level, the Fare Class shown is XN. “Fare Class” is a one (or in this case two) letter code that signifies what cabin you are in and what you paid for that seat. Airlines divide their available seats into different fare classes that cost different amounts of money or miles.
The normal United fare class for an economy Saver award is X, and a Standard economy award is HN according to the Wandering Aramean. XN is the fare class for economy Saver awards booked by elites.
Elites have access to all the award seats United opens in the X fare class and any extras that United opens only to them in the XN class. Non-elites only have access to seats in the X fare class.
United.com conveniently will display how many seats are available on each flight in each fare class if you use Expert Mode as explained by One Mile at a Time. For the May 17 flight we’re looking at from Houston to Buenos Aires, there are 9 XN seats and 0 X seats.
Translation: an elite could book an award for up to nine people on the flight for the Saver price of 30,000 miles per person. A non-elite couldn’t book a single person at that price, instead having to pay the Standard price of 55,000 miles per seat.
This flight is an extreme example of extra seats available to elites, but it illustrates how valuable the benefit can be to elites.
Except that Megan is not an elite, so why does she have access to the extra XN Saver space?
Her United account is about 45 days old. She has never flown a United flight before. She has the United MileagePlus Explorer Card. The only thing I can figure is that having that card is somehow getting her access to XN space. That’s a pretty neat trick!
I do not believe this is a stated benefit of the card. Here’s the card’s advertised benefit related to award space.
From the United MileagePlus Explorer landing page
This benefit refers to cardholders being able to book any seat, any time as a Standard award. There is some value to the benefit, but in general I try to avoid booking Standard awards, which tend to cost double the price of Saver awards. I would much prefer to get more Saver awards than be able to get any seat as a Standard award.
What this means?
For me, this could be great news. I currently have United Silver status, which gets me the extra economy availability–XN space–that this post discusses. But I will probably lose that status and benefit next year because I doubt I’ll requalify. If my United MileagePlus Explorer Card could pick up the slack and get me the same economy Saver award access, that would be incredible, and it would be worth paying the card’s annual fee to maintain access to elite-level Saver space.
What I don’t know
I don’t know for sure why Megan has access to XN space, giving her a ton more options for economy Saver awards. I’d like to see more data points from people without status but with the card and without status and without the card to try to determine if the card is granting access to XN space.
I don’t know whether the card grants access to IN and ON space too. IN and ON are extra space that United Platinums and above get for business class Saver awards (IN) and first class Saver awards (ON).
I don’t know if this is an intended benefit or a glitch on United’s part.
Recap
The extra economy Saver award space that elites can access is accessible to my non-elite friend who has a United credit card. I’ve never heard of this benefit before.
The United MileagePlus Explorer card comes with 30,000 miles after $1,000 in spending in the first three months and 5,000 more miles for adding an authorized user. The card also has a host of other benefits like a free checked bag, priority boarding, and two United Club passes per year. The $95 annual fee is waived the first year.
FlyerTalkers report being able to get a 50,000 mile targeted offer. Rookie Alli couldn’t replicate their methods, so she successfully sent a secure message to Chase asking them to match her 30,000 mile offer to the 50,000 mile offer.
Application Link: United MileagePlus Explorer Card
Charlie contacted me wanting to share his experiences with applying for his first rewards cards, hoping it would be useful for other newbies. Each person’s ideal cards are different. Charlie had to convince a skeptical spouse and had unique goals for his upcoming travel. For comparison, see how this shaped his card choices differently than Rookie Alli’s.
Charlie is a software developer and consultant, now mostly retired, in Poulsbo, Washington. He writes about testing and test-driven development at It’s the Tests.
Previously: Charlie’s First Cards: Planning
In my previous post, I described how my wife and I came up with a plan to apply for nine cards, six of them in my name and three in hers. For easy reference, here are the six cards I was applying for:
And here are the three we selected for my wife:
Applying for My Cards
As the day approached, I got all my links ready and made sure I had the information I would need handy. After some thought and a bit of research on how the credit checks would work, I decided to apply for my own cards all on one day and wait to see the result before applying for my wife’s cards. That way, if I were turned down for any cards, we could try again in my wife’s name. As it turned out, that wasn’t necessary, but it didn’t do any harm either.
The application process turned out to be fairly easy. I applied for cards in the order of their importance to me, grouping them by bank.
I started with the Chase Sapphire Preferred, filling out the online application and receiving an immediate approval.
This seemed like a really good start after only 15 minutes or so!
My next application was for the Chase Ink Bold card. I filled out the application, using my Employee Identification Number (EIN), which I have because my business is an LLC. If you are doing business under your own name, you can just use your Social Security number.
This application didn’t go quite so well as the first, although I wasn’t turned down flat.
From reading this blog, I knew not to wait for them to contact me. I immediately called the reconsideration line as recommended in Scott’s Free First Class Next Month: Best Practices for Your First Cards post.
The agent who took my call verified my identity and asked me a few questions that were already on the application. He was very friendly in his approach and wanted to know why I was looking for this card in addition to the Chase Sapphire. I explained that I always kept my personal and business expenses separate, which seemed satisfactory. I told him I had held a Citi-Business card for many years, but that I now wanted a card that would earn rewards. I picked Chase because the cards sounded terrific and because I already had a relationship with them–I have checking and savings accounts at their bank. He wanted to be sure that I understood the Ink Bold is a month-to-month charge card, and I told him that I pay my balance at the end of the month anyway and didn’t need any more extended credit at the moment.
Finally, he got to the point. He explained that he was a bit puzzled that I had so little credit history. I repeated some of my history, as told in my first post, how I had paid off my mortgage and loans a few years back and had not been using personal credit very much for the past few years. I also pointed out my excellent history with Citi, reflected in my business credit report. He was aware of this but told me that they mostly go on personal credit history for a small business like mine. This was something I had not realized, so I’ll keep it in mind from now on.
He asked me again about how much I would use the card. By this time, I could see I was going to be approved, so I explained that I’m about to go on a trip to Europe and will have business expenses. I wanted–I told him–to make sure that the card had a sufficiently high limit that I wasn’t forced to make payments in the middle of the month. He went off the line for a while and then came back with an approval. The limit was more than I had asked for and he told me that the Ink Bold has a “flexible limit” so I could exceed it by a pretty large amount without any penalty. That’s important to me, since this is a card I actually want to use.
At this point I was two for two and feeling pretty cocky. I moved on to the Barclay’s cards and filled out applications for both the US Airways Premier World MasterCard and the US Airways Business MasterCard.
Both of them came back with the same result…
Here’s where I discovered one mistake I had made. I did my application on a Friday afternoon on the west coast. It turned out to be too late to talk to Barclay’s, whose credit application department seems to keep limited hours as compared to the other banks I dealt with. I wouldn’t be able to talk with them until Monday.
With my spirits only slightly dampened, I moved on to the American Express applications. I filled out the application for the Gold Delta SkyMiles Credit Card from American Express and was approved right away.
But when I applied for the Gold Delta SkyMiles Business Card from American Express I saw this notice
I called the number right away. The agent I spoke to told me that the application had been automatically put in a pending status because I was applying for more than one card. I explained that I was applying for two different products but he told me that anyone applying for two Delta cards at the same time would have the second application held up “Sometimes,” he said, “people just submit the same application twice.” He gave me the date–three or four business days ahead–when I could call back for a decision.
Naturally, I immediately called back, using the reconsideration number this time rather than the one on the notice. A different agent told me the same thing and even added that “there was no other reason my application was being delayed.” I took that as a positive sign.
Final result at the end of the day: three applications approved and three pending.
More Calls to Make
On Monday morning I received an email telling me I had been approved for the US Airways Premier World MasterCard, making it four approvals and two more pending.
I next called the Barclay’s reconsideration line, knowing they were back in the office. While the Chase and AMEX agents I spoke with were quite helpful and friendly, I found the Barclay’s guy to have a bit of an attitude. Like the others, he brought up my “thin” credit history and mentioned that I had no track record at all with Barclay’s. He told me they couldn’t give me any more credit, having just approved me for a personal card. The fact that this was for my business didn’t hold any water for him.
I knew that my next step should be to ask them to move some credit from the brand new card to the business card, but I decided to just thank this guy and get off the line. I spent a few minutes thinking about what to do next. One option would be to call back and talk to a different agent. But frankly, I was aggravated and decided I no longer wanted to pay $79 to get these extra miles. From what I have read, I should be able to repeat my successful personal application in 91 days. If the no-fee link still works, this will be a much better deal. Suddenly I realized I was already planning my next cards. That made me smile.
On Thursday of that week, it was time to call about my Gold Delta SkyMiles Business Card from American Express and find out if it was approved. That call was routine. Just a few questions that called for the same information as the initial application and I was approved.
Getting My Wife’s Cards
The next day, I sat down to make the three remaining applications on my wife’s behalf, with her standing by in case I needed any extra information from her. Two of the cards were identical to applications I had already made and they went the same way. Her Gold Delta SkyMiles Credit Card from American Express was immediately approved and the US Airways Premier World MasterCard was left pending. Now feeling like quite the expert, I told her she would get an approval email in a few days–which, in fact, she did!
The United MileagePlus Explorer Visa application was a new one for me, but no more difficult to fill out than the others. I made sure to add an authorized user–myself–in order to get an extra 5,000 miles. The application was immediately approved.
Recap
I applied for nine cards for me and my wife and was approved for eight of them. My own applications were all done in one day and my wife’s on a separate day about a week later. Four cards were approved instantly two a few days later and two after talking to an agent–although only one conversation really got into any detail.
After spending $12,000 on these cards in the next three months, we will have 98,000 Ultimate Rewards, 70,000 Dividend Miles, 153,000 SkyMiles and 36,000 United miles.
That’s enough for quite a bit of travel for two people domestically or a few big international trips.
In the process, I learned a few things that will help me the next time.
Next week I’m going to beg Charlie to talk about getting the cards, tracking his spending, and setting up tracking for his annual fees.
Posted in American Express, Barclay's, Delta, United, US Airways
Tagged American Express, Barclay's, Delta, United, US Airways
I have earned millions of points, primarily though credit cards, to travel the world in first class for pennies. This blog will show you how to earn and redeem points to do the same!