Free Giveaway and Nuggets 9.21.12

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1. Frugal Travel Guy posted an awesome rundown of the major credit-card issuers’ rules on how far apart applications must be and how churnable their bonuses are. I have it bookmarked for my future use. Highlights:

• An AMEX card must be closed one year to get a new bonus on the exact same card. Cannot open “similar” products within 90 days of each other and get both bonuses.
• A CHASE account must be closed two years to get a new bonus on the exact same card.
• CITI applications must be 18 months apart to get a new bonus on the exact same card. (Note the difference. This clock has to do with applications. The other two have to do with account closures.)

2. Earn double Rapid Rewards on Southwest flights between now and November 15 by signing up for the promotion at the link.

Hopefully most of your Southwest flights are the cheapest Wanna Get Away variety. Normally those earn 6 Rapid Rewards per dollar, but under this promotion you will earn 12 Rapid Rewards per dollar for flights flown by 11/15.

Twelve Rapid Rewards are worth 20.3 cents, so this is a substantial rebate.

3. Earn double A+ Credits on AirTran flights between now and November 14. Earn triple A+ credits on international flights.

A+ credits can be converted to 1,200 Rapid Rewards each, so a oneway AirTran ticket would earn $40.56 cents worth of future Southwest flights. That’s a substantial rebate too!

4. Don’t forget about the ability to transfer between Southwest points and AirTran credits. I outlined how a few instantaneous transfers can save you thousands of points five months ago, and the technique still works. See How to Exploit the Southwest-AirTran Merger.

A twitter follower saved 8k points using the trick yesterday!

5. My pet project has been opening up the SkyMiles Auction page every morning. I haven’t seen any good deals yet–even at my 1.2 cents per mile valuation. But I think it’s possible there is an occasional good deal since many of the auctions are experiences or the opportunity to meet someone you might be a big fan of. Most of the locations of the experiences are Delta hubs like Minneapolis or Cincinnati. That’s also where people have a ton of SkyMiles, so one obvious tip is to look outside those cities–like the Boston College football experience.

6. Just like last Friday I’m giving away a free GoGo single-flight inflight internet pass. Comment below for a chance to win a single-flight pass that expires 12/31/12.

Gogo internet is available on select planes on Air Canada, AirTran, Alaska, American, Delta, Frontier, United, US Airways, and Virgin America.