Milenomics² Episode 191: Status Promos, More Cards and Ongoing Battles.

0:21 Hyatt Globalist Lite Fast Track (FM Summary)

• Offered through Bilt Rewards (no Bilt credit card required to for this)
• Needed to register between March 28 - April 1, 2023
• Stay 20 nights between April 17 - July 16 2023 to earn and retain Globalist Lite through February 2025
• Seemed like a big deal at the time, but is it?

04:38 Targeted Southwest Companion Pass Lite

• Needed to book a r/t between April 3 and 5 and fly by May 24
• Companion flies free from August 15 - September 30
• Happens to coincide with a booking I already have
• Need to cancel and rebook
• And need to use cash not points.
• Which already has me considering having to rebook Tahoe if the CP comes through

13:06 Fluz Update

• Failures abounded last weekend.
• How do we each handle a failure?
• The margins are thin – somewhere between 1.5% and 2.4% when 1TC cards work.
• 3% is still not bad when MCC coding works (grocery seems to be the worst, most picky)
• Robert: Fraud alerts, Fluz inconsistency. The work flow has *never* worked as smoothly as I’d hoped it would, but I’m hopeful for the future!
• Getting Started with Fluz
• Wednesday April 12, 2023 at 7p Eastern
• Second call to follow in a couple weeks for existing users

18:50 Applied: Targeted NLL Gold Business 90+5k offer

• Talked about this a few shows ago. Finally went in on it
• Just what we mentioned with the +5 fiasco: I can’t get any SUB on cards with referral but can get my nth Gold/Platinum business. Wild
• Min spend will be 100% fluz fuel. Somewhat short term cannibalistic of my Wyndham spend.

20:31 Applied: Targeted NLL Business Platinum

• Closed an old Business Gold to get down to 9 charge cards
• Applied late Friday, declined because computer didn’t see closed card yet (takes 30 days they say)
• Checked status online: System down (the system is almost always down)
• Called: Said reps couldn’t see applications because system is down (the system is almost never actually down)
• Rep saw the application and put it through for reconsideration
• Approved just after midnight eastern time early Monday morning (I’ve never seen reconsideration approvals come through on weekends)

27:30 Targeted: Synchrony 2% Mastercard $100 Welcome Bonus

• So far, Synchrony really is doing a great job of cloning Citi’s utility. Pay by phone, fraud alerts, janky web interface. It’s all here.
• Shortly after getting approved for a Synchrony MC they sent my wife a targeted $100 welcome bonus for the same card
• Likely a coincidence (marketing not knowing what cards someone has applied for) but it got me thinking whether I could get her another card, the $100 welcome bonus, and more credit line.
• The credit line is what I’m really after, so maybe I’ll just take it slow and steady.

31:12 Spinning up a New / Unused Citi card

• As mentioned I need more citi balances
• Started using citi premier cards that have been on the sidelines.
• Used my standard Citi technique:
• Day 1: $75, Day 2: $125, Day 3: $150, Day 4:$175, day 5: $225, Day 6: $275, Day 7: $325.
• From there I had no issues with $500 loads.
• No Fraud alerts yet.
• This even worked with rotating Fluz categories. Smiths/Smiths/Fluz Fresh/Kroger/Kroger/Albertsons.
• Cashing out at 3% cost for 3x TYP just to generate a balance to pay off.

38:20 Ongoing Citi Battles

• Noticed that my wife’s Citi Checking account had a -$12.00 balance and was overdrawn
• Chatted to close savings and checking a month ago, evidently they closed the savings but not the checking
• Chatted to try to patch that up, they say it takes 2-3 business days to patch that up
• The “I respect your decision” to close this account (when requesting it a second time) really makes me wonder whether we’re better office with chat bots or robotic chat reps 🙁
• Concurrent with this, I’m informed that a new AT&T Access More card is headed my way. “Please click here to confirm contact info”
• I noticed that an old/unused landline was still on file for the cards so I changed them to be my
• Did that, hours later: Fraud alert on all the cards
• Called in, offered up that it was probably due to changing contact info. Rep still asked about recent transactions. Sharing here that it really pays to not touch your Citi accounts in any way if you want to avoid eyes on account.

43:56 Booked: Lake Tahoe for Labor Day

• Outbound on Southwest, lgb-rno booked using flight credits from Amex platinum.
• The process of transferring credits is non trivial.
• Three nights in a vacasa, 13,500 per night (10% diamond discount). Fantastic value for a 1+loft.
• Tahoe is tough for vacasa, pricing causing issues.
• Car rental: corporate code helped me save about 40% see #car-rentals for more
• I don't have great car rental discount codes available to me so this one shared on slack has been my go to.
• Return Monday also nonstop
• Should be a fun beachy vacation and our family's return to the lake (last visited Aug 2020).