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Best Airline Rewards Credit Cards

ha, yeah, i was mostly joking, if i could get people to pay right away when eating out, i would do that for every meal. #firstclasstoeurope
 
DrummerDeac said:
You guys who were approved on the spot are lucky! My application is pending... not sure why, but that has happened to me before with a Chase rewards card and they ended up approving me with (with a pretty high limit, so not sure what the issue that required review was). I called to see if there were any issues with my Reserve application and they just said no, it's normal for it to be pending, and if they have any questions they'll call. :noidea:
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Finally got my Reserve card yesterday! Now I have to figure out how to spend some serious money over the next few months...

I downgraded my Preferred to the Freedom Unlimited (1.5% on all categories). I still have the Southwest Rapid Rewards card, which has an annual fee, but they said there is no other option to downgrade that to since it's a branded card - I would have to close the account. Not sure what I'll decide to do.

Thanks again to the various people who provided advice!
 
Don't close the southwest account if you've had that card for a while. Having accounts with age help your score. Just don't use it or only use it once a month or something to make sure they don't close the account for non use.

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How quick is the downgrading process for the Preferred to the Freedom Unlimited? Can I do it in a 10min window?
 
I've had success using the messaging function on the Chase website to make travel alerts and cancel cards. Might be able to downgrade that way.
 
Cool, thanks- I'll give it a shot.
 
lbE08 said:
How quick is the downgrading process for the Preferred to the Freedom Unlimited? Can I do it in a 10min window?
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Yes it's quick, with the Preferred an actual person answers the phone. I did it on my way to the train station this morning and the total call was 6 minutes.
 
DrummerDeac said:
Yes it's quick, with the Preferred an actual person answers the phone. I did it on my way to the train station this morning and the total call was 6 minutes.
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awesome!
and yeah, I know it's a real person - that's one of the things I like about the card - just wasn't sure how long/involved the process is.
 
dubs21 said:
Don't close the southwest account if you've had that card for a while. Having accounts with age help your score. Just don't use it or only use it once a month or something to make sure they don't close the account for non use.

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Good point. It's actually my 2nd most recent card. I got it last August for a Southwest Rapid Rewards bonus. I happened to be looking for a Southwest flight and I just couldn't help myself, haha. It's worth it for the first year but I'm definitely not going to keep paying $65/year after that.
 
lbE08 said:
awesome!
and yeah, I know it's a real person - that's one of the things I like about the card - just wasn't sure how long/involved the process is.
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make sure you ask for a pro-rated refund of your annual fee on the preferred
 
09deaconX said:
make sure you ask for a pro-rated refund of your annual fee on the preferred
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The whole conversation took less than 5 min, they're giving a pro-rated refund of the annual fee, which I'll see reflected "in 2-3 billing cycles."


...that said, If I pretty much never use the card and it has zero balance, how will they be able to process the refund of the annual fee? You can't have a credit card with a negative balance (to my understanding).
 
I think you can request that they just send you a check for the negative balance. I did that with capital one once.

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Our pro rated refund resulted in a negative balance, I just paid part of a larger bill with the specific amount of the negative balance to get it back to zero.
 
Just downgraded our Sapphire Preferred to the Freedom Unlimited (because we got a Sapphire Reserve in Fall '16). So I guess the idea is to use the Reserve for all travel and dining things, and the Freedom for everything else?
 
Why not use the reserve for everything?
If you just cash the points towards travel, isnt that the same as 1.5 cash back on the unlimited non travel/dining purchases you'd be making?
 
lbE08 said:
Why not use the reserve for everything?
If you just cash the points towards travel, isnt that the same as 1.5 cash back on the unlimited non travel/dining purchases you'd be making?
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If you have a reserve account, you can transfer all your chase points (including the ones you earn from the unlimited) to that account, which can then be redeemed at 1.5 for travel through the chase portal. It's only a half a percent different, but can definitely add up. The ideal Chase stack (not including their business cards) is to use the freedom for whatever the 5% categories are, the reserve for travel/dining, and the unlimited for everything else, and transfer all point to the reserve account.
 
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