While in Los Angeles with the gang from Internet Brands and Flyertalk we had the opportunity to showcase how we choose credit cards to apply for … I wrote about my reconsideration call with Sam in another post.
Howie and I sat in a conference room with our subject, Brent, and three other employees who listened in as we brainstormed how best to start Brent in his first full fledged turn.
We started with Brent’s current cards which consisted of one Capital One card. His score was in the 780 range on the FICO style scale, he had no mortgages or major purchases planned in his near future. After gaining this base information the fun really began.
Brent wanted to go to Hong Kong, or Japan, New York or the Grand Hyatt Kauai and we wanted to get him as much as possible this time. The locations kept changing top priority as the number of travelers changed. Some trips were solo, some with wife, and some with wife and three year old. We spent half an hour bantering around which one should take priority and because of the time frames of the proposed trips we actually got a few pieces of several trips taken care of in Brent’s first time.
The Grand Hyatt Kauai was a no-brainer for Brent and his wife when he got home. Two free nights per application with the Hyatt card from Chase and as a Hyatt Diamond, Brent had four suite upgrades available for use before the end of February 2013. Brent got an instant approval for the Hyatt card and will be heading to the oceanfront suites at a beautiful hotel for his $75 application fee.
We picked the SPG card as his Amex personal card and for his daily spend. I had to get him out of that Capital One card and get him earning some decent future earnings, even without a destination in mind for the miles and points. Instant approval for this one as well.
The flights to Hawaii were covered with each he and his wife applying for the Chairman’s Preferred US Airways Barclays card and 40k miles on first purchase. Again an instant approval and we had Brent’s Hawaii trip covered.
We passed on a Bank of America card this time as spend was going to be an issue but did a two browser trick for the 50K Citi AA cards. I was glad to see current info on the Flyertalk thread saying people had been approved that day for 50k each or 100,000 AA miles. That pretty well covered his business class ticket to Asia as well. We got a delayed decision answer for each of the AA cards but will handle that easily with a reconsideration call in the next couple days.
Brent’s first haul was 4 nights at the Grand Hyatt for $150 (assuming his wife is approved as well), two coach tickets to Hawaii, almost all the miles he’ll need for a business class ticket to Asia or Japan and a great everyday spend card with the SPG card. Using conservative points values, all of this was worth over $5000 tax free income.
Not a bad start Brent. Welcome to the game. Next time we’ll get you in on the Ultimate Rewards game with Chase and up your earnings per dollar of spend.
Deal of the Day
For today’s Deal of the Day American Airlines AAdvantage® has provided 2500 AAdvantage® miles for the best deals, fares, promotions, anything related to American Airlines, their oneworld partners or AAdvantage® partners. Add it to the comments section of this post or this afternoon’s Deal of the Day post (with your first name, last initial, and home airport) to be eligible to win.
