Fun Virgin America Contest

Some of you love entering contests. I’m not a huge fan, but this one was actually a lot of fun. Play Go Big Bingo daily and enter to win 500,000 Virgin America miles. Also grab some decent daily prizes every time you enter.

Reader Sam sent me a great article from Dan’s Deals reminding people of an old tip for getting gold status. If you’re a newbie, you should read this one. The idea is when you fly United or any other Star Alliance airline, you should credit the miles to Aegean Airlines. Their standards for Silver and Gold status are pretty low. With status, you’ll get nice benefits like free checked bags, priority screening and boarding, etc. Read the article. You know if I link to something, it has to be pretty good.

Freebies

Some of the free (and “semi-free”) mile/point offers out there include:

  • 2,500 Jet Airways miles for new members.
  • 500 points from Preferred Hotels Group for new members of iPrefer.
  • 2,000 miles for joining Alitalia.
  • 600 United miles for a survey.
  • 1,000 United miles from Small Business Network. 
  • A possible 2,000 Lufthansa miles.
  • A definite 500 Lufthansa miles.
  • 300 Southwest points for new members of their dining program.
  • 2,000 United miles for a trade.
  • 5,000 American miles for wine purchases.
  • 750 Southwest points for new members.
  • 500 more Southwest points for signing up one of your spam email addresses.
  • 2,000 Southwest points if you can refer 4 friends.

Tuesday’s Deals

  • Starwood points, as I say constantly, are probably the best around. Only Ultimate Rewards can give them a half-decent argument. So if you don’t have an SPG Personal or Business card, now’s the time to do it. The bonus was increased to 30,000 points once last year and it’s on again now until September 3.
  • The limit of buying Vanilla Reload and prepaid cards from CVS is now up to $5,000 per day. How exactly do people struggle to meet minimum spends these days?
  • Earn up to 12,000 Southwest points buying Marriott gift cards.
  • Southwest now flies to Puerto Rico and is giving away a trip there. You can also win a trip to New Orleans.

Fun Opportunity From Starwood

At the time of this posting, there are only 19 of these packages left. Use a very reasonable 2,500 SPG points to play softball at Wrigley Field this Friday.

Happy Weekend

Before I run through the deals of the day, I want to do a quick response to yesterday’s post. I got a bunch of emails asking what my strategy is with credit cards after I open them. Here’s my thoughts:

  • I kept all the old no-fee cards that I’ve had in my wallet for years open. Why do people close these? It’s a big help keeping your Length of Credit History in good shape. 
  • I do close the majority of my mile/point cards with annual fees. I keep them open at least 6 months and typically cancel them before the 1-year mark.
  • Yes, as some of you wrote, the Bank of America and Barclays cards can be much more “churnable” than the Citibank/Chase ones.
  • When it’s time to close a card, I do occasionally downgrade to no-fee cards if they give me the option. And when they offer me a spectacular retention bonus to keep the card, I always consider it.
  • Certain cards make sense to keep open beyond the first year. A lot of this depends on personal preference and your comfort level paying fees. I talked about this topic recently. 
On to today’s deals:
  • Starwood’s fun Pay Your Birth Year promotion is back, and their Take Two promo is on the way. See if you qualify for their targeted free night after a stay deal here.
  • 250 free Virgin Atlantic miles for downloading their toolbar.
  • 100% bonus buying US Airways miles is fine, but the same bonus on underrated Lifemiles is better.
Enjoy your weekend!