Her: Ok thanks for the info - What do you think about the Chase Saphire preferred card?
Me: I think it's a great card. I have it. You can earn points which you can then transfer to other airlines. It's better if you combine it with 2 others, the chase freedom and the United card.
Trips to Europe cost 60,000 united miles. The bonus on the Chase Sapphire preferred (CSP) is 45k if you add an authorized user. If you get the United card which is 50,000 miles and the Freedom when the bonus is at 22,500 you can combine all of those miles into your United account. It's a good card to have if you want to add some extra miles to get an award ticket. I wouldn't recommend starting out with it though. First, the spend to get the bonus is $4,000 in 3 months. Second, you can get other cards that have higher bonuses for lesser spend.
I would recommend getting the Chase Freedom when the bonus gets to 20,000. The freedom has 5x bonus categories that rotate every 3 months. Right now it's grocery stores. So for every $1 you spend you get 5 points. Once you accrue some points then get the CSP so you can transfer them over to an airline account. \
Me: If you do decide to get the Chase Sapphire Preferred could you email me for a referral code. You get the same bonus, but I get 5,000 points if you use it.
Her: Hey! I signed up for it because I will spend 4,000 in the next three months between rental fees for the wedding, hotel stay for our job conference were going to next weekend and honeymoon stay (not the flight). I didn't see a referal code when I signed up but it says it would take 7-10 business days before they sent me the card, so maybe I can still do it since I haven't activated anything yet. Should I add ben as an authorized user now? Or once I activate the card?
United - we have had some AWFUL experiences with them. a lot of people in our family refuse to fly them. I guess Im confused in the transferring of points and all that. The Chase Freedom - what do you mean "When the bonus gets to"? How does the bonus get there?
Thanks for your patience with me :) Ben doesn't know any of this either!
Me: It's all good. I had to email it to you. Add him as an authorized user.
Here's the awesome thing, you don't even have to fly United. Mary and I are using United to fly on partners that are in United's alliance. For example, for our China trip we are flying austrian airways, Air China, and ANA airlines (which is rated as one of the top 5 airlines in the world. On the left side bar of this link you'll see United's partners (they are part of the Star Alliance.) You can fly on any of them using United miles. You should never have to fly United if you are planning on an international trip. http://www.staralliance.com/en/about/airlines/united_airlines/ (United has some of the best travel partners out there. Plus it's really easy to find cheaper award tickets. (Go United's website and search from Washington DC to any destination that you want to go to in Europe. (Click on award travel, when the search pops up look at SAVER AWARD, it's in the far left hand column. The total amount of points for 1 person round trip to Europe at the Saver level is 60k miles. So for both of you it's 120k.
-Chase has an award currency called Ultimate Reward points (UR). You just got 40k UR points, plus another 5k when you add Ben as an authorized user. The Chase Sapphire is sweet because you can transfer those points to a certain set of airlines (United has one of the lower priced award charts) Read this, it's a great guide: http://www.insideflyer.com/articles/article.php?key=8979
With UR points you can book an airline ticket directly, which I don't recommend because it's poor value. It based on the amount the flight would cost if you payed cash for it, so a fixed ratio between cash and points 1 cent per point. The flight Mary and I booked to China took 140k points, which we first converted to united miles. If we would have purchased our ticket directly we are talking about $3500 total.
The Chase Freedom card is a no fee card that earns UR points, the same as your CSP. Right now it's 10k points for signing up and 2.5k for adding an authorized user. Every couple of months chase bumps the bonus up to 20k for signing up plus 2.5k for adding an authorized user. You and Ben should hold out until that happens. You can't transfer points from the Freedom directly to airline miles. You have to transfer them to your CSP first.
-United cards get to 50k miles plus 5k for adding an authorized user (minimum spend $2k
Calculations include the minimum spend 1 CSP: 49K UR points 2 Freedoms: 46k UR points (500 dollar minimum spend for the points) You can earn a heck of a lot of points on these cards, (categories of 5 points per 1$ 2 United cards (114k United miles)