No credit card required
Browse credit cards from a variety of issuers to see if there's a better card for you.
My statement tells me nothing about how many points I earned, so I'll eyeball it and say somewhere around 57k MRs. None were redeemed last year.
Total spend (all on Platinum) was $17,758, of which just under $10,000 was airfare. The biggest takeaways for me is that:
1. My gym membership apparently codes as entertainment. Who knew?
2. I apparently guessed wrong on a few purchases that should have gone on CSR instead. $96.39 in restaurant spend made its way on the Platinum somehow as did $1,067 in transportation, of which none was gas. That was likely parking fees and other misc. transport services that might have coded as travel for 3x on CSR instead.
If I'm nickling and diming this, I used $200 travel credit, Saks credit, all of my Uber credits, and the SkyClub around a dozen times. I also spent 3 months not traveling due to paternity leave so I should get more visits this year.
The good news is I am finally allowed to put work travel spend on personal cards instead of using a corporate card, so my airfare spend on Platinum should at least double this year. I'm already over $5,000 on airfare spend this year after just 1 month so it's looking better already.
I don't want to brag.
Let's just say the nearly $4,000 in annual fees for Amex pays off in multiples. I ended up with over $14,000 in value just on the Delta side of my Amex relationship, which is a key reason why Delta Reserve will continue to be my non-category card for 2020 (right after I finish this huge spend requirement for Business Platinum).
I can't brag, I am less than K-in-Boston
For 2019 only had the BCE
SUB $200
Cash Back 167.25
Offers $90 (already racked up $130 in 2020)
In 2020 will be more since I only got my bce in may of last year, and I got the amex Amzon Prime Biz card, so that is more rewards and another SUB.
Spend = $4,067
Cash Back = $27
Offers = $258
==============
Total = $285
Fun! But not quite as easy for me, as I'm mainly in the MR/Skymiles side of things.
On my Blue Cash Everyday, I had an SUB of 225 on a spend of 2187.14, so a bit over 10%, plus I guess eventually another 21.
On my three MR cards (Gold is closed), I can't get a total of MR earned, My spend was 22,102, so I'm going to conservatively say I got 25,000 MR from that, plus from SUBs and referrals and Rakuten another 108,133, for a total of 133,133
Valued at 1 to 2 cents, that's anywhere from 6-12%.
My primary uses for Amex though, are lounge access and baggage check. Secondary is 0% interest. I'll maximize the rewards I can get, of course, and will always use the platinum on 5% categories, but for normal stuff I use my 2% and 3% cashback cards. I did get both Saks credits. Probably only 4 Uber credits, and the $200 airline credit when gift cards still worked. I'll never get it again.
I didn't have a 2% on everything card last year, so Amex got a lot of my daily spend. This year my spend on Amex will be substantially less. Some airfares later on the platinum, and I charge my phone to the Blue Cash to make sure it's used regularly. I've done my Delta Gold SUB spend already.
Total Spend:
Platinum: 6k
- $1,250 Offers
Aspire: 16k
- $510 Offers
Everyday: 1k
Green Corporate: Hidden
Makes you stop and think how much you chuck onto those pretty little pieces of metal and plastic. Luckily, think of all we could've lost had that all been spent on debit cards.
@K-in-Boston wrote:I don't want to brag.
Let's just say the nearly $4,000 in annual fees for Amex pays off in multiples. I ended up with over $14,000 in value just on the Delta side of my Amex relationship, which is a key reason why Delta Reserve will continue to be my non-category card for 2020 (right after I finish this huge spend requirement for Business Platinum).
Yikes, this is definitely going to feel like a brag then.
In 2019 between my fiancée's and I's Amex accounts we spent over 700K. I only started my reselling business in July too.
So far in 2020. I've spent over 300K and we aren't even two months in.
This is just amex spend, not accounting for any other banks.
The cards more then pay for themselves, I could have bought a Mercedes with just my amazon 5% cashback.