@longtimelurker wrote:
@mongstradamus wrote:
@UpperNwGuy wrote:Unless you travel one heckuva lot@, you should pick either UR or MR and stick to one of the two programs. As to which of the two to choose, the post by @iced above explains it well.
The only issue with that strategy is one of them gets nerfed pretty hard. I personally try to earn both because of the fear of putting all my eggs into one basket
Do points (as compared to cards) get nerfed? I know there there is "inflation" where an airline increases the points needed for certain awards, but that would potentially impact both UR/MR. I guess Amex could cut their bonus offers they have from time to time, but again to me that's not a real nerf. I guess if they made UR no longer worth 1c as cash, that would be real nerf (even if it didn't impact travel redemptions). (Or if the Amex Scwarb stopped supporting 1.25c per MR, but that would be a card nerf).
When i was referring nerf like if airline partners get removed and replaced with one that is no where near as good. KE is a good example. Another example of a nerf would be if the 1:1 points to miles transfer is removed.
I may be in the minority but i would rather diversify my points between reward programs if i had a choice.
Nerfed or not nerfed, it is what it is and why worry. Sometimes having a bank of points works out, such as Amex current 40% transfer bonus to Avios. Hell, I took 200k of my MR point bank for that offer. The same was the case for UR points when CSR came out and their travel portal redemption went to 1.50x, it was thrilled with some redemptions.
It is what it is and we win some and lose some. I thought my loser was cat 8 Marriott air package but I got 30k points back, I brokeven.
Personal Cards: Amex Plat | Amex Delta Res | CSR | Citi AA Exec Business Cards: Ink+ | Amex BGR
@UpperNwGuy wrote:
@mongstradamus wrote:
@UpperNwGuy wrote:Unless you travel one heckuva lot@, you should pick either UR or MR and stick to one of the two programs. As to which of the two to choose, the post by @iced above explains it well.
The only issue with that strategy is one of them gets nerfed pretty hard. I personally try to earn both because of the fear of putting all my eggs into one basket
Neither of these two point systems has ever been nerfed. Even when they make minor changes to their programs, Chase and Amex give ample warning, usually months in advance, giving you the opportunity to either redeem your points or transfer them over to one of the partners.
Spreading your points across two systems means you have to work twice as hard to earn enough points for a meaningful redemption. Frankly, that's not worth the time and trouble for the average cardholder. But, as I posted earlier, a person who travels a lot (usually a "road warrior" whose job involves extensive business travel) would have a high enough volume of travel spending to make it work. That kind of person, however, can afford to let points collect randomly in different systems.
You don’t need to be a road warrior, just a lot of spend will do it. As I said before I’m lucky with biz spend but one thing I will tell you is that by using MR offers, Chase’s shopping portal and most recently Rocketmiles can allow someone to use both reward programs without much difficulty.
My office manager logs into my UR shopping account for all our staples purchases where I get 2x more UR points with my 5x UR points on my ink+.
We dumped Amazon 2 yrs ago and all our personal shopping is done on AA or Chase. The only time we go to the mall is to make returns.
So get a little creative and points can really stack up.
@redpat wrote:You don’t need to be a road warrior, just a lot of spend will do it.
Exactly. I never travel for business, but have a lot of spend and do a fair amount of leisure family travel. I spread out with SkyMiles, MRs, URs, TYPs, and Marriott points, and burn through them for redemptions all the time and it works well for me.
