Hilton HHonors American Express Super Sign Up Bonuses

I found a great offer from Hilton for their HHonors American Express card. If you sign up for their latest offer, you could easily rack up over 62,500 HHonors points very quickly. They are offering 20,000 points with your first purchase, and another 30,000 points when you spend a modest $1,500 in the first three months. Throw in a further 2,500 for each of your first four stays, and 2,500 for an additional card member, and you can easily be at 62,500 HHonors points on bonus points alone.

While Starwood Amex is my favorite hotel card, Hilton HHonors is a good program as well. For one thing, there are over 3,000 hotels underneath the Hilton corporate family, including several of my personal favorites such Hampton, Doubletree, and Embassy suites. There is also the Waldorf Astoria, which always reminds me of the place James Earl Jones stayed in Coming To America.

Chase Customer Service Refuses To Recognize Basic Arithmetic

I recently extolled the virtues of my Internet only bank, yet there are still some circumstances, like cash deposits, when it is necessary to have an account at a local brick and mortar bank. When our mortgage was sold to Chase after our last refinance, I realized that we could have a free premier checking account at Chase with no minimum balance. When we got an offer for $150 cash for opening the account, it seemed like a no brainer. My wife opened the account and accepted their offer for an additional $50 credit for taking plain old Chase reward card. She was told that we would receive the reward when we spent $50.

This weekend, the first bill arrived, and there was no statement credit. Furthermore, they had somehow managed to enroll us in a “payment protection plan” . Not only is it a terrible value, I oppose on principle the cramming of these recurring charges. Removing the payment protection was easy enough, but my wife was stymied when she asked why she didn’t receive the the $50 off of the statement. Seeing her frustration, I offered to speak with the representative. The conversation went something like this:

Me: “I see our statement lists $50 available as reward, what do we have to do to get that reward as a statement credit”

Chase: “Just request a statement credit.”

Me: “May I please have the $50 as a statement credit.”

Chase: “Certainly, the credit will post to your account in 7-10 days and it will not count as a payment. You will still have to make the minimum payment.”

Me: “Great, so I can subtract $50 from my balance that I will be paying in full this month, since my bill is not due for another 14 days”

Chase: “No, it is only a statement credit, not a payment”

Me: “My bill is $58. If I subtract $50, that leaves only $8, right?”

Chase: “No, you will still be responsible for the minimum payment, which I am showing to be $10″

Me: “I am going to pay off my balance in full, so the balance should only be $8″

Chase: “No sir, you are still required to pay the minimum payment”

Me: “How can my ‘minimum payment’ be $10 if my balance is only $8????”

Chase: “The $50 is a statement credit not a payment”

Me: “I understand, however $58 minus $50 equals $8, so therefore I only need to pay $8 to pay my balance in full. This is simple arithmetic.”

Chase: “I understand your logic, however I am not allowed to say that your payment will be reduced.”

Me: “Fine whatever”

Needless to say, I will only be paying $8. I used to think that you had to be pretty intelligent to get a job at a bank, but obviously that is not the case anymore.

I honestly wish I had recorded the conversation. I think it would have produced quite a few hits on YouTube.

Retention Bonus

Annual fees are the bane of my existence. They are the opposite of a reward, in that you pay money and get nothing back. They are usually waived for the fist year, however they refuse to budge after that.

I have since found a partial solution to the problem. Simply call the company and tell them you are considering canceling the card because you do not want to pay the annual fee. They will explain that they cannot waive the fee. If they don’t suggest it, inquire if you can get some sort of retention bonus in points. I have read several reports that this results in some sizable point bonuses.

You pay the fee, but at least you get something in return.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 20th, 2008 at 23:26 and is filed under Maximize your Credit Card Rewards. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.