This morning I woke up to some pretty bad news – no, there wasn’t another attack in Europe but rather Alaska Airlines increased the number of miles required for Emirates first and business class awards. Without warning. To me, this isn’t a huge loss. This may sound jaded, but Emirates’ first class product always seemed … Read more
Update: As of March 31, 2016 Giftcards.com has re-activated their affiliate links. Don’t worry, this isn’t the grim reaper making another appearance. I got a message from Adam Viener, founder of Yazing, that Giftcards.com has temporarily deactivated their affiliate tracking network. This means cash back portals like iConsumer and Yazing won’t be able to offer … Read more
Someone on Twitter once called me the Grim Reaper of manufactured spending – I really hope that’s not the case here. Gloria from Southern California sent me an email a few days ago saying her local Walmart discontinued split payments on bill pay transactions. They informed her they’d changed their system and splitting payments would … Read more
I checked into the Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos over the weekend and am seriously impressed with this place. The Hyatt Ziva Los Cabos is a family-friendly all-inclusive resort that requires just 20,000 points per night. This is a great use of Hyatt points and I personally think both families and those traveling without kids will have a … Read more
I started using Yazing to earn cash back at Giftcards.com back in February. At the time, I wasn’t sure if Yazing was legitimate. Their lack of a member dashboard gave me doubts about whether I’d even get the 2% cash back payout they were offering. I did get some reassurance from Yazing’s founder (who subsequently … Read more
I took most of last week off after having a very productive weekend. I figured I had all the miles I needed at the moment and focused my efforts on redemption ideas (the AAdvantage devaluation is happening tomorrow, so you might want to explore your options as well). My sister has been working hard in school … Read more
Back in October I went to Chicago for the annual Chicago Seminars, a points and miles conference that takes place every year at the Holiday Inn Elk Grove Village. This time around I wanted to spend a few days in the city. So I decided to book the Hyatt Centric The Loop in downtown Chicago. … Read more
A few weeks ago, the Yazing shopping portal appeared on my radar when they began offering 2% cash back at giftcards.com. I placed several gift card orders and subsequently received tracking notices from Yazing. Shortly after this, a few readers brought Yazing’s terms to my attention, which specifically prohibited manufactured spending activities from earning cash … Read more
After yesterday’s post about my productive week of manufactured spending, I received a lot of questions from people about how I spend my points and miles and whether I even need to earn that many to begin with. To be clear, I don’t usually generate this much spend in a typical week. It’s only in … Read more
It’s getting tough to keep these weekly manufactured spending posts somewhat entertaining/original. Unless something interesting happens, it’s pretty much business as usual. I buy a bunch of cards, unload them, then do it all over again. This week it was to the tune of $38,000. For the most part, these were gift cards purchased at … Read more