atanac

Currently Chase is offering a measly 12000 bonus points when you sign up for a new Mastercard.
How or where is the best way/website to find out when a better offer comes along? I do read
many of the blogs that update people on airline and hotel deals but can't recall any of those
mentioning an Amtrak CC offer. If anyone has some insights to share with me on how best to be
alerted to a new deal I would appreciate hearing from you.

Thanks in advance.

diogenes2011

Check out the sticky in the MilesBuzz forum:

"The special credit card offers master thread"


Two offers, one for 30,000 and the other for 32,000 points.

beltway

That would be http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/miles...er-thread.html

drbobguy

My understanding is that Chase and AGR split the first-use bonus points. So if the bonus is 12,000 points, each of them puts in 6,000 points. This matters because apparently for the better offers AGR will only deposit the points if you're targeted.

I'm not 100% certain about this, but the 32,000 offer is targeted, so if you apply you may only get the 16,000 miles from Chase while AGR refuses to deposit their 16,000 into your account. Still that's better than 12,000, so it's worth a shot.

I just applied for the 32,000 because I have a bunch of Amtrak travel coming up in the next 4-5 monthts (10 trips or more). I was declined but am hoping I can get through for reconsideration. I've done so many other CC signups in the past 6 months it doesn't surprise me, but those were all for airline miles that I only need for vacation, whereas the Amtrak travel I have to do one way or the other, and I'd prefer to save the money if possible.

atanac

Outstanding follow up by you three. I will call Chase tomorrow and inquire about the card code mentioned
on the 30K offer. If they say it is still valid I will go with that one since the other for 32K doesn't
indicate the promotion code.

Really appreciate all your very valuable comments!

ywlke

Remember that while Chase may say it's valid, it's the points from Amtrak that you may not get.

drbobguy

Yep. Would be interested in hearing your experience with this, as it there are very few recent reports (and I've looked on other forums as well).

The AGR card is actually a great card to have, even without any bonus points. If you regularly ride Amtrak the points are generally more lucrative than airline points (since redemptions cost way less in terms of points), so there's great value in that. Add in the fact that there's no annual fee and it's a great credit card to have. The bonus points are just the icing on the cake.

beltway

Plus, AGR is giving 5% rebates to cardholders on redemptions for Amtrak travel (so a 1-zone o/w costs 2850 points).

AlanB

Actually I've seen a few people report that AGR even adjusted the Chase points back to the correct level because people didn't qualify for the promo.

And let me also point out that this forum is regularly visited and read by AGR personnel.

ywlke

I don't have personal experience with this one. I've just read reports that you need to well-document any targeted promotions as sometimes Amtrak will even forget that they targeted you and give you fewer points than they should have.

atanac

That is hard to believe as Chase purchases points from Amtrak and then they use the points
anyway they wish. Don't see how Amtrak could influence Chase to renege on their own
promotional ad.

kspeed55

I looked at this offer and it says: "This exclusive offer is limited to the member and member number to whom this offer was communicated."

soundslikepuget

Does anybody know what credit score you ought to have to even bother applying for the card? I travel Amtrak frequently, so I'd like to get it, but graduate school bills put my credit rating lower than I'd like it to be.

Anybody know what the cutoff seems to be?

Much obliged.

nerd

This was discussed once before, without much consensus:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/amtra...astercard.html

amamba

Well it happened to me. This was back with maybe the 16K point offer, and I received it to my email address, but I have a bunch of cards in my name so my H clicked on the link and filled it out, etc. He even called Chase before hand and they promised that he would be eligible for the promo.

On our first statement it clearly stated that we got the 8K points from them. But only 6K total (3K from chase, 3K from AGR) showed up in his agr account. They stated that since he wasn't elible for the promo he could only get the total of 6K points. I have so many AGR points that it wasn't worth fighting over.

EDIT: I should add that with the AGR mastercard, the points show at the bottom of your Chase statement and then flow over to AGR. So it is AGR who is maintaining your point balance at all times, not chase.