Originally Posted by ThePointsCollector (Post 22575089)

He was in his 60's. And the reason I know it was him is because when I grabbed my stack of 5 VRs there was a bunch of them left. I rang them up and decided to do another 5 on different card. Came back and there was only 3 left. I was like what the ...? And then I went back to register and heard "That would be 5 thousand and 54 dollars (something like that)", I knew this was the bieatch :mad:

Originally Posted by silver4300 (Post 22574793)

Fraud is totally different than MS. Fraud involves theft and unauthorized purchases. MS involves authorized purchases made by the legitimate cardholder.

If the fraud department is doing their job, they just verify that the purchases were made by the cardholder. It is the "perk abuse" department that would care about MS.

Originally Posted by craz (Post 22575691)

Ive had many of my CCs placed on Hold when they want to make sure its all legit charges and Im making them. Never before today did any rep ever mention anything about GCs. They were only concerned if the charges were made by me and are legit and nothing about what I was buying. Today was the 1st time what I purchased ever came up, and I dont like that

If you think 1 dept wont say anything to another well........ My pt was they seem now to be getting interested in what is being purchased, I only hope my rep was a 1 off and isnt something that is gonna be a normal occurance. Not worth having to go thru a whole FR over this.Was hoping to score well into the 5 figures for VRs for my next statement now I will keep it low key for a couple of statements hoping not to awaken the sleeping bear

Originally Posted by silver4300 (Post 22575750)

I've also been contacting many times by Fraud prevention and the only verify purchase. What was purchased has never come up.

I also wouldn't like it if Fraud prevention started poking their nose into legitimate purchases.

Originally Posted by Marathon Man (Post 22575841)

Direct MS

When you pay too much for miles you feel down.

When you feel down you stay in bed.

When you stay in bed you forget to log into FT and find new miles deals.

When you forget to find new miles deals, someone else blogs about them and you also lose your job as a blogger because you get less hits. Then they give your blog job to someone new.

When they give your blog job to someone new, he has a lot to learn.

When he has a lot to learn, mistakes are made and he gives up all the good deals in his blog.

And when mistakes are made and he gives up all the good deals in his blog, you get shut down bodily by an 800 pound gorilla like Citi, Amex or Chase.

Don't get shut down by gorillas like Citi, Amex or Chase.

Get rid of none points earning CCs and get into Direct MS.

Originally Posted by AveApostle (Post 22560846)

Now if there's a smile on my face
It's only there 'cause, gift cards at Publix.
But when it comes down to FR-ing, you
know honey, that's quite a different subject.

Don't let my disposition
Give in to their inquisition
Really, I'm sad, oh, sadder than sad.
BC gone and I'm hurting so bad,
MMS clone, I pretend to be glad

Now there's some sad things known to man,
but ain't too much sadder than
the tears of a clone
when there's no VR around.

Now if I appear to be carefree
It's only to camouflage my spending
In order to shield my CL I try
To pass an FR with my payments pending

I hope my show'll convince you
That I've been happy since you
decide to let me go
BC, I need you so
I'm hurt and I want you to know
But for AmEx I put on a show

Now there's some fad things known to man
But ain't too much faddier than
the tears of a clone
when MMS ain't around

Just like Marathon Man did
I try to keep my secrets hid
Posting in the public forum
But my topic didn't reach quorum
The tears of a clone
When there's no arrows around.

Originally Posted by Bowgie (Post 22574393)

This is what I do. I cannot find a CVS with reloadable VR in-stock. I buy One Vanillas - four $500 loads at a time - take them to WallyMart and convert them into two $1,000 MO's for a fee of $0.70 each.

This is not really a cost efficient way of earning cc points. Looking at my profile, one can surmise that I am doing this just to meet a cc minimum spend.

Originally Posted by horseymen (Post 22574624)

I am fairly new to the game, and you are right - this will end sooner than later; however, I'm sure people were crushed as I read in retrospect, when the Mint ended, and this came up. There will likely be something else. We may be getting into some lean months, but there's enough ingenuity to where we are all doing this because we CAN. When we are forced to learn new tricks, I suspect at least a few of us will. I'm not very good at being creative or coming up with the loopholes, but I am pretty good at scaling - so we'll see. I tend to be conservative in my ideals, but on this, I feel a need to 'hog out' - I think something like Evolve in small doses at 5x points may have staying power. I agree with you that I'd be shocked if we're doing this next year - either on CVS end or Bluebird end.

Originally Posted by steppie (Post 22574696)

I just started and am now concerned. Yesterday and today I bought $5,000. each day.......should I buy more tomorrow?? I have a very high credit limited, but don't want to rock any boats? Would appreciate FTs thoughts! thanks

Originally Posted by ThePointsCollector (Post 22574795)

Had my first face-to-face with VR competitor this afternoon at my usual CVS :D
Now I know who's been hiding them behind GameStop cards.

Originally Posted by FlightNurse (Post 22576742)

Why isn't it ? I think one of the biggest issues I have with the statement like yours is, others look at and think the same thing. This game is all about YMMV... Spending an extra $55 bucks to make the min spend for a airline ticket that cost 12-20K is still a bargin in my book. People need to look at the very big picture, we are traveling around the world for next to nothing sp spending just alittle bit more is nothing to worry about. The bloggers want people to look at this as something SO easy, we all know that the less expensive route isn't the easist way to go.

Originally Posted by PowerMan572 (Post 22576916)

I walk in to my CVS and the older cashier lady is always so nice! "It's nice to see you again!" I asked her if they sell a lot of the Vanilla Reload cards and she stated that she sells more VR than cigarettes. She also stated that it's mostly the same people that come in and she's like "you all seem so nice! One guy got his entire trip to Tahiti for free on these cards!" She knows what's going on :D

Originally Posted by Marathon Man (Post 22577297)

He was saying that to discourage the masses from using the method so therrs more avail for us