what is churning?
 

I looked around first, can't see it in glossary.
Does anyone have time to point me in right direction?
thanks.

are you talking about the practice of getting a miles credit card, qualifying for the bonus, canceling the card then doing over and over again?

Churning is one of the most wonderful activities known to humanity. In churning, you apply for and get a credit card which are offers bonus miles (say 25K), use the card, get the bonus, reapply, use new card, get another bonus, etc. Then use miles to fly 1st class to Paris and enjoy.

Unfortunately, while churning was pretty easy until eighteen months or so ago, the credit collapse has made it pretty tough, and a lot of FTers have stopped for a bit--others fight on!

Delta AMEX Churnworthy
 

Experience says Delta AMEX is still churnworthy. However, use those Skymiles to pay for hotels as they are now worthless for flight.

I was wondering about that. I had heard that (for sure) with the AA Citi card the churning days were over. But, is this really the case with all "churnable" cards? And since I - for reasons mentioned above - never got into the DL Skymiles card, are there really any worthwhile cards to get into?

Also, as somewhat of a newbie, what is the official/proper/best practice for waht to do with card #1 after applying for and getting the bonus for card #2?

THanks everyone!

Does this have a negative impact on your credit score?

Where is Churnman?

Caveat emptor. Read around the Delta forum a bit and you'll find dozens of examples of people that have had signup bonuses not awarded owing to having had the card previously for every one who has successfully churned one.

From what I've read on FT, successful delta churners do not supply there ff# when signing up for the card. Let delta/amex assign you a new ff# for the additional bonus miles. If you have a high balance of miles on your current delta account I would avoid this because delta could close your account and take away those precious delta pesos :)

FWIW, I recently redeemed Skymiles for 4 domestic tickets for my step-daughter, her husband, and 2 kids to fly from MHT to LAS roundtrip.

Sorry for reviving an old thread, but I can't get my head around something. When you cancel your card/reapply for a new one, what happens to the points you earned on the card you just canceled? Doesn't it get ... well, canceled?

Yes, but most of the impact is temporary. If you have a base of credit cards that are aged and active a few cards churned here and there isn't going to hurt your credit in the long run.

When you have a card, they typically transfer all points / miles to your FF account on a monthly basis. Chase is the only company that has been known to pull back miles if you cancel their card. BUT this only happens (if it happens) if you have not left the credit card account open for 6 months. Leave the card open for 6 months and they will leave the points / miles in your FF account.

Remember, the CC companies are not the same companies that hold your FF miles / points.

its a good idea to not cancel the card within the first 6 months....after that all your points/miles should be safe....

I've successfully churned the UA card three times, with a minimum two years between each card, for 100K total I think. I've now done AA twice for 60K, but with more than three years between. I did the NW card twice, I think, and the the Delta card twice, but I received only half the offered miles on the second Delta card, probably because it was less than two years between the two.

I'm now waiting to see if Starwood will send me an offer for a second go-round.