We bring you an interview with the US Bank Altitude Reserve mastermind, a review of five Greece direct flights , a review of the Yanggakdo Hotel, define award booking anxiety, visit amazing dive sites, get you some good advice on booking the IHG Pointbreaks hotels and more!
TBB Blog Mission: To Entertain. Educate. Inspire. In That Order!
You can support TBB by applying for CREDIT CARDS, shopping with our AMAZON AFFILIATE LINK & clicking our REFERRAL LINKS. Thank you!
Reminder for the April 29 TBB Blog reader meetup in Fort Lauderdale!
Did you miss my awesome Sunday post? Jeff Bezos CEO Letter, The Last Jew, Best World Conditions, Manly Last Words
Good advice for booking IHG Rewards Club Poinbreaks hotels today for just 5,000 points, book fast!
Good interview with the guy at US Bank responsible for the new Altitude Reserve card. Interesting to see he came here after 26 years at American Express! I just can’t stand bank bullshitspeak, such as We want to first offer this card to our valued customers as they are our #1 priority. Did you also catch the line about adding “geo-location abilities” to fight fraud? I can see now very annoying interruptions using it. We shall see how this goes. Question remains how.many.will.renew! Finally, I am surprised they added “Reserve” to the name…which I thought it was kind of cheesy Chase-y.
Good review of 5 non-stop flights to Greece from the US this summer. Oh, and I guess I am not flying Philadelphia to Athens as…”there is not a single business class award seat at the saver level for the entire schedule (as of April 21).”
Resolution and update on my friend’s Chase travel concierge fail. So, the Chase travel portal uses Expedia which then faxes (!!!) the hotel confirmations to the hotel. Shit goes down when hotel’s fax machine is not working. Fax???? What the hell, is this the 90s? I think I’ll pass on booking travel directly on the Chase travel portal, thank you.
16 Amazing Dive Sites. I am not a diver. But some of you may be.
Your personal finance fix of the day: Ten Commandments. “IMAGINE YOU HAD ONE SHOT at offering financial advice to a high school or college graduate. Your mission: Come up with 10 rules that’ll help your graduate succeed financially in the years ahead. What would you recommend?” GREAT list!
I usually don’t post links to hotel or flight reviews. But I am making an exception for all things North Korea as usual 🙂 Here is a review of the Yanggakdo International Hotel in Pyongyang. Omg, look at that bed, my back hurts just looking at it! Maybe I’ll start a kickstarter campaign to raise money you guys so I can go review it..for you lol.
March For Science signs. The one below is my favorite:
This section is for advanced level hobbyists and veteran blog readers & personal rants & stuff
What a bonus! Running With Miles with a second link today, wow! Award Booking Anxiety – Which Flight Now? I REALLY like the term “Award Booking Anxiety”! I suffer from it! I find the whole process excruciating, especially how it has gotten in the past several years (looking at you American Airlines!).
You would be amazed how many people out there have no clue that all these bloggers make mucho dinero from selling credit cards. Of course I make a few dollars here myself, especially from apps coming from my own familia #winning. And the rest from you who know what you are doing. But make absolutely no mistake that I don’t spend any time forming my content around ways to keep.selling.plastic! Like in the image below. Now queue up the trolls 🙂
Is my blog being noticed more? Is it due to my plunging Alexa rankings (inside joke)? I was offered $30 for a backlink to some “branding company” website. I delete these emails. But if I had more integrity I would probably say yes bwahahaha.
That Dosh “paid influencer campaign” lady is persistent. I keep deleting and she keeps at it, wow. I don’t do this shit, I am very careful of what appears here. Just give me a little more time as I am almost done with my 763 reasons I like the Chase Sapphire Reserve card lol.
And I leave you with this…
Check out my updated blog lists: Blogs I Love, Blogs I Like, Blogs To Ignore
TBB
travelbloggerbuzz@gmail.com
Follow TBB on Twitter @FlyerTalkerinA2
You can subscribe to TBB below, winners only!
Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
And they’re off……….
Thanks for the links, George!
Bronze… But I just upgraded into Cathay first for my trip next week after checking daily since I booked it in January, so nothing will keep me down today!
Very nice! It has been a while since I flew Cathay first but I have great memories! Enjoy the trip!
I’m traveling with a friend, and had booked her into first class hoping more seats would open. This will be her first time in anything nicer than domestic first, so I definitely wanted her to have the seat, but reaaally didn’t wan to have to ask permission to come visit during a 16 hour flight.
This is how you ruin friends 🙂
When I flew Cathay Pacific First it was only me and another passenger, we each had our own rows. And I swear I was a pig as I must have ordered everything 🙂
It’s easy when you have flight attendants that say “oh, the shrimp quesadilla is rather small, I’ll bring you two”
As of now, we’re the only passengers in first, so I’m hoping that sticks.
Sadly, I passed on all dishes containing shrimp…as I have developed a severe allergy to it…which absolutely blows! This is not a joke! #thestruggleisreal
first the eyebrows disappeared, now a shrimp allergy? Jesus bro whats next?
Congrats to the medal winners…One day I will do a mock ceremony 🙂
Just wait until Ramsey gets a hold of the story behind Macron’s wife, brings to mind that Van Halen song “got hots for the teacher” or something.
That comment from yesterday Sam “follow your leader”….still makes me smh.
You all have a great week.
Blog post volume in the blogosphhere is way down, not sure why…
Do you now what he meant by ‘follow your leader’?
Did he?
I have no idea!
At this point…it’s just…sad!
I hope Macron wins
The Doc comes out and calls out TPG and he “usually like TPG’s content”…
I think it is going to snow today here in Michigan!
That Chase hotel story – and similar ones on the FT thread – are a reason I have generally avoided going that route…and the same with Citi TYP for that matter. Seems like such a goofy-ass system they set up – fax, really?? Maybe waiting until 24 hours in advance?? The best travel agent/concierge I’ve had so far, is myself! And I’m free! LOL!
The pink in that NK dining room just burned my eyeballs. Seems funny that NK is an open-carry-alcohol place.
Good post on non-stops to Greece…might head there next year.
Seeing that list of plastic-pimping-posts reminded me of another pet peeve with the pumpers…can they write one of these without using the word “lucrative” or the phrase “value proposition”? Figured they could afford a thesaurus with all that affiliate income.
I am half way through my “763 reasons I love the CSP card”, stay tuned!
Notice the strategic placement of the exclamation mark 😉
Wonder if doc, the TPG fan, was paid for his Dosh Post.
Hi Phil. I’ll reply here as well as on my own blog:
No, I wasn’t paid for that post. I don’t accept paid posts on my site at all, I will earn $ if people sign up using my link though (as clearly mentioned in the article). Dosh didn’t contact me either, if that’s the case I might contact them and see if they will be willing to give my readers a better deal.
Personally I think I’ve earned the benefit of the doubt in cases like this, but everybody is entitled to their own opinion.
The Dosh PR lady must have emailed me at least four times by now, persistent she is, wow!
Dosh did not pass my smell test. Readers emailed me to confirm I was right. MLM crap, watch out. I am sure everything these guys do have really high Alexa ranking numbers!
Was offered this morning $100 to sponsor my site from some online media company…nope.
I thought I have earned the benefit of the doubt after four and a half years blogging but queue up the trolls with their “you are a hypocrite and you have no integrity” rants…
It’s a tough world out there.
Now can someone tell that VFTW dude that he is taking his annoying travel thought leader posts to even more ridiculous levels
“the benefit of the doubt” –Sorry, Charlie (or Bill or whatever just pick a dang first name already! 🙂
Question of the day: Who still gets “the benefit of the doubt”?!
Mile Nerd
🙂
I am keeping myself out as I am biased and it’s just not fair!
At this pace today…tomorrow it will be the shortest Buzzy post ever, come on guys, blog some good shit!
I second the question of the day, it is good food for thought.
In today’s day and age, I think the benefit of the doubt has all but disappeared. Need to read this Mile Nerd fellow more as he comes highly regarded.
In docs case, if money is earned through signup ups is this still an unbiased referral?
Despite his contention of earning the benefit of the doubt I find he works off far too few data points in an effort to be first on something. Being first does get the most clicks, linkbacks, and hat tips (unless you are George then they give the HTs to Allan H., not him). However, the lack of data points has caused corrections to be needed and the dissemination of bad information. I don’t think he is the saintly doc that others do. But he said it best we are all allowed to have an opinion.
One day I will interview Alan H. here…one day 🙂
Mile Nerd is awesome. I just wish (we all do) he ranted more, those posts are way awesome! The one deal a day is unique. And my content is unique too (and MUCH more time consuming…I tell you!).
I always believed if you take the time to comment you type a comment you care so all feedback is valuable.
Unless you are a sad troll who reads every day and comments on blogs you can not stand then…there is something wrong but hey, you can express yourself here. I only canned a few comments in almost five years (and I did it NON proudly) when two posters went at each other, it just got out of hand, even for my very high threshold.
We all have an opinion, sure. Mine are expressed here and I love having my little blog allowing me to do so. Some things are just priceless. If I was aiming to increase my traffic numbers I would be nice to all them Titans, doing interviews at MMS and commenting on every blog out there but.I.don’t.
Hey Phil,
Thanks for the constructive criticism. I think you make a good point and you’re probably right in some respects (re: posting with too few data points). We’re making more of an effort to compile those on Twitter before posting an article.
Sometimes I feel confident enough to post without a lot of DP’s (e.g the Chase small business week offers today). It can be hard to illustrate to readers why I feel confident about certain things in some cases.
This is still something we could do a better job of and as always we will make an effort to do so.
Another Passenger Suing United for Being Bumped From Their Seat, But Something Doesn’t Make Sense
Link?
🙂
But can you be confident with so few data points? Let’s use your example the points bump for SBW at Chase…. Turns out there is no bump. You posted off a data point saying the contrary. Singular data points are simply not enough.
It depends what the DP are, one of my sources at Chase said there will be a bump. We also posted about 5/24 from a similar source and that was without any DP and helped a lot of people stock up on business/3rd party Chase cards.
DoC definitely gets the benefit of the doubt. One of the most ethical and up-front bloggers in this space. Also, one of the best when it comes to putting readers first.
Yeah…if he could only stop linking to “most ethical and up-front bloggers in this space.”
🙂
This is the slowest Monday EVER in this blogspace, wow!
Agree DOC should be on the very short list of bloggers people can trust. But agree about his linking BS. Gotta make a stand at some point. If you try pleasing everyone you will eventually please no one. Of course MN can be trusted. But I think DOC can too. Just needs to fix that issue. I think he does it for selfish reasons so they will link back and his numbers go up.
He is bigger (visitors-wise) than anyone, except TPG. He certainly doesn’t need them! 🙂
“Doesn’t need them” isn’t a smart point. How many ambitious people stop trying to make money because they have a lot? He had a goal of traffic and part of the plan was the linking thing. Spineless is too strong but it is a little wuss.
Are you stating doc is 2nd biggest in the game to TPG and his bulldog? I doubt that but would love to see where you are pulling the data from.
Scratch that just didn’t scroll far enough. This comment linked things are weird.
In fact, he probably has about double Gary’s hits!
@John I meant he doesn’t need them in the way that his site would rank as more of an authority than the others.
I havent been to Alexa in years.
I did not check the site you stated Charlie because:
-I don’t trust these sites
-What does that do for my readers, absolutely nothing!
Glad to see Doc doing well. I like to give him hard time sometimes. I don’t want to but every time I see a link to VFTW and TPG I..lose it a little bit…
Oh, ooops, just saw VGTW post “The Best 9 Cards from Chase”….Wow. Deep. He ‘ll probably link to that too? If not, next link will lead readers to go there…This guy really likes Chase cards hey?
IHG Pointbreaks are live you guys!
Zzzzzzzzz
One of the hotels I wanted was sold out for an end of July weekend. What the heck?!
Well, I think that hotels might block out certain nights in advance. Or else some people are incredibly fast!
Trolls are so lazy, where are they to doubt my integrity and stuff like that?
At this pace, I may start my Part 1 of 134 series of my 2016 Asia summer trip report for tomorrow finally. Yes, this is a warning
Blog some good stuff, anyone?
There are some REALLY fast clickers in China making $ off of IHG hotel booking “opportunities to” I hear…
Charlie, where do u get these #s? Maybe the troll can go there instead? We are all so sick of Alexa numbers.
What will happen first? Doc linking to View from the Wing or VFTW linking back to Doc or HTing Alan H. on a link first appearing at TBB? Now THIS is going to be super close 🙂
Now excuse me while I go look for my integrity while working on my super friendly Alexa linking strategy.
Got offered $150 via email for some sponsored type post. Clicked delete.Again…no integrity whatsoever I tell you!
similarweb.com It is not perfect but it does have more accurate numbers than alexa.com
It puts VFTW at 954K visitors with 1.68 pages per visit
It puts TPG at 6.7m with 1.63 pages per visit
It puts DoC at 1.9m with 2.75 pages per visit
That is for the month of March
Similarweb also very inaccurate Charlie. Sites like TPG that are optimized for traffic research will show huge numbers. Sites like TBB and probably yours too will not get an accurate reading at all. The comparison of those 3 you listed is not going to be correct.
Where would you find more accurate data?
There is not an accurate option for sites that don’t optimize for traffic research purposes. Certainly not a free website. I work In that industry and would not recommend wasting a minute on that data. Google searches for miles and points blogs and where a site shows up will generally still give you a good idea of its reach.
>>>>>>>Sites like TBB and probably yours too will not get an accurate reading at all.
Aha, I knew it! Can’t wait for the troll to update us all for the latest update of my plunging Alexa numbers woohoo!
Love yelling at Alexa:
Bite me!
I started the 2016 Asia summer trip report. WARNING!
Similarweb puts me at 430,000 visits for March vs 605,000 ‘sessions’ shown by Google Analytics. Not sure if a vist is a ‘session’ though.
I don’t read closely but I have always found DoC to run a good show, both in quality of information and in not keepiong his thumb on the scales as to what he writes about.
On the Hat Tips, the ethical thing to do would be for bloggers to not write about material they get elsewhere but to link to the source website.
Hey Buzz-why don’t you do that? You already do?
Never mind.
Agree 100% with your Hat Tip comment. Except I think it’s the ONLY ethical thing to do!
What’s the over/under on how many points/miles sites would still be in business if this were the law?!
#Sam’sRight
#BravoTBB
If that was done, I would say 95% of blogs would be…GONE!
No…97%
What iz goin on overhear at TBB? U all angry 7 of you? Next thing u know is TBB will find something, rewrite it with some BS thrown in and then do a blog post, add some cc affiliate links, and HT that blog post while we know 99% of readers will miss said HT.
Then throw a few bones, errr links I mean to some blogs because, cough, it’s good for business?
Xcuse typos, stabucks packed, outside under sun b4 picking up Princess
Too many blogs, too little TBB worthy content…
U know it is a super slow day…when top deal is about paper towels and IHG buying points and Pointbreaks.
What about Halperin sitting next to Emily’s husband, that’s not a story?!
Who?
Missed this.
I glance very quickly in some posts in Feedly in that blog, can’t take to look at every pic 🙂
Google “Halperin”
I just did.
Mega LOL
If I already have two flavors of INK (plus+bold), can I expect Chase to bless me with a 3rd using the same TIN?
Checking for data points at Doc site 🙂
My gut feeling: No….keeping all three! But if you volunteer to give up one you may have a shot. You give up both for the Ink Preferred to “consolidate” all business spend in one card…why not? But then you lose three times 5x…
I should probably stop by and look for a Business Relationship Manager one day 🙂
Haha data points… since all you need is one… I will answer ABC’s question. Yes if you are under 5/24 you can have three flavors of Ink.
But if you are under 5/24 ABC you are missing some good bonuses out there dude.
Phil:
For the same business/TIN?? I can see justifications for having two that can fly…but three is a bit of a stretch. Imho. No data points 🙂
If ABC was under 5/24, has a high credit score, and good income on computer app he doesn’t need to explain to the computer why he wants a third. If he isn’t auto approved and goes to a judgemental decision he will need a reason ie: no fx on the new card, is starting a new project and want’s to keep expenses for this project separate, something at least half way decent.
I assume he was over 5/24 and was going to stop by to have a chat with his friendly BRM at the branch 🙂
This is comment #55
Probably surpasses all comments posted on FTG for the whole year?
Trip report tomorrow on my trip to Asia with what I burned and my JAL flight DFW-NRT on Business, you won’t believe what happened next!
At some point yesterday I counted 19 total comments on their 10 most recent posts. I wanted a comparison with omaat, tpg, mms, etc… But then I realized I didn’t really care and just went on living my life.
Going to bed
with a smile on my face after reading yr comment Brenton, thank you!
This just in:
Mommy Points has a post up now on the best Amex card for evryday spend.
Probably the first in a series. Tomorrow: Which Chase card to use when you want to feel free. Then which Barclays card to use when you’ve just arrived.
Think she can make these rhyme?
Heard of a new term yesterday: Atrocious fuckery.
It reminded me of the table I post in the Buzzy posts with this collection of drivel designed to keep pushing plastic.