Welcome Back!

Hope everyone is doing great 😊 

My trip to the UK was amazing! I had an incredible time, except at the airports - my original flight to London got cancelled, and the airport for my flight back home lost power the night before, shutting down all airport systems on the day of my flight…

Luckily, things ended up okay and I made it there and back unscathed. But if any flight cancellations or delays happen to you, there are certain credit card benefits for these kinds of situations that can potentially help you, including:

• ✈️ Trip delay/cancellation insurance

• 🧳 Baggage insurance (damage or loss)

So yes, another reason to travel with credit card points and benefits!

In today’s edition:

• 🍽️ Amex Dining: Coming Soon? 💳️ 

• 🏦 Transfer Bonuses ✈️

• 💳️ The Chase Ink Preferred Has Risen 💸 

• 📰 Other Stories and Deals 💰️

🍽️ Amex Dining: Coming Soon? 💳️

Big news from Amex over the past week: They’ve agreed to acquire Tock, a dining reservation app, from Squarespace for $400M. If you didn’t know, Amex also already owns Resy, another restaurant reservation platform and app.

Tock seems to have reservations for relatively higher-end restaurants, and well, Amex wants the attention of people that want to dine at those kinds of restaurants. This acquisition definitely lets them do that!

Also, Chase Dining was run in partnership with Tock as well, so this also turns out to put Chase in a weird spot once this acquisition goes through. Two for one! 🤯 

But what does this mean for users? I have generally three thoughts:

1. For restaurant bookings, this will give Amex cardholders potentially more reservations to get their hands on. Whether on their own or via the Amex concierge, Amex customers may have an easier time with restaurant reservations.

2. As for their more core product offerings (cards), some of Amex’s refreshes (discussed this before too) have included monthly credits for restaurants on Resy, so maybe Tock can get integrated into that? These monthly credits are rather annoying though already, so hopefully we don’t see more of this…

3. With Amex owning Resy, Tock, Loungebuddy, as well as having a foothold on experiences at concerts, sporting events, and more, Amex may be trying to establish itself as an experiences powerhouse. Also, this checks out with rumors that they are working on an app!!

Whether you need a restaurant reservation, tickets to Coachella, or a hotel booking, Amex wants you to know that it can do all of that for you! Their network of hotel partners, restaurants, lounges, and more are getting more and more comprehensive, and this acquisition furthers this 🏃 

For me personally, as long as I still earn lots of points for my spend and the cards still make sense to hold on to and use from a cost perspective, I’ll continue to be an Amex customer. But if these acquisitions affect the cards negatively, especially the Amex Gold Card (check other card links for maybe a higher bonus if you are considering it!), I’ll be so sad… 😢 

Let’s hope that this acquisition represents only positives for us consumers, and nothing else!

🏦➡️✈️ Transfer Bonuses

¹ New transfer bonuses that were not present the week before are in bold.
² This bonus is stackable with a separate 10% bonus for holders of the Aeroplan® Credit Card, for a total of 30%! Details of the deal here.

💳️ The Chase Ink Preferred Has Risen 💸 

I wrote previously when the Chase Sapphire Preferred® had a higher signup bonus than usual, because it is one of the more solid credit cards in the travel game, and I wanted to share that as much as I could. Well, another solid travel card from Chase has an elevated signup bonus, so let me share:

Common signup bonuses we’ve seen on this card is 80k and 100k points after spending $8k in the first three months after account opening (sometimes more than $8k). Why settle for less when you can get more??

But just like last time with the Sapphire, this bonus is available in-branch only for the moment. Rumors convey that on July 3rd, however, the bonus will be available online! Even better, if a family member or friend has this card and refers you, their referral bonus is another 40k points on top. So potentially 160k points all added up to use on a trip if the points are pooled together!! ✈️ 

Of course, you do need to be approved, so the Chase application rules all still apply, like 5/24, etc. Check out my work-in-progress glossary if you aren’t familiar with Chase’s credit card application rules 📖 

Do note that this card is also a business card and not a personal card. This does not mean that you have to have an official business to get business cards, though. There are tons of guides on this topic, but business cards are accessible to most!

To my knowledge, these bonuses can be earned again every 24 months. So if you’ve had the card already for 2+ years, maybe it is time to product change/cancel and reapply for another bonus?? 🤑 

So if you were considering this card, now is a great time to head to a Chase branch and get this elevated offer!

📰 Other Stories 📰

• 🧑‍⚖️ If you’ve been here since the very beginning of Sense per Point, you may remember a segment on the Visa-Mastercard Settlement - well, a judge blocked the settlement, so what about our rewards now?? 😲 

💰️ Tips & Deals 💰️

• 🇫🇷 Have airline status? You can potentially take advantage of a status match to Flying Blue (Air France & KLM)

• 💸 Buy 2 award tickets for the price of one with Avianca’s new discounts to Central and South America!

📤️ Spread the Word! 📤️

Thank you so much for subscribing! This newsletter is committed to providing you all with helpful info and tips to maximize your points and rewards, at no direct cost to you! (appreciate you using any of my referral links, though!)

Being that I don’t use social media, it’s been a bit harder to gain subscribers, but I can do it with your help - if you do find this newsletter informative, helpful, or entertaining, I’d greatly appreciate you spreading the word about it! If not, please do give me feedback on how I can improve your Sense per Point experience.

Also, if my newsletter helps you to book travel using points, let me know! It’ll make me so happy 😄 

Hope that all makes sense! That’s all for this week’s edition of Sense per Point.

See you again after the 4th of July 🎆 

- Sean Kim

PS: If you want to make sure Sense per Point doesn’t get caught in your spam, you can move this email to your primary inbox, or Reply “Hello!” directly to this email by clicking the link and hitting send 📩