Can you prepay your entire cruise?

another easy way to meet spending requirements for airline bonus miles is to buy gift cards with the credit card for yourself at sams club or costco.....you then can use them like a debit card at sams/ walmart or costco for any purchases

But $4,000 of gift cards? Wow! Would like to be the recipient of that one. Aside from that, we opened another Citicard last year, offering 60,000 points for the same reason that Dave was explaining. We had signed up for the Grand Asia and knew that the mandatory $3,000 was not going to be a problem. Now . . . if only we had been able to use the 60k points for our return flight four days before Christmas - good luck!

But $4,000 of gift cards? Wow! Would like to be the recipient of that one. Aside from that, we opened another Citicard last year, offering 60,000 points for the same reason that Dave was explaining. We had signed up for the Grand Asia and knew that the mandatory $3,000 was not going to be a problem. Now . . . if only we had been able to use the 60k points for our return flight four days before Christmas - good luck!

There use to be a trick where you could buy dollar coins from the US Treasury with free shipping. People would get $1,000 in dollar coins, then deposit in the bank, then pay the credit card back before interest was applied. The CC companies got wise to that and stopped it.

But $4,000 of gift cards? Wow! Would like to be the recipient of that one. Aside from that, we opened another Citicard last year, offering 60,000 points for the same reason that Dave was explaining. We had signed up for the Grand Asia and knew that the mandatory $3,000 was not going to be a problem. Now . . . if only we had been able to use the 60k points for our return flight four days before Christmas - good luck!

it's not very hard to spend $300 +++ a month at sams or costco....you can buy the card for yourself so not really a "gift".

You can’t transfer it to a travel agency after paid in full, so if you want those discounts, transfer it first

another easy way to meet spending requirements for airline bonus miles is to buy gift cards with the credit card for yourself at sams club or costco.....you then can use them like a debit card at sams/ walmart or costco for any purchases

That is a great idea, and one I'd never considered.

Back in the day, before my issuer cottoned on, you could earn points on cash advances. It wasn't the cheapest way to earn an award ticket or retain membership in a frequent flyer program, because interest started to accrue immediately on the amount you'd borrowed, but when you really needed to get there...

Speaking of the things we're willing to do - I once drove the 35 miles to LAX for a round trip flight to SNA (40 miles away) and then drove back home again, because I desperately needed the 1,000 points (500 per segment) to avoid dropping from Silver to lowly Blue in a frequent flyer program! :D

Ah, there's a possible caveat here - if you were to cancel for a refund, your bonus points would likely evaporate. The points earned for the actual spend would definitely go bye-bye. I can't imagine what would happen if you've already used the points!

Been there, done that. You don't lose anything. Trust me, I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last nite :eek:

We rarely never pay for anything in advance. Most especially travel products.

The only exception would be when paying in advance yields a significant discount .