I want that Vantage West Connect Rewards to compliment my other 5% cards. Maybe I should ask another member for a referral? Is that allowed?
@ptatohed wrote:
And.... I have no interest in paying at the POS with my phone (but, if I were to, it would have to be for 5%, lol).
A littile off topic: When mobile pay was less common than now, it was a bit of pain, first seeing if you could use it then reaching for the cards! But now, at least where I go it's nearly accepted everywhere, so my physical wallet only has two credit cards, Altitude Reserve and a 2% cash back (for when I can't use mobile pay). I don't really need to carry the AR either, just from when certain airlines or hotels need to see a physical card. All rotators, things like Amazon Prime for Whole Foods etc, are on the phone
I find this so useful I would use mobile wallet even if there was no rewards advantage (well, I already do that when using cards apart from AR). It allows me to have a very slim wallet, I already take my phone with me everywhere so it may as well do this job too! And if I lose it, I still have the physical cards at home
@longtimelurker wrote:
A littile off topic: When mobile pay was less common than now, it was a bit of pain, first seeing if you could use it then reaching for the cards! But now, at least where I go it's nearly accepted everywhere, so my physical wallet only has two credit cards, Altitude Reserve and a 2% cash back (for when I can't use mobile pay).
I am not sure whether it is wisely to carry a heavily metallic card like AR in the physical wallet. I was keeping it in the flip case of my mobile and in the first week, it got dropped somewhere. So, I needed to request a replacement 
Fico8: EX~EQ~TU~810 (12 month goal~840).
Just a heads up that I did pass my info to a forum member as a referral for Vantage West and they were not allowed membership due to geofence, so a referral doesn't seem to get around that restriction like was shared in that other thread.
@digitek wrote:Just a heads up that I did pass my info to a forum member as a referral for Vantage West and they were not allowed membership due to geofence, so a referral doesn't seem to get around that restriction like was shared in that other thread.
Well, that's a bummer! Thanks for confirming.
I guess I'll need to see if I have any long lost siblings in AZ 
@ptatohed wrote:
@elboullee wrote:
@ptatohed wrote:I was giving it some thought and it hit me that being able to select your own 5% cat is pretty handy. I still enjoy my rotators but being able to know which cats you can earn 5% CB in all year long, without taking it quarter by quarter, is pretty sweet.
citi Custom Cash. Not selectable as in you check a box but selectable by your spending habits. Great card.
BoA Customized Cash Rewards (but only with Platinum Honors).
USB Cash+ and twins. Two selectable categories!
Vantage West (Possible hoop jumping and/or possible geo restrictions).
Don't all of those just have a relatively few selectable categories from which to choose?
For example, neither gas or groceries are 5% categories for the USB Cash+ and utilities aren't a category for the Custom Cash.
The idea of having and trying to manage 20+ cards just to get an extra 2% or so on a few thousand in spend a year sounds like an absolute nightmare to me.
With just two cards, the CFF and Discover IT for example, you end up getting 5% [on $1.5K spend per quarter on each card] for six months of the year on all of the major categories [or 5% on up to $3K in spend when the cards duplicate their categories]. And with the CFF you get 7% for three months on resturants and drugstores. I think 7% for three months on resturants would, for most people, more than make up for losing the 2% for the other six months on all of those other cards.
YMMV
For me, I was thinking the opposite. I was thinking getting 5% cards with selectable categories could simplify things! No rotating categories for those cards. You could take the card, set up to auto-pay your utilities/phone/cable/streaming, whatever it might be and that card doesn't even need to be in your wallet. You can pick restaurants as your cat and that frees up the rotators to go for something else that quarter (and/or increase your cap on restaurants). I have no problem juggling cards. No nightmare here. Only enjoyment.
The Sears card does kinda complicate things for us though.....
@coldfusion wrote:
@ptatohed wrote:
@elboullee wrote:
@ptatohed wrote:I was giving it some thought and it hit me that being able to select your own 5% cat is pretty handy. I still enjoy my rotators but being able to know which cats you can earn 5% CB in all year long, without taking it quarter by quarter, is pretty sweet.
citi Custom Cash. Not selectable as in you check a box but selectable by your spending habits. Great card.
BoA Customized Cash Rewards (but only with Platinum Honors).
USB Cash+ and twins. Two selectable categories!
Vantage West (Possible hoop jumping and/or possible geo restrictions).
Don't all of those just have a relatively few selectable categories from which to choose?
For example, neither gas or groceries are 5% categories for the USB Cash+ and utilities aren't a category for the Custom Cash.
The idea of having and trying to manage 20+ cards just to get an extra 2% or so on a few thousand in spend a year sounds like an absolute nightmare to me.
With just two cards, the CFF and Discover IT for example, you end up getting 5% [on $1.5K spend per quarter on each card] for six months of the year on all of the major categories [or 5% on up to $3K in spend when the cards duplicate their categories]. And with the CFF you get 7% for three months on resturants and drugstores. I think 7% for three months on resturants would, for most people, more than make up for losing the 2% for the other six months on all of those other cards.
YMMV
For me, I was thinking the opposite. I was thinking getting 5% cards with selectable categories could simplify things! No rotating categories for those cards. You could take the card, set up to auto-pay your utilities/phone/cable/streaming, whatever it might be and that card doesn't even need to be in your wallet. You can pick restaurants as your cat and that frees up the rotators to go for something else that quarter (and/or increase your cap on restaurants). I have no problem juggling cards. No nightmare here. Only enjoyment.
The Sears card does kinda complicate things for us though.....
lol, very true cf!!
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