Surprisingly strong Citi Travel results, the best credit card combinations that cost less than $95 combined, keeping your miles alive, and more [Week in Review]

A long-running joke in this space is that there’s no IT in Hyatt. That’s because Hyatt has long been known for its less-than-stellar IT.

I ran into my latest experience with Hyatt’s lackluster IT this week when I wanted to book a simple one-night stay at an airport Hyatt Place. The property I was trying to book is in Category 2, where an award would cost 8,000 points per night at standard rates. When I toggled the switch to use World of Hyatt points, it showed no available rooms.

However, when I toggled the switch to use one of my Category 1-4 free night certificates, it showed that I could book a room with a Category 1-4 free night award.

Not wanting to waste a Category 1-4 free night certificate on a Category 2 standard-priced award, I decided to call the Hyatt Globalist line to inquire as to why the property was available with a free-night certificate but not with points. To my surprise, the phone agent immediately saw the property as being available using points, and she made the booking over the phone without any issue at all. The entire call took less than 5 minutes. I was certainly happy with the outcome (and glad to know how to solve the issue the next time I run into it), though it is somewhat frustrating knowing that a property may be bookable with points but appear unavailable in search results. If I didn’t have a free night certificate in my account, I may have assumed that a standard room wasn’t available.

On the blog this week, we have your less-than-a-week countdown reminder of the Hyatt award chart and category changes coming up, surprisingly strong Citi Travel results, the best credit card combinations that cost less than $95 combined, how to keep your miles and points alive, and a lot more.

This week on the Frequent Miler blog…

(1 week to go) World of Hyatt announces 2026 category changes. They’re not inspiring.

You have mere days left to take advantage of Hyatt bookings at current award pricing. As of May 20th, 2026, in just a few days, Hyatt will launch its new award chart with 40 different pricing levels for hotels alone and over 100 when you consider the Miraval and all-inclusive charts, not to mention the charts for suites. There’s no doubt that the World of Hyatt program is going to be significantly complexified, and award pricing is going to feel a little bit more dynamic than it has in years past.

If you want to book a property that’s increasing in category or where you think it’s likely that the property will increase in pricing band, now is the time to do it. Make your bookings before May 20th, and you can lock in current pricing. Also, remember to check out our points advance post because it is possible for Discoverists and above to make bookings at current pricing, even if you don’t yet have the points to pay for the booking.

Another round of rental car comparison shopping reminds me to shop around

With the need to book rental cars for several upcoming trips in different cities, both domestic and abroad, I decided it was a great time to do a relatively full comparison of rental car prices across numerous booking platforms. I was quite surprised to find that Citi Travel was knocking it out of the park in terms of rental car pricing, often returning better pricing than what I could find elsewhere.

The trade-off there is that if you’re renting domestically, Citi cards that include rental car CDW coverage only include secondary coverage within the United States. Coverage on qualifying cards is primary for rentals abroad, but if you’re renting within the United States, any claim would first need to go against your personal insurance. Still, if you’re cool with that, the pricing through Citi Travel was often excellent. That said, AutoSlash usually wasn’t too far behind.

This data isn’t meant to be an indication of where you should be booking your rental cars, but it should be a good wake-up call to remember to shop around. As I wrote this post, I noticed the frequency with which rental car prices were changing, sometimes several times within the same day. It really makes sense to track your rentals with AutoSlash so that you can get a notification when prices change.

Analysis paralysis: Which way to pay for a 2-night hotel stay?

I have an upcoming trip to Lake Tahoe to make a run at Caesars Diamond Plus status, taking advantage of a tier credit multiplier. Before I could run the numbers on that, I first had to run the numbers on my hotel booking.

Overwhelmed by a slew of credit cards with hotel credits and various options for stacking, I wrote this post to help myself decide how to book my hotel. As it turns out, I cancelled what I said I had booked in this post and reconfigured plans after publication. More next week on what I ended up doing, but this post gives you a good road map of the various things to think about when it comes to your hotel booking options. This should also provide food for thought as to how to value hotel credits. Hint: You should be valuing them at significantly less than face value.

The best card for Priority Pass lounges, experiences, and restaurants

Speaking of analysis, the 2026 changes to the Chase Ritz-Carlton Visa card’s Priority Pass forced Greg to re-analyze the best Priority Pass options on the market. For many years, it was really easy to identify the best credit card for Priority Pass lounge access. The answer was, hands down, the Chase Ritz-Carlton card since it offers unlimited free authorized users, each with their own Priority Pass. Until this year, that Priority Pass came with unlimited guests. Now, Ritz cardholders are limited to two guests, though they can still add unlimited free authorized users, giving each person their own Priority Pass membership. Still, that’s not as ideal a solution as it once was, so Greg has fully updated this post with all of the best options depending on your situation.

Is the Bilt Palladium card worth its $495 annual fee? | Coffee Break Ep105 | 5-12-26

Speaking of the situational, the Bilt Palladium card is a polarizing topic. Some people think it’s the best thing since sliced bread. Others think it has no place in anyone’s wallet. On this week’s Coffee Break podcast, we assert that it really does vary from one person to another as to whether this card is worth its annual fee. For a lot of people, it won’t be. Look no further than my analysis paralysis post above to see that the $200 hotel credit twice a year is not really worth $200.

I think it ultimately comes down to how much money you spend every year and your ability to take advantage of either the point accelerators or points based on housing. For high spenders, I think the ability to effectively earn 3 points per dollar or more on all unbonused purchases, combined with the ability to earn points 1:1 through Rakuten, is a pretty compelling offering. For folks who aren’t particularly high spenders, it probably won’t make any sense at all since you could direct all spending towards multiple other new card welcome bonuses instead.

There are multiple approaches to this hobby. The Palladium card is a great fit for a segment of credit card enthusiasts.

Best $95 travel credit card combo | Frequent Miler on the Air Ep358 | 5-15-26

If you’re put off by the ever-increasing annual fees on ultra-Premium credit cards, this week’s Frequent Miler on the Air might just have the solution for you. On this week’s show, Greg and I discuss the best combinations of cards that cost no more than $95 in total annual fees. It is possible to put together a pretty impressive wallet that covers excellent multipliers in a multitude of popular categories for no more than $95 out of pocket. People who don’t know much about this hobby sometimes ask me, “Which credit card should I get?”, but the truth is that the better question is “Which cards should I get?”. With the right combo, you can make sure that most of your spending is well-rewarded.

Are you eligible for a new Marriott card? (Brilliant changes reversed)

Now that Citi has taken over the rest of the American Airlines Advantage portfolio, Marriott may stand alone in the rare circumstance of being a loyalty program with two competing credit card issuers. As a result, eligibility rules for Marriott credit cards are incredibly complex. You need to consult a matrix to determine whether or not you’re eligible for a particular Marriott card based on which cards you have or have had before. That matrix was updated this week because American Express changed some of the application rules regarding the Brilliant card. See this post for the latest.

JetBlue and United Blue Sky partnership (elite benefits go live this week)

Speaking of the latest, the news this week may not quite seem like it came out of the blue, but there are updates nonetheless. JetBlue and United originally announced their Blue Sky partnership about a year ago. One of the marquee benefits of the partnership when it was announced was that there would be reciprocal elite benefits. In other words, United elite members would get benefits when flying JetBlue and vice versa.

Somewhat frustratingly, it’s been a long, slow rollout of this partnership, with other steps gradually launched over the last year, including things like reciprocal earning and redeeming of points and the ability to book flights with cash or with points on either carrier’s website. This week, JetBlue and United finally announced that reciprocal elite benefits would begin being available this week.

Personally, I have a United flight booked next week, and I have JetBlue Mosaic 1 status, but I haven’t yet been able to select preferred seats. I’m certainly looking forward to accessing priority check-in and getting priority boarding. If I’m able to score an extra legroom seat 24 hours before check-in, I’ll once again be thankful to have completed 25 for 25 last year.

American Express adds $300 in ChatGPT credits on Business Platinum and Business Gold cards

American Express Business Platinum and Business Gold cardholders can now receive up to $300 per year in statement credits for ChatGPT business subscriptions. That means you can get a ChatGPT Business subscription for two people for free for six months. Since that benefit is $300 per calendar year, if you’re a cardholder and you subscribe in July, you’ll get 12 continuous months for free between this year’s credit and next year’s credit.

One key warning I pulled out of the comments from a reader is that if you currently subscribe to the consumer paid version of ChatGPT, you can migrate your data to the business version of ChatGPT when you subscribe to ChatGPT Business. However, if you later decide to go back to the consumer version, the reader reported that you cannot migrate your data from the business version back to the consumer version. That might be a pain point for people who rely on conversation history.

How to keep airline miles and hotel points alive (2026)

One pain point that you want to avoid in this hobby is letting your miles and points expire. Some loyalty programs require activity once every 18 months in order to keep your points or miles alive. Others require activity every 24 months, and still others require activity every 12 months. What counts as activity, and which programs have no expiration at all? This post has been fully updated for 2026 with everything you need to know about how to keep your miles and points alive.

Hotel review: JW Marriott Crete Resort & Spa

Stephen had previously reported on his stay at a Dome’s property in Crete, Greece. This week, he wrote a complete review of the brand new J.W. Marriott in Crete. This looks like a really pretty resort, and he got a terrific suite upgrade, but service wasn’t quite up to snuff. That’s disappointing.

That said, I might try this place in the future if I were in Crete in the summertime, as the views do look pretty good and the grounds look pretty. I will say that I wasn’t surprised to hear about his issues using gift cards at checkout. It’s always a fiasco when I try to use Marriott gift cards at checkout. It’s good that Stephen brought his to the desk with plenty of time for them to figure out how to redeem them, but it stinks that he got stuck in the lobby for 45 minutes as they tried to sort it out.

That’s it for this week at Frequent Miler. Keep an eye on this week’s last chance deals and be sure to grab the ones you want before they’re gone.

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