Further update: Unfortunately this was too good to be true and it does look like this is a glitch after all. Richard Kerr of Bilt has apparently confirmed that it’s an error and it looks like the addition of non-lounge experiences on the Citi Strata Elite card was an error too.
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Update: Justin has confirmed in the comments below that restaurants, spas, etc. are now showing their Priority Pass account which they obtained from their Citi Strata Elite card. With both the Strata Elite and Bilt Palladium cards being World Legend Mastercards (a relatively new designation), it seems that it might be related to the Priority Pass benefit that comes as part of being a World Legend Mastercard.
For several months, the World Legend Mastercard website has listed its Priority Pass benefit as:
Get access to 1,700+ airport lounges worldwide and special offers and discounts in the terminal on dining, retail and spa experiences.
Although there was that mention of dining, retail, and spa experiences, the corresponding Priority Pass memberships didn’t include that. Mastercard does allow customization of card benefits, so we’d assumed that neither Citi nor Bilt wanted to invest in a more expensive kind of Priority Pass.
However, the fact that it’s now showing for both those cards might mean that restaurants and spas were omitted inadvertently in the past—that they should’ve been accessible for Strata Elite and Palladium cardholders all along.
That said, perhaps this is a glitch on the Priority Pass membership, but it seems strange that it would only happen for the membership type that comes on these two specific cards. If you have travel in the coming week and you’d want to visit an airport restaurant or spa location, it’ll be worth verifying beforehand that it’s still showing for you because if this is a glitch, it could get pulled quickly.
Here’s the original post.
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When Bilt launched its premium Palladium card earlier this year, one of its benefits was a Priority Pass membership for the primary cardholder and authorized users (albeit with a $95 annual fee for each authorized user card).
In keeping with the vast majority of Priority Pass memberships that come as a benefit on some credit cards, it only provided lounge access—access to Priority Pass restaurants, spas, etc. wasn’t included.
That wasn’t too surprising as it’s a rare card that does offer Priority Pass restaurant access. Well, the Bilt Palladium has joined the ranks of said rare cards because its Priority Pass now does include non-lounge experiences.
That could be great news depending on which airports you fly out of and through. For example, Seattle-Tacoma airport only has two Priority Pass lounges: one in Concourse A and one in the South Satellite. There are twice as many restaurants though: two in the North Satellite, one in the Central Terminal, and one in Concourse C. The addition of those restaurants for Bilt Palladium cardholders will mean that you’ll have a far greater selection of options no matter which terminal you’re flying out of.
Reader Ivan also gave us a heads up via email about this development, along with some of the terms and conditions of how this feature will work. In keeping with other Priority Pass memberships that include lounge access, you’ll get to spend up to $28 at the restaurant. You can also guest in one person, so that would get you up to $56 of food and drink.
The membership includes access to other airport experiences like spas too. You’ll need to check the Priority Pass website or app to see the full details though, as the terms will vary from location to location. For example, at the Be Relax Spa in Houston airport you can get the following:
- Be Back 15-minute Lounger Massage plus O2 (a US$38 value)
- Be Back 30-minute Lounger Massage (a US$38 value)
- Polish Change plus Hand Massage (a US$38 value)
- Be Feet on lounger 10-minute plus O2 (a US$44 value)
This addition of Priority Pass non-lounge experiences is an excellent enhancement on the Palladium card which will make it even more appealing for someone who’ll be able to get good use out of it each year. Fingers crossed that this is a permanent change rather than some kind of temporary error on the Palladium’s Priority Pass membership.
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The good news already vanish. It was a glitch on the priority pass.
That is why Bilt Palladium is only worth $600 in first year benefits, right? Despite users easily finding $2,000+.
who are these “users” are they in the room with us right now..?
Read the blogs. Even this one has some people who found the $600 so beyond reality they reported their own results (typically over $1,200 – twice the FM estimate).
FM is peddling a valuation formula that is totally broken. Google ‘Using Frequent Miler’s Valuation Method, The Bilt Palladium Card Is The Most Valuable Card They Have Ever Seen, Even With Zero Housing Spend’ for a line-by-line valuation of Bilt, then tell us where that calculation is wrong.
FM is totally screwing its readers by letting them down on this valuation.
I know they are embarrassed for totally missing the value of Bilt, but denying it just leaves the fake valuation up there for all to read, and for more and more people to compare with reality (and adjust the credibility rating of FM downwards).
Here’s almost a dozen different ways that your calculations are wrong:
1) Most of the value you list isn’t anything to do with the Bilt Palladium’s benefits in the first place. It’s based on redeeming Bilt Cash which can be earned through spending enough on the card; something completely different to an actual benefit that can be valued.
2) Your whole thesis only works (well, it doesn’t actually work, but that’s beside the point) if someone selects Bilt Cash as their earning preference on the card. Many people select Housing-Only Rewards and, in fact, that’s the default that Bilt has set up now. If you earn Housing-Only Rewards, more than $2,000 of your purported value immediately goes up in smoke.
3) You’re seemingly assuming that everyone is redeeming Bilt Cash for every single redemption option there is. That’s simply not happening.
4) Even if it was realistic, they’d need to spend ~$80K+ per year on the card in order to earn enough Bilt Cash to redeem for each of those options. Accounting for the rewards you can earn on $80K+ spend is simply not how our first year valuations work. If you want to calculate that way for yourself personally, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. However, it’s simply not a widely applicable or useful calculation for your average person.
5) Your calculations assume that someone is going to redeem $100 Bilt Cash every single month in order to save $100 on a minimum two night hotel booking 12 times per year. That means a minimum of 24 paid hotel nights that have to be booked through the Bilt travel portal, something that virtually no one is going to do.
6) You’re valuing the 2x $200 hotel credit at 88%; that might be realistic for some people, but that’s vastly high overall.
7) There’s a very limited set of Bilt Dining partners accepting Mobile Dining Checkout, so getting 88% of value from that Bilt Cash redemption option seems overvalued again for your average person, especially seeing as it’s capped at $25 per month so it’s not going to go far in the first place.
8) How many people are going to need to and/or care about saving $5 on parking every single month?
9) How many people are going to want to vastly overpay for products through GoPuff every single month in order to save a measly $5 on an order 12 times per year?
10) Your calculations don’t account for various benefits going to waste due to Bilt having a punitive policy regarding when certain credits expire like GrubHub, Walgreens, etc.
11) Your post says “Deflation percentages are the same as the FM deflations for the AMEX Platinum Card.” That’s grossly incorrect. For example, you’re valuing the Bilt Palladium 2x $200 hotel credits at 88%, whereas we value the Amex Platinum 2x $300 hotel credits at 50%. You value the GrubHub redemption at 80%, we value the $10 monthly dining credit on the Amex Gold card at 25%.
1) Most of the value you list isn’t anything to do with the Bilt Palladium’s benefits in the first place. It’s based on redeeming Bilt Cash which can be earned through spending enough on the card; something completely different to an actual benefit that can be valued.
L3: Bilt cash is the benefit. It has to be valued. What you meant to say was
“FM’s broken valuation system can’t handle any card with an internal currency. We need to replace it with one that does. Clearly this is part of Bilt’s genius and we were too asleep to realise it”.
Apology accepted.
2) Your whole thesis only works (well, it doesn’t actually work, but that’s beside the point) if someone selects Bilt Cash as their earning preference on the card. Many people select Housing-Only Rewards and, in fact, that’s the default that Bilt has set up now. If you earn Housing-Only Rewards, more than $2,000 of your purported value immediately goes up in smoke.
L3: The choice is endogenous. I chose the case of Bilt Cash because it is what I use. However, you can choose housing benefit and get similarly huge returns. Just remember to document your home equity loan to adjust the base on which housing benefit is earned.
3) You’re seemingly assuming that everyone is redeeming Bilt Cash for every single redemption option there is. That’s simply not happening.
L3: No. Read the article, I explicitly put my numbers out there as one set of correct calculations. I say that you can choose how many of the benefits you use and to what extent. In particular, I repeat what your broken valuation does — I give you the maximum value, as the whole point is to establish the bound.
Now hang on just one second. Didn’t you say ‘ If you earn Housing-Only Rewards, more than $2,000 of your purported value immediately goes up in smoke.‘? If we accept your statement (which I don’t) you have just increased your Bilt valuation to $1,000+ from the FM claim of $600.
Oops! The truth is wriggling out.
4) Even if it was realistic, they’d need to spend ~$80K+ per year on the card in order to earn enough Bilt Cash to redeem for each of those options. Accounting for the rewards you can earn on $80K+ spend is simply not how our first year valuations work. If you want to calculate that way for yourself personally, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. However, it’s simply not a widely applicable or useful calculation for your average person.
L3: Your calculations are wrong. About $30,000 would be required, as I say in the article, which is what AMEX Platinum or Chase SR members have to spend to obtain FM valuations of those cards.
5) Your calculations assume that someone is going to redeem $100 Bilt Cash every single month in order to save $100 on a minimum two night hotel booking 12 times per year. That means a minimum of 24 paid hotel nights that have to be booked through the Bilt travel portal, something that virtually no one is going to do.
L3: No. As I say, pick your own redemption rate. I think I assumed 85% for most things because that is what FM assumed in their explanatory article (which I referenced) explaining the FM formula.
And actually, 12 bookings a year is not that hard to imagine users of a travel web site doing. You should get out more.
6) You’re valuing the 2x $200 hotel credit at 88%; that might be realistic for some people, but that’s vastly high overall.
L3: Once again, FM’s redemption rate;
7) There’s a very limited set of Bilt Dining partners accepting Mobile Dining Checkout, so getting 88% of value from that Bilt Cash redemption option seems overvalued again for your average person, especially seeing as it’s capped at $25 per month so it’s not going to go far in the first place.
L3: In the noise. It does not matter if you include that, it is too small. It was done because your (FM’s) article did it for the AMEX card.
8) How many people are going to need to and/or care about saving $5 on parking every single month?
L3: I’m not, are you? It is in ‘the second order of smalls’ (Alfred Marshall). It doesn’t get you where you want to be.You are stretching. Bilt is still #1.
9) How many people are going to want to vastly overpay for products through GoPuff every single month in order to save a measly $5 on an order 12 times per year?
L3: I’m not, are you? It is in ‘the second order of smalls’ (Alfred Marshall). It doesn;’t get you where you want to be.You are stretching. Bilt is still #1.
10) Your calculations don’t account for various benefits going to waste due to Bilt having a punitive policy regarding when certain credits expire like GrubHub, Walgreens, etc.
L3: Not sure what you are saying here. What is your depreciated value of those offers? I don’t use Grubhub because the drivers urinate on the deliveries when I don’t tip them ‘enough’.
11) Your post says “Deflation percentages are the same as the FM deflations for the AMEX Platinum Card.” That’s grossly incorrect. For example, you’re valuing the Bilt Palladium 2x $200 hotel credits at 88%, whereas we value the Amex Platinum 2x $300 hotel credits at 50%. You value the GrubHub redemption at 80%, we value the $10 monthly dining credit on the Amex Gold card at 25%.
L3: Repetitive.
L3:
So let me see if I understand you:
SP1) You are saying that Bilt is worth $600, right? I can quote Stephen Pepper as valuing Bilt at $600?
Or should I take what you say with a grain of salt?
SP2) You are saying that the FM valuation method is valid, right? I can quote Stephen Pepper as saying that?
SP3) And you speak, ‘vox FM’, right? So you speak for Greg and Nick as well, right?
Just want to check that I am not misrepresenting you.
If that is what you meant then that is what I shall do, but I think all three of you would be better advised to admit you missed Bilt. Thank me for comprehensively and consistently pointing that out. And totally rebuild your first year evaluation model. In fact, why not put out a call for ideas. You might get better results from outside the bunker than within it.
Re Bilt Cash vs Housing-Only Rewards – you can only get “similarly huge returns” a) if you’re willing to spend a ton on the Palladium card and b) if you have a very large mortgage or rent payment each month.
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You’ve claimed numerous times in comments on various different posts that the Palladium card first year value is $3K+, but in your last comment you admitted that you don’t value some of the “benefits” (that aren’t benefits – they’re Bilt Cash redemptions) which go into making up that $3K+ figure.
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I’ve also pointed out that you’re using the wrong “deflation” figures for things like hotel credits and GrubHub which you claim are the figures we use on Frequent Miler. Despite pointing out that those aren’t our figures and that what you’re saying is factually untrue, your only retort is “repetitive” rather than admitting that you’re simply incorrect about how we’re valuing certain benefits.
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You also said (my bolding):
Didn’t you say ‘ If you earn Housing-Only Rewards, more than $2,000 of your purported value immediately goes up in smoke.‘? If we accept your statement (which I don’t) you have just increased your Bilt valuation to $1,000+ from the FM claim of $600. Oops! The truth is wriggling out.
As you can see, I said your purported value – not ours. I therefore didn’t increase our valuation of the Palladium first year value because it was clearly and specifically referring to how you’re valuing it.
Our first year value estimates are precisely that: estimates. At no point do we say that people can only get $x amount of value from a welcome offer. It’s simply a conservative estimate that an average person could expect to get from the welcome bonus + certain card benefits.
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You asserted that:
And actually, 12 bookings a year is not that hard to imagine users of a travel web site doing. You should get out more.”
12 bookings per year would require a minimum of 24 paid hotel nights. Many readers of this site aren’t going to be staying 24 nights in hotels each year in the first place. Those who are will often be booking stays of 5+ nights for vacations, not in 2 night increments once per month. Of those who do, many will be booking with points, rather than booking paid nights. Of those who do want to book a 2 night stay every single month of the year, there’s a good chance that they’ll be booking stays that cost far more than $50 per night which means that they’ll have a larger cash co-pay for the additional cost every single month beyond the $100 Bilt Cash redemption.
Over the past 12 months, I’ve spent ~75 nights in hotels. Of those, only 3 were paid for out of pocket and that was because they were so cheap ($50-$75 per night), plus they were one night stays. 5 nights were also booked using the hotel credit on Amex Platinum & Business Platinum cards. Despite spending three times as many nights in hotels compared to that 24 night requirement to get full “value” from the Bilt Cash hotel redemption option, that redemption would’ve held zero value as none of our stays were for two nights.
Your valuation of that benefit also doesn’t account for the fact that you won’t earn hotel points, you won’t earn elite night credits, you won’t receive status benefits, etc. for those bookings. That’s simply not appealing for many of our readers.
You also claimed that we value that benefit at 85% – again, that’s simply incorrect.
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You claimed again that our valuation of the 2x $200 Bilt hotel credit is 88%. It’s not – it’s 25%, something I’d already pointed out, yet you continue to double down on being wrong and still claim we value it at 88%.
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With regards to the parking and GoPuff credits, I questioned the value of that and how many people would value those.
You replied “I’m not, are you?” Except you were valuing those. Your post clearly lists those benefits, assigns a value to them, and includes those values in your purported $3K+ total value. If you don’t think they hold any value for your average person, great – we don’t either, which is why we assigned zero value for them when calculating the first year value estimates for your average person.
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No, I don’t speak for Greg and Nick – I speak for myself. I’m simply explaining how our first year value estimates are calculated, something that is clearly laid out here.
Impressed that Stephen took the time to respond in such detail. Like, clearly it’ll never be good enough for L3, but Stephen’s an honorable guy to explain himself and take the heat. Well done.
Are you making sure to deduct the late fees because Bilt’s portal didn’t actually process my housing payment in that calculation?
I made absolutely certain I excluded them. Clearly, you should not be messing with the grownups card.
Unfortunately, according to Kerr, only allowing grown ups to use the card removes 99% of their market share.
If it were 2016, I’d vote for this Jeb!
Dude, it’s not even worth $200, and most are gonna downgrade or close after renewal AF hits in February 2027…
Google ‘Using Frequent Miler’s Valuation Method, The Bilt Palladium Card Is The Most Valuable Card They Have Ever Seen, Even With Zero Housing Spend’ for a line-by-line valuation of Bilt, then tell us where that calculation is wrong.
Google says… “no, thanks”
I donno, bud. I’m starting to think you’ve got an ulterior motive promoting BILT as hard as you do on here…
Wonder if this clown realizes his desperation to push this 3rd rate card is so transparent that if anything these long post just push people away. Makes it sounds more and more like a scam every time he posts.
So, just another nothing special Priority Pass membership. Combined with rotten travel protections. Both cards. Not certain what World Legend denotes.
Also, it would seem that Mastercard’s representation regarding the Priority Pass amenities was false. Class action anyone?
I was denied at Be Relax spa, so apparently it is an error.
Kerr confirms it’s a PP site error in his slack
That is why is affected Citi Strata Elite members as well.
I am logged in with Strata Elite but I am not seeing the restaurants in the PP app. How can I see them?
It was a glitch for a short period of time. None of the Bilt or the Citi Srata Elite has access to restaurants or non lounge.
Frequent Miler already updated the post/blog to mention it.
does this perhaps put pressure on the other elite cards to add restaurant benefits back?
No
CONFIRM….It is a BONANZA here at the PDX
If true, this immediately cements the Palladium to being a “keeper” for me.
The card’s 2x$200 hotel credits (fairly easy to use) + $200 in BILT cash (for which one of the best applications is to use 2x$100 on those same hotel redemptions) are probably worth somewhere between $400-500 for me. Then, the fact that in my situation I can effectively get a minimum 3.33x points on all spend (vs 2x points on a few other cards being the next-best option) + gold/platinum status (and access to the best transfer bonuses) bridges most of the rest of the gap with the annual fee. That has made it a fringe keeper for me, though especially useful in times where I will have lots of non-bonused spend.
But PP restaurants is super useful for me. I’m probably in an airport without a lounge but with a PP restaurant about 5x per year. And with 2 people and $28 and 5x, it’s a nominal value of $280, and probably worth some reasonable fraction of that to me. This definitely pushes it into a definite keeper for me.
PP restaurants appeared for a moment this morning, and then they were gone by 11 AM EST. Hoping BILT Rewards brings back the benefit but not keeping hope comparing to C1VX, CSR, and other banks that dropped the benefit.
Not seeing any PP restaurants in SEA or JFK after signing up for PP with the Strata Elite
Agreed.
I have the Bilt Palladium and I am not seeing them either.
Supposedly the BILT app doesn’t show it it’s the priority pass app via the linked membership
I have tried both the website and the PP app using my BILT login, and neither showed anything except the standard lounges. The BILT app does not show PP that I have found.
Can confirm that Citi Strata Elite PP APP now shows restaurants/experiences
Looks like this change is for World Legend MasterCards as I just checked my Citi Strata Elite’s Priority Pass entitlements and it’s now showing experiences and restaurants, too, which it never did before.
Ooh, thanks for confirming that – I’d just asked in our Facebook group about this very thing, so it’s great to know.
I can see it in the app but not on the website, so I’m not sure what is really going on.
Just created my Bilt PP login and not seeing any restaurants available.
Same — even after logging out and back in. My local airport has a restaurant that’s not showing, and I also looked at SEA and saw nothing. So this is either random, appearing slowly for some users, or an error. Certainly intriguing on a random Tuesday AM 🙂
Same
Same