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With cheap fares, a revamped elite program, more substantial snacks, and one of the most comfortable domestic premium cabin seats in the sky, Spirit has exceeded our expectations as of late. But it isn’t all rainbows and sunshine — on this week’s Frequent Miler on the Air, Greg and I talk turkey about Spirit and what you need to keep in mind if you roll the dice.
Watch or listen below or read on for more from this week at Frequent Miler, including why I’ve decided to stop spending toward a welcome bonus, Greg’s experience thus far with the X1 card, and more. Keep an eye on our Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals post as we will continue to add deals to it throughout the weekend and Monday.
Frequent Miler on the Air
- 01:09 Giant Mailbag & Confession Time
- 5:12 What crazy thing…did American Express do this week?
- 09:05 Mattress Running the Numbers: Should we mattress run the stacking Wyndham promotions?
- 18:46 Main Event: Should we stop overlooking Spirit?
- 1:00:25 Post Roast: How do you refer someone to the fantastic Resy Platinum offer?
- 1:04:40 Question of the Week: What are your thoughts about Amazon pulling Visa in the UK? Might that happen here? Will battles like this lead to a reduction in rewards from credit cards?
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This week at Frequent Miler
Delta vs. Spirit [On Greg’s Mind]
I’ll say it: Spirit not only isn’t that bad, its Big Front Seat is pretty darn good and its elite program offers the chance to enjoy dirt cheap fares without the add-on fees (and at a reasonable amount of spend with the airline). There are definitely sizable downsides as Greg’s most recent experience clearly illustrates, but I think that avoiding Spirit just because “it’s Spirit” is shortsighted. That said, if you do decide to take a walk on the wild side, I recommend proactively booking a backup flight “just because it’s Spirit”.
Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals and stacking opportunities [2021]
We added a number of deals to this post throughout Black Friday and it will get another update today and all the way through Monday. There are some excellent deals still alive, particularly on the gift card front, that could be worth a look whether for personal use or resale.
The games we play
On occasion when someone asks me the secret to traveling more for less, the answer always feels a little more complicated to explain than it does to execute. This post breaks it all down into nicely digestible nuggets that might give you an appreciation for the complexity of the games you play. Of course, the fun part of the games we play for many folks is the outsized winning that becomes possible with a little strategy. The next time someone asks you about those games and you’re not sure how to break it down and explain it in a manageable way, share this post.
I give up: Missing the welcome bonus for the first time (On Nick’s mind)
While I generally play these games to win, I had to recognize recently when it was time to surrender. Of course, I was quitting on one small game because that welcome bonus pales in comparison to all of the winning to be done with Amex right now, but it was a good reminder to me to stay focused on the big wins first and foremost.
X1 First Impressions: Fun, Rewarding, Scary
The X1 card sounded so cool to me when Greg first wrote about it. In the time since, it has seemed like a gigantic waste of time for a lot of early adopters who have been shut down for what seems like no reason at all. I am intrigued by X1, but I’m thankful that they don’t yet have the Android app ready because I feel like it would be a waste of time to get it until they work out the kinks. In the meantime, I’ll live vicariously through Greg.
That’s it for this week at Frequent Miler. Keep an eye on our Black Friday & Cyber Monday deals post for updates and on this week’s last chance deals for all the deals set to end at the end of the month.
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A huge downside to at least consider when doing the math is that Spirit’s default checked bag is only 40lbs, if you need 41 – 50 lbs. it’ll cost you +$50.
with the newly announced easy status match on Frontier, maybe it’s time to do the same analysis with them
Greg missed the fun – https://liveandletsfly.com/spirit-airlines-flight-attendants-punched/?utm_source=BoardingArea&utm_medium=BoardingArea
Sounds like the secret is Spirit gold status — but at $29 a flight how likely is it that you’ll rack up $5k of of spend in a year? Even at $100 per flight that’s 50 flights. And then, once you have it and don’t have to pay for bags, keeping it if even more flights!
Very simple answer on Amazon accepting Visa in the US. As long as their cobranded card runs on the Visa network (with or without Chase) Amazon has to take Visa.
Should we stop overlooking dogmeat tacos in Tijuana?
Just wanted to correct the record. JetBlue does offer point pooling: https://www.jetblue.com/trueblue/points-pooling.
Is the Wyndham 10K-for-2-weekday-nights promo repeatable? Digging around in the terms I did not see a clear answer either way, unlike the $25 GC which prominently states it can be repeated once (2x total). I already have a 2-night Wyndham stay in Dec with a Sunday check-in, so I will get the 10K + $25 GC, and then I have a night at a Caesar’s property in early Jan that says it should qualify for the 7500-for-4-nights. I doubt I would do a mattress run of 1 additional night to get that incremental 7500, but if I did a throw-away 2-night stay to get another 10K, the 7500, and a $25 GC, I would definitely consider it.
It is NOT repeatable. I found this in the terms and conditions:
“A Member who completes one (1) Offer Qualifying Stay pursuant to these Offer Terms will receive ten thousand (10,000) Wyndham Rewards bonus points for such Offer Qualifying Stay (the “Bonus”). Notwithstanding anything to the contrary contained in these Offer Terms, there is a maximum of one (1) Bonus per qualifying registered Member”
Yikes. It looks like we messed up that one!
SPIRIT Airlines…….. Nothing to see here folks move along…..
……..but check back there might be a Viral video of fighting Floridian flyer’s that for some reason choose Spirit airlines.
Sadly that statement has proven to be all to true, but to be fair it’s not just Floridians or Spirit, but also Delta, SW and people from all over the country.
No. No one should even consider flying Spirit. Fly a real airline or walk
One of these days I’m going to fly the Spirit Big Front Seat, but the last two times I’ve booked them, they cancelled the non-stop and rerouted me through a far-away connection point, causing enough of a delay to trigger the refund clause in their contract of carriage.
Getting a refund wouldn’t be a big deal aside from the fact that fares have usually changed by then on other airlines, so it’s a double whammy to fly someone else. One of these days, but probably not soon.