Archives for December 2013

Earlier this month I tried to engage fellow travel blogger Mr Travel Summary in a ‘Blog War’ where we rope off a circular area of the internet and use our vast knowledge of a certain subject matter to find who is the bestest of them all.  I failed to engage this young man in that […]

I came across something interesting recently. I have just booked a short trip to Carmel to stay at what I think is the best value Hyatt in the USA for my two free nights from the Hyatt Credit Card (here’s my analysis on that decision if you are interested). And was looking at how the […]

As I look forward into 2014 I think to myself, who shall I screw over this year.  The thought has been striking me with increasing regularity how people claim that some of the things I do are, shall we say, not quite Kosher.  But at the same time, I see these people themselves doing things […]

Earlier this month a group of companies won a class action lawsuit against American Express, as outlined in this New York Times article that allows them to charge a different price for a product based on the method of payment selected at point of sale.  Basically, what these retailers were asking for is the ability to […]

Ah Christmas, a time of reflection and gratitude.  I, for one and eternally grateful for the airlines of OneWorld and Star Alliance, and the hotel chains of Hilton, Hyatt and Starwood.  This post will reflect on the points burned in 2013, which is a little more than I expected, and really was so much fun.We […]

The Barclaycard Ring is offering something unique in the credit card space, they are willing to pay you 1% of the amount that you balance transfer in the first 60 days to the card.  I think this makes for an interesting proposition should you be in the right financial position.Clearly the goal of incentivizing the […]

I started writing a post today to pimp a link, and found myself going through a great self learning experience that I thought to share in this post, I hope it will be helpful to other bloggers and to readers in general.It all began with a swap in Affiliate Programs, I moved many of my […]

The IRS issues a list of Merchant Categories, which the business use for calculating how they report their income.  Credit card companies also use this listing process in order to identify which stores count as reward multipliers.  Credit card companies list stores by their categories which can impact the reward multipliers available. Understanding how this […]

I’m currently in Basel, Switzerland.  In this short trip I have already faced a number of money issues that are important to navigate properly in order to create the most value from your trip.  The key issues I have faced throughout my travel experiences have been currency exchanges and both overt and covert fees that […]

I remember vividly a lecture in school regarding the exploitation of miners, not only we’re they forced to work long hours, but rather than being paid in real money they were instead compensated in tokens that were redeemable only at the company store.  What stuck with me about this situation was how ingeniously evil the […]