MGM Rewards Cruises: How to Book BOTH Gold & Platinum Cruises
Can MGM Rewards members book both Gold and Platinum complimentary cruises in the same earned-status year?
In this episode, host Justin Vacula is joined by returning guest Marc Konchinsky to break down how it can be done, even when cruise reps and agents give conflicting answers.
Marc shares his firsthand experience booking and sailing both a Gold cruise and a Platinum cruise, including a Radiance of the Seas sailing and a Wonder of the Seas sailing, while dealing with missing offer codes, incorrect account coding, long hold times, and an escalation process with MGM.
They discuss strategies such as HUCA (Hang Up, Call Again), emailing MGM contacts, and checking cruise partner sites for updated offers. The conversation also covers Royal Caribbean ship highlights, pre-cruise hotel stays, status match opportunities, and broader travel and points strategy.
If you’re trying to maximize your MGM Rewards Gold or Platinum status, this episode will help you avoid booking problems and get more value from your casino and cruise benefits.
Topics covered in this episode:
How to book both MGM Gold and Platinum cruises
Missing offer codes and account coding issues
HUCA strategies and escalation tips
Differences between Gold and Platinum cruise benefits
Royal Caribbean cruise experiences and ship highlights
Pre-cruise hotel stays and points strategy
Status matching, travel planning, and card rewards discussion
Timestamps:
00:00 Intro
00:45 MGM Cruises Controversy
01:47 Marc’s Two-Cruise Timeline
02:32 Codes and Finger Pointing
03:55 Email Escalation
06:51 Hold Times and Booking Tactics
07:31 Cruise Offer Details and Confusion
10:25 Perks and Why It’s Worth It
13:01 2026 Strategy and MGM Cards
16:35 Announcements and Affiliates
19:12 Live Update: New Code
20:14 Missing Cruise Benefits
21:02 Cruise Planning and Hilton Stays
22:24 Ship Highlights
23:15 Dining and Internet
25:41 Shows, Waterslides, and Amenities
26:40 Cabins, Bathrooms, and Balconies
28:00 Status Match Cruise Stacking
28:51 CocoCay, Casino
30:34 Upcoming Travel and Cruise Teasers
31:17 GM Credit Card Rewards
35:03 Why Three Hilton Surpass Cards
36:44 Final Tips and Listener Wrap
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Rough Transcript:
Travel at low cost with points and miles. Credit card rewards bring the smiles. Many adventures tales to be told, make and save money, the world will unfold.
Fight the war on happiness. Pick up the gold. Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast breaks the mold.
You’re listening to the Hery Gerdy Travel Podcast. I’m your host, Justin Vacula, here to help you make money, save money, and travel the world at low cost with credit card points, miles, benefits, and loyalty programs. MGM Rewards offers comp cruises for both gold and platinum members. But some cruise agents claim you only get one cruise, that if you reach platinum status, you can’t book the Gold Cruise.
Today’s returning guest, Marc [00:01:00] Konchinsky booked two cruises with his 2025 earned MGM Platinum status. What’s the real story? Today we’re showing you how to maximize MGM rewards benefits, somewhat double dipping, push back with reps when needed, HUCA, hang up, call again and maybe walk away with more than call reps claim you’re supposed to get.
Let’s fight the war on happiness and answer the call of the waves. On with today’s episode recorded March 17th, 2026. Welcome back to the show, Marc testing a new microphone for hopefully better audio quality. Absolutely. Great to be back with you. This is episode eight of you being on. It is and St.
Patrick’s Day too. Ah, excellent. Excellent for us, but not for listeners. True enough. You recently returned from a cruise you booked with MGM. Yes, I was on the wonder of the Seas just recently and before that the gold level cruise was radiance of the Seas in January. You booked both [00:02:00] the gold and the platinum for your 2025 earned year.
Let’s go back in time a bit. You earned gold status and you booked the Gold Cruise mid 2025. You earned platinum status around December of 2025. You thought it might be easy to book that platinum cruise after you had booked and taken the gold cruise, but not so fast. Womp, wmp, war on happiness. They wouldn’t give you that second cruise so fast.
Absolutely. They were saying the code was unused that the cruise itself was already booked, but then they were referencing the gold level cruise was, it was very confusing and very challenging. A code? What do you mean by a code? I thought you just get the status, you call in, they verify the status, and you could just book it.
Oh, you would think so, but there’s a separate code for gold and for platinum. This was said by both celebrity and Royal Caribbean, both cruise partners. Correct. They couldn’t find a [00:03:00] platinum cruise and I was telling I qualified for it. There was some sort of rewards booking department over at MGM and everyone was pouring a finger at each other.
It was really annoying. Spent a lot of time with ChatGPT, trying to rectify it and come with different emails and everything, and finally got it handled. It. It was quite the challenge. And time was ticking because you earned the MGM Platinum status in December, and the rules are that you have to book the cruise by the end of December and then take it by the end of April in the following year.
Correct along with the fact that I’m also having a challenge of trying to book for good times to travel for myself and my girlfriend. That we actually could go. ’cause you have to just off from work and things like that. So it’s not, I just hop on a plane and go somewhere. I. Right.
You want advance notice and you want this to be an easy process to book and preferably not be on the phone for three or four hours and sending emails back and forth. You mentioned emails. Who were you emailing? What was this process like when the phone [00:04:00] reps weren’t able to resolve this issue and saying things that weren’t true?
Yes, there was a woman Neri who was working with, can you spell that? Neri, N-E-A-R-I-E. Okay. Yeah. I could probably dig her last name up too. She was at MGM and she was very instrumental in getting the platinum code working properly.
She was going with higher ups from her, and they finally got it handled. But without her, it would be just keep having to hang up and call again over and over again. But she understood what we were trying to do and she was on the ball and got it handled. Royal and Celebrity were essentially blaming MGM rewards, or they were claiming that you were only able to book one cruise, but not two.
It’s almost like Royal Caribbean and Celebrity weren’t aware that you were eligible for two cruises. Like they were just dumbfounded that you would get two cruises from a casino company. MGM Platinum members always got the complimentary cruise.
This Gold cruise was an added benefit, and early on, MGM [00:05:00] did clarify that you indeed get both and you don’t get penalized. Say you wait. You book the Platinum Cruise first. You shouldn’t be told, oh, you only get one. Or you book the gold and then you can’t get the platinum. That’s all very confusing.
The real answer is that you get one at gold and one at platinum for two per year, as long as you qualify and then re-qualify for that platinum status, which is why we love MGM. This is what they told me. I booked the platinum cruise first, and they were telling me that I couldn’t book the gold cruise because I used the platinum benefit, and that was also not true either.
I booked a platinum cruise out of China, and I’ll be taking that in time. But it’s good that you were able to book both of them and successfully take them. And how did the emails start? What did you tell Neri or how did you eventually happen upon Neri? I was just emailing over at MGM through the gold email.
Had a link if you had [00:06:00] questions or issues with your MGM points. And I emailed to that and then I guess I got passed up to Neri and then Neri took it from there. Oh, okay. Good. Neri contacted them, or you got information from Neri and then had to speak with the phone reps? Yeah I did speak to her.
And then a lot of it was just emails going back and forth. She was saying it should be all good now within 24 hours, then I would call Royal and Celebrity and it wasn’t good. So I had to go back and email Neri again, and then she would go to bat for me again. And I wanna say it took probably 13 days to get this resolved.
Wow. Don’t try to do this on December 20th. Absolutely not. That was just, wow. Just blown away how hard it was. It wasn’t only hangup call again, it was email again, call again pretty much. And then having to wait on the phone. ’cause depending on when you call celebrity and Royal Caribbeans, casino booking number other people can be using it too.
You’re on hold for a while. You can [00:07:00] spend up to 45 minutes on hold with Royal Caribbean. Yes, these could be time consuming and tedious calls. I usually recommend people multitask, perhaps make these calls while driving, prepping meals, cleaning or other light tasks.
So what was your process? Hopefully you weren’t just lying in bed, putting them on speaker phone, waiting. Usually doing chores around the house because I didn’t wanna be driving somewhere. Because then if you do get ahold of the person, if you get ahold of the person, you wanna be able to
write what you’re talking about as far as what cruise dates are available. Ultimately they did give me a list of possible cruises as a PDF document for the platinum level cruises, which was very helpful ’cause you can actually see on paper all of them. Surprisingly,
the cruises, although was offered to be a balcony cruise, there were different lengths of cruises and different balcony versus ocean view versus interior room and three, four or five nights for the platinum. I was under the assumption originally that it was gonna be up to a week [00:08:00] cruise with a balcony.
Up to. Not all people will get the maximum and maybe certain routes won’t have all of those nights either. Even more confusion. Perhaps contacting them, try to book this early, perhaps when there’s more availability, or maybe periodically calling and seeing if there are those longer cruises.
Correct because like the listing, the actual chart of the benefits for both gold and platinum list, up to five nights for the gold cruises, up to seven nights for the platinum cruise. And then the difference being a ocean view versus balcony, which I assumed, I think most people would assume it as well, that it’s your choice.
I received an email with a platinum code. I think it was something like PLAT 25, but then I never got anything about the gold cruise.
I think the system is just recognizing me as a platinum member. Even in 2026, I didn’t get an email that said, congratulations, you’ve retained gold status. Here’s an offer code for the cruise. That [00:09:00] was new to me, this offer code stuff. When I was getting to gold status, got the code and the email about 25 Gold three, I got two emails from them saying it’s time to book your gold level cruise.
But then I got nothing. Nothing at all. Still to this day, I have nothing about achieving the platinum level cruises. I have an email about getting platinum status, of course, but nothing about a platinum level cruise being available or a code. The only way I had the code was because Neri gave it to me. A little bit of contacting.
And the first cruise booking, from what I remember was flawless. You didn’t have any problems with that. At worst, they had to verify the status and you just called back, but it was the second one that was giving issues. Is that right? Correct. Yeah. We actually wanted to do a three day cruise, so when I got the email saying about, I’ve been awarded a three night cruise, that was fine, because there was no reason to complain because that was our plan. We flew down to Fort Lauderdale on New Year’s Day and then took a cruise on a Radiance to the [00:10:00] seas from Fort Lauderdale. That was a three night cruise, then back to work.
I’d be interested to hear from listeners in the comments if you can comment on YouTube or perhaps other places about whether you were able to book two cruises, what they told you and what might’ve helped to book that second cruise. I think many people might’ve just given up, oh, I don’t want to be on the phone.
I don’t wanna call. This is taking too long. What was the value of this cruise that kept you persistent versus booking a cruise in other ways? Perhaps using a My Vegas reward with an interior room or taking some sort of other offer. The value of the cruise was the fact that I earned it and I wanted it.
That was it. I worked so hard. How about the points? How about the balcony? I worked so hard to get the points. I want my cruise man. Yeah, pay the man his money. Pretty much, yes. I think the MGM platinum cruise, especially with the balcony, they added other things like bonus free [00:11:00] play, room amenity and other perks, and now they have the reciprocal earning where the tier you earn on board allegedly should also at least somewhat apply to your MGM account.
Yes, absolutely. With the gold level cruise, you get an ocean view room and then you get $75 of onboard casino credit and $125 of onboard credit to spend at the room, whether it be for internet or drink packages or excursions or whatever. The platinum cruise gives you $200 of onboard credit and $100 to play in the casino.
Yes, pretty good benefits and it’s, at this point, I’m spoiled where I don’t want to take Interior Room cruises anymore because there’s so much opportunity for at least Ocean View cruises. I get celebrity emails every few days now trying to get me back on an ocean view cruise due to past play on board, through video poker. Or maybe it’s because I have the higher MGM status. Lots of value in [00:12:00] this and offer matching, status matching as well that can come from that balcony cruise. And they just like you. I hope so. Caesars I don’t know about them. A lot of negatives from Caesars, but MGM for sure, let’s keep that relationship going.
Absolutely. They are definitely the most generous of all the casinos that I can think of, and especially for us on mainly the credit card side, because you’re not going in casinos and playing slots or really playing anything. Most of yours is through the credit card spending and the online play on BET MGM.
Correct. And the MyVegas games? Yes.
Hopefully this problem will be fixed in 2026. They’ll update their marketing and their emails, and hopefully this process will be easier, but if there is a snag, hopefully this will help listeners get what they are entitled to and have less confusion about the process. One can only hope. For a big casino company they really need a better [00:13:00] marketing department.
What’s your game plan for 2026? You are almost requalified for gold here in March of 2026. When you reach gold, are you going to try to book the Gold Cruise first or are you gonna wait, try to book the Platinum Cruise first? What do you think you’re going to do?
I’ve already done two cruises this year. I think my plan for Kelly, myself is to book the Gold Cruise. If we’re gonna try for a third cruise this year, then we booked the Gold Cruise in 26 and then book the platinum level cruise in 27.
Excellent. I’d like to hear from some listeners what their plans are for 2026, especially if they’re already MGM Platinum members when they requalify. What are you going to do? And hopefully this will encourage listeners who don’t have MGM status to at least go for the gold, the MGM gold status with the MGM iconic credit card and the no annual fee
mGM rewards masterCard. Tremendous value in having both of these [00:14:00] cards. There is a one year cool down period when you get one card, you have to wait a year before getting a signup bonus on a second card, but I have both. You have both, and it’s really awesome to be able to get two cruises per year and so many benefits from holding these credit cards.
I don’t know of any other credit card where you can spend and get a comped cruise twice a year.
Your recommendation is if you don’t have either of the MGM cards to get the iconic first. Get the iconic first because it’s going to give you more tier credits. It has a lot of benefits. Correct. ’cause when I got the card, the basic card was the one that was available.
The icon came like midyear and I had to wait for the 12 months to be passed to get the second one. Plus it’s metal. Everyone a metal card? Yes. It looks nicer. It’s heavier, and there is an increased signup bonus. At the time of recording March 20 26, they are throwing in a bonus, 15,000 [00:15:00] tier credits.
And many of the benefits. And we’re waiting on the renewal of the iconic card because many benefits will post on the card member anniversary, so we’ll see what that looks like. The complimentary night, the extra tier credits, I believe, and other perks.
Yes. And you also get $200 of annual resort credit. If you really need to rack up points quickly, there’s also accelerated earn on the MGM category that your spend at MGM is further multiplied compared to the no annual fee card.
And you get a complimentary night when you spend $25,000 in a year which you’re gonna do anyway if you’re striving for these cruises. Yes. I’m waiting to see what that benefit actually is. I believe that’s on the card member anniversary, whether they just add $200 to your account because that’s what they’ve done with other benefits.
That’d be really nice because I imagine many that would spend heavy on the card already have complimentary nights or very low cost nights, [00:16:00] or we’re using MyVegas for our complimentary nights. It could be a redundant benefit, but hopefully they just give us the 200 in comps, that would be really nice.
And then you can get the great Mexican food at the Borgata. Yes, it’s changed many times. It was one thing and now it’s called breakfast time. They’ve run out of names for sure, but still Huevos Rancheros and you can’t beat it. Absolutely. Except for the Amphora lounge and the buffet later in the day, certainly.
But for breakfast, you gotta go somewhere. Ah, they do have the brunch buffet sometimes as well.
We’ll take a break for some announcements, and after the break we’ll talk about your recent cruise experiences and why listeners should fight for their rights to party and get two cruises in one year.
For more content between shows, follow Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast on Facebook and x. Follow Justin Vacula on Instagram.
Subscribe to Hurdy Gurdy Travel podcast on YouTube for [00:17:00] daily content, including travel videos, podcast clips and posts. Find more information including select episode transcripts at HurdyGurdyTravel.com. And Marc, you’re on Facebook primarily on social media? Yes, I would say so. Yep. Okay. If you could spell your name for listeners.
Marc. MARC. Last name is Konchinsky, K-O-N-C-H-I-N-S-K-Y. And if you find me on Facebook, you’ll see Mark under the Friends. You could search through there. MARC? Yes, absolutely. Visit meetup.com/PhillyMilesAndPoints to RSVP for monthly Greater Philadelphia Travel Credit Miles and Points Meetups I host in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania.
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Use my link in the show notes. Get SaveWise.com/HurdyGurdy. Once again, I’m here today with Marc Konchinsky returning podcast guest talking about MGM Rewards, cruises, booking two cruises in a comp booking, two cruises in one status earning year. And you had an update Marc, a live update as we are recording.
Live update. Live update. I’m logging into my Royal Caribbean, the website . It says up to a balcony room plus $200 onboard credit, a hundred dollars free play up to five nights. qualified sailings redeemed by February 2027, and the code is the same code as last year, but just they just advanced the digit.
Two six PLT five, correct. Two six, Percy, Lima, tango five. You can see all the live sailings and then separate by room type, whether it’s ocean [00:20:00] view, balcony, or interior room. And then you can redeem it. No mention of a gold cruise again. Here’s a new issue.
Oh, oh. So now have a new problem. Now where’s my gold cruise, man? Come on man. I just want a cruise. I wanted to cruise twice. Now we gotta fight for it again. But at least we have the platinum cruise already, which I guess is because I have platinum status.
They really need to clarify. This is really bad. They added the new benefit, but not everything was really added. It’s not seamless, MGM, but we do appreciate the gesture of adding more benefits. It is nice to look at a list of all the cruises as far as like when, where they’re going from and what the dates are, and then you can do your own research about the ships.
Having to sit there and call on the phone and make like a list. It’s very convenient for that matter, but but man, like, where’s my gold cruise? Come on. Where’s my money? Where’s my money? Just don’t bring a baseball bat to the headquarters. That’s all
our Generation X fans will remember the I want my $2 from the kid with the newspaper. Better Off [00:21:00] Dead. A classic movie with John Cusack. Let’s talk about the cruises. After all the effort of earning the tier and making the phone calls what were some of the notable moments from your two cruises that you had booked with MGM and Royal Caribbean slash Celebrity?
I have three American Express Hilton Surpass cards which generously if you spend on the account, come with the annual night to spend it. Basically any other properties. So what I always do is go to these larger cities that have a nice Hilton property, and we stay at one of those in advance of a cruise.
You used yours internationally. I just don’t do too much international travel other than the cruising itself. We flew down to Fort Lauderdale for the first cruise. Did a really swanky Hilton property. Got on the cruise ship radiance of the Seas on the day after New Year’s and did a three night cruise over the weekend, and then were done on Monday back home.
Flew back home on Tuesday because the rates were less and drove [00:22:00] right from the airport to work. Ah and then worked the day. Yes, absolutely. I’m still rooting for the Quit Your Job 2026, but we’ll see how that goes. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely.
We chose it primarily because it met our schedule, because that we could fly down on New Year’s Day, which was a day off from work for both Kelly and myself. It was a short cruise and then get back and get back to work. And then for the four night cruise, that was on the Wonder of the Seas, which is by far the largest ship that we’ve ever been on. It is the fourth largest cruise ship. It’s up to 7,000 passengers has I think like 15 different bars and all these upscale restaurants and just a massive aqua theater and stage show and a dedicated comedy club.
Just a really great cruise ship. All kinds of great experiences there. We would go ahead and choose a larger ship hands down every time.
I really like this comp cruising because you get to have this luxury [00:23:00] experience at very low cost. I, for one, would never pay something like $3,000 to take a cruise, but I’m happy to just pay the taxes and fees and have this experience at very low cost.
It’s a sort of all inclusive experience. What were the dining experiences like for you? We did the windjammer buffet and also the main dining room for the most part.
One night of the upscale dining on Wonder of the Seas, we did a restaurant called Wonderland. And that was a exchange, like a delayed Valentine’s present to each other. The main dining room is quite nice so you don’t have to do upscale dining.
And in neither case do we ever do a drink package. So we’re not big drinkers like that. Paid for internet twice, because I’ve learned long ago that if I don’t have internet on the cruise, I don’t post about the Facebook ever.
Oh, mandatory. Mandatory. To have the mandatory to have the internet man and the MGM cruises give you the onboard credit, which can offset the internet cost. But I think at worst with the premium, it’s maybe something [00:24:00] like 20 a day. Correct. That’s what we did. I had internet on both times.
And the Dining quality. Some have been skeptical of the buffets on the cruises or some of the cruise companies. How was it with Royal Caribbean? We were really impressed with the food quality on Royal Caribbean, both in the main dining room and also in the Windjammer.
Very happy with it. It definitely is more luxurious, more fancy food than Norwegian in my experience. I will be taking a Virgin Voyages cruise again in 2026, so listeners stay tuned for an episode on that. Yes. That’s still on our bucket list as far as what we wanna do. ’cause I know my girlfriend really wants to try out those hammocks.
They have a hammock in every balcony. You can actually sail while you’re sailing, sail back and forth. Come sail away with me as the song goes. Absolutely. Stacking the sailing.
What about made to order options [00:25:00] for fresher food as some lament the buffet? Oh, the food’s been out there. It’s been sitting. I’ve gone to many of the Asian stations where they would have a clean wok, fresh ingredients, make the food for you stir fry style, or sometimes they would have a soup section with the fresh ingredients and just make it for you there as well.
Those were good options. They had that, we didn’t do that. We did get on the Wonder the Seas. On Wonder of the seas they have the central park and there’s a central park cafe, and there they would do salads to order. They did do some wraps and things like that, of that nature.
Not to order, they just prepared them fresh for you and you gave me a pager and then you’d come back up for your food was ready. The bigger ship, I imagine lots of water slides and swimming possible on board. There was a dry slide called the abyss. It was like a kind of, you went down on almost like a sack you put your feet in it. There were a couple of different water slides.
The shows you went to many of the shows and they were water [00:26:00] themed as well.
They have an aqua theater, and the show on that ship was called. Intense. It was all women doing the high dive jumping and synchronized swimming and play acting, sword fighting and things of that nature. It was set to like high energy music.
It was, probably the best show at sea I ever saw. And then there was also an ice skating rink on that ship. We saw an ice skating show and Oh, that’s different also. The Absolutely, and also the stage shows and there was a comedy club, a dedicated comedy club where they had, two different comedians that did shows. We’ve actually gone to shows more than once before because I’ve been on the Norwegian jade twice. We saw the same show twice on that ship. And how about the room type? How was the room quality? Especially the size of the bathroom.
Did you get any bigger bathrooms? Bigger bedroom areas with the ocean view and the balcony. The ocean view on Radiance of the seas was perfectly fine. It wasn’t anything over the top compared to other cruise ships [00:27:00] we’ve been on. However, on the wonder the seas with the balcony view it has a lot of the modern amenities that you expect. There’s USB and electrical at your nightstand with the lights inside the bed. There’s actually more outlets in the room. There’s a hard shell, like a clamshell, clear glass shower stall. Not the shower curtain that will blow in the breeze from the fan and stick to your legs.
In the corner of the bathroom, there’s a foot peg where you can get to put your foot when you’re shaving your legs. She liked that and plenty of closet space.
Any jacuzzi or jets for the tub? Was there a tub? There was not a tub. We’ve had tubs on the Norwegian jade based on the balcony room that we chose, but not on this ship. I imagine they have the bathtubs on the ship. Just not the room category
we got, which was a standard balcony.
The Margaritaville at Sea Islander Balcony Suite that I got reigned supreme of all the bathrooms. How about that? Looking at your videos. Absolutely, yes. We do wanna try to Margaritaville at some point. It just hasn’t hasn’t come to [00:28:00] fruition.
And when you’ve got MGM just basically trouncing two different cruises a year in your face, plus the promise of your spending in the casino counting twice, once for Royal Caribbean and then again for MGM. It tempts you to stay with them. Yes. Maybe it’s going to be one per quarter cruise in that you go to Atlantic City, you do the Ocean Casino status match.
Bring your MGM platinum card, you take the virgin voyages cruise with ocean, and then you match. Margaritaville at sea, so you can get four cruises with this method. Very easy. And then optional side quests perhaps with Princess Carnival and other companies. All the cruises all the time. Quit your job 2026.
Any other thoughts on the cruises that you took? Any other highlights? Things that stood out?
This was our first time at the Perfect Day at CocoCay, which was a lot of fun. The private islands are always nice because it’s very [00:29:00] controlled. Various different forms of entertainment, music and there was volleyball nets and people doing cornhole games and everything was already established there. You weren’t having to figure out how things are done or how to run a scooter or whatever. It was all right there for you.
You played some video poker. Not too much, some blackjack, not too much. With some more practice and time for these future cruises and hopefully not feeling sick.
Then you’ll hopefully play more on the 2026 cruises, maybe playing through about 8,000, maybe 9,000, getting a lot more credit card spend, the cruise offers and more. I’m rooting for you on the future Cruises. Yes, for this last cruise on the Wonder, I was sick for the first three days. The day we arrived in Miami.
I was sick that day. Oh, and then two more days of the cruise port. And as I’m sure other listeners can attest, it’s best not to [00:30:00] play when you’re either sick or tired because you’ll make mistakes. I really didn’t go to the casino very much on that cruise. Or running up 15 or 25 drinks depending on what the drink package permits.
Yeah. I had no drinks. I’m not opposed to drinking. I just didn’t have any. In the casino they usually give you the comp drinks when you’re playing, at least when you’re on these offers. And perhaps at the end of a session you could have one, maybe one during the session.
Just not going too crazy. Of course, use credit responsibly and gamble intelligently. Absolutely. Any upcoming travels? We’re recording again March, 2026. What are we seeing for the rest of 2026? My girlfriend has a trip with her youngest daughter planned.
They’re gonna go to Utah, but I don’t have any travel planned myself, not at this point. The cruises are coming ’cause I’m looking at the offer for a platinum level cruise right now. We can book and book that and take that right now if we wanted to.
Maybe, but it’s my understanding that you have to requalify [00:31:00] for the status in order to actually take the cruise, so perhaps it’s a teaser. It could be. It is nice because I’m looking at the cruise dates and it does carry all the way up to February 15th, 2027. We have the entire year of cruises look in a list of all the different possibilities.
You mentioned that you had three Hilton Surpass cards. You have other cards with American Express, many Chase cards. You’re well past the Chase 5 24 rule. You’ve looked into other cards to get, the MGM credit cards. One interesting card that you got is the GM card now with Barclays, which I think is a big improvement versus the old Capital One and the
goldman Sachs version of the card. What was appealing that had you sign up for the GM card? This can be a niche play for listeners deep in the credit card game, looking for more cards. I sell general Motors vehicles professionally. As my career, it was a unique opportunity with this [00:32:00] new rendition of it, with Barclays, it basically becomes a catchall card because it’s three x on virtually everything you’d ever spend money on.
And then if you’re at a GM dealership, you’ll essentially get a bonus seven x. You’re basically gonna get 10 x. you do have to spend those credits at a GM dealership, but even if you aren’t driving a GM vehicle, the fact that they can put tires on virtually any vehicle Fords or Toyotas or Nissans or whatever.
They can do inspections, they can do oil changes on other makes. It makes the card appealing as a catch-all card. And the three X is a 1 cent per point redemption, correct. Correct. A hundred percent. Basically everything you spend on the card, you’re essentially earning 3 cents back and you’re redeeming it for service work or parts at a GM dealership or potentially for OnStar service in your car, things of that nature.
For me, I get my car serviced because I’m already there. Able to redeem those points and pay for those oil changes and whatnot as well.
That could be really good for the oil changes in inspection, and I don’t think there’s much [00:33:00] markup on those or they’re really competitive. And I like the idea of certified pre-owned vehicles, that you can use these GM points toward the purchase of a certified pre-owned vehicle and when you’re purchasing that vehicle. At least when I bought from you in the past, they allowed a $3,000 swipe. So I’d get the 10 x on that three K initial spend, finance the rest with a low cost auto loan, or just pay it. And then those 10 x points would then be carried over to future oil changes or a future vehicle.
Correct. Yes. When you spend over 499 at a GM dealership, you’ll be getting 10 x points essentially. We bought a car for Kelly’s oldest daughter. I put $3,000 on that GM card and got 10 x points that was $300 basically to spend in the service department or parts counter at my dealership.
You can also put those points to use towards vehicles that are financed with GM Financial, which is of [00:34:00] course GM’s banking arm. You can redeem the points to make the car payment itself as well, whether it be a lease that’s interesting or finance.
And there’s a signup bonus too at the time of recording in March, I believe it’s 30,000 points, essentially
$300. It may be higher or lower at a future time. Correct. You spend a thousand dollars, you’re gonna get $300 back towards credit at a GM dealership. I have gotten other cash back cards like the US Bank triple cash. I got in at $750 a signup bonus.
Sometimes it’s as low as 500, and I’ve seen cards with maybe a $200 cash bonus, but a 300 isn’t bad. And for the heavier users, the more intermediate to advanced listeners, three x everywhere is really nice. The catches that you have to use it with gm, but using it towards things like inspection, oil change service, I think that can be reasonable for people that have a gas powered vehicle or a hybrid.
They’re looking for that certified pre-owned vehicle, and there is a business [00:35:00] card version of the GM card as well.
Very good. And finally, your American Express situation. Three hilton surpasses. Why three? Why not just one? The cards cost $150 a piece per year to have, and then you’re getting a free night for spending $15,000 on each card.
And then also every quarter you get $50 to spend either towards your bill at a Hilton property or towards a bill at the restaurant, which is how we do it if we don’t have a stay planned at a Hilton property. Six x points at grocery.
Lots to love the Hilton Gold status as well. Absolutely. And then also you and I have discovered that you can actually do a lot of these stay and park at the Hilton properties, which I’ve never seen one of those stay and park type situations that didn’t require payment With actual money, you can never use points for those stays.
But basically you can stay at Hilton property near an airport or seaport, and then they will run you over to [00:36:00] the airport or the cruise company, and you can leave your car parked safely in their parking lot, and then you’re paying cash money, but it’s being offset by 50. Or if you just split tender on the bill, it could be like 50 times three or times four, however many surpass cards you have to offset that cost.
It’s a great use for the card. Very good. Looking forward to your upcoming trips and maybe we’ll see you taking international trips in 2026 because almost everything you’ve done is domestic. But I think work is a big constraint there.
Yes. Work is a constraint both for me and for my girlfriend and then, trying not to be away too much ’cause we have animals. And having to have people watch the critters absolutely. Okay. Very good. Any other thoughts? More cruises, more fun. Excellent. And be persistent with these reps.
Have the option of contacting MGM rewards if it doesn’t work out and check the individual cruise login sites for the offer code or the offer. [00:37:00] It’d be awesome if you didn’t even have to call in and you could just book it through the website. That sounds like a possibility, but I’ve always called in to book it in the past.
Absolutely. Never give up. Never surrender as they say. Only surrender in blackjack when it’s appropriate to do oh, absolutely. Yes definitely. I’d like to hear from you listeners, if you’d like to comment on YouTube, your thoughts on these cruises, your experience with booking them through MGM
Rewards and more.
You can also contact me through email info@HurdyGurdyTravelPodcast.com.
But the email is only one place or the contact form at HurdyGurdyTravel.com. And thanks for joining me again today, Marc. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. This is podcast number eight in the books. Number nine. Coming soon. There you go. Thanks everyone for listening and stay tuned for future episodes.
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