Upcoming changes to Chase Sapphire Reserve card $795

I don't mean this as a smartass question...just genuinely: how does your home airport having a lounge help much? Do you leave hours early for a flight to hang out in the lounge? Or maybe you hang out there when they are delaying your flight by 4 hours but doing it 30 minutes at a time like they love to do?

I'm just curious since when I'm going somewhere, I try to get to the airport as late as possible, and when I get home, I'm obviously just...going home. I realize that if you're stuck somewhere on a 4 hour layover and they happen to have a lounge you can access, that would be amazing. But no lounge is nice enough as far as I know that I'm going to spend extra hours at an airport if I don't have to.

Depends how you define "best"

For Priority pass lounges it's still the Citi Prestige card since it still offers PP restaurant credits on top of lounge access- but it's been closed to new members for a while.... After that for PP access... Cap One Venture X used to be good in that it was basically free after its travel credit and annual point bonus.... but now the credit is only good on their own travel site and they are dropping free guests so it's gone from one of the best to one of the worst....

So for PP it'll depend on where you can make the annual fee worth it... I already mentioned that might keep CSR as "the" card for some if they can use the credits.... Amex Plat is (to my anyway) harder to make the AF worthwhile with its coupon book but might be easier for someone else.... The Marriott Brilliant might be the best choice if you're someone who can get a lot of value out of the annual 85k free hotel room, etc...


For non-PP purposes that's much more YMMV.

Only Amex gets you into centurion lounges for example--- but how much that matters depends on the airports you tend to use.

The Sapphire lounges- there's not many yet but the couple I've been to are very nice (the LGA one for example is definitely nicer than the Centurion one next door)-- but you only get unlimited access if you hold a CSR... if your HOME airport has one, and you fly often, I'd probably consider that a substantial benefit unless there's some other really nice lounge at the airport you'd otherwise have access to.... IIRC Priority Pass gets you one free annual visit at a chase lounge and then it's $75 each time.

Cap One has a few lounges of their own too, but given how crappy they made the Venture X lately I wouldn't bother.

Completely disagree about Venture X, it's actually the best by far. No free guests is relevant to only a minority of freeloaders.

The annual fee is low. The limitation to using the annual travel credit through their portal is a minor limitation because the rest of the year, for points earned, you can always easily get statement credits for anything vaguely related to travel (e.g., food).

Also, Capital One lounges are well above average.

Or, ya know, the vast majority of travelers who have friends and family they travel with.

i think it really depends on the area but most PP lounges around my home airport are crowded. i'm sure we'll disagree but i'm glad that they are enforcing guests limits.

Good point; in fact, sneaking guests in was a growing problem and it's a positive change to simply say: one membership per visitor required. No more free rides. If you want a seat, get in line and don't let a bunch of "friends/family" show up to cut in front of you (a universal law of etiquette).

How was anyone "sneaking" guests in? Entry with guests was part of the benefit.

If you buy a BOGO deal you're not stealing the second thing, the second thing is the deal.

A CC company gating being able to get a partner into the lounge with you behind some insane annual spend like C1 did just means I'll stick to other premium cards that still include guests as part of the benefit.

Heck one of the (several) reasons I still keep my Citi Prestige open is it still includes not just PP guests, but still includes PP restaurant credits up to $56 for two per visit.

I am calling this pressure on them to let you pretend you're some generous host to your pals and family, as dead weight on the economic model that we are relying upon. Every man for himself.

if a company can't afford to maintain an offered benefit profitably, while other companies can, that seems a failure of the first company (Cap One in this case).

The alternative explanation is they COULD afford it, but simply wish to squeeze more out of their sucke^h^h^h^h^h customers instead.

It sure ain't my job to help a 100+ billion dollar bank with their economic model. That's very much a "them" problem not a "me" problem.

So this every man for himself will stick with the cards offering the better benefits.


It's also possible your general outlook is why you don't have any travel companions that'd benefit from the better lounge access, but you do you as the kids say

Straight to the point: you've gotten high on the subsidized feeling that you are a host and wealthy big daddy to pals and families,

Str
but how you live at home, is who you are. I live high on life every day with good friends and family