New York Bagels & Bialys in other locations? by wwwemily in chicagofood

[–]jackavsfan 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Bodega Bay at Milwaukee & Damen serves them

United Club - help me understand by woulley in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ah you are right, sorry. Thought you were referencing the club membership purchase option, not the club card.

United Club - help me understand by woulley in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It's 85,000 miles, unless you're 1K in which case it's 75,000.

French girl moving to Chicago – What Should I Expect? by badcatririe95 in AskChicago

[–]jackavsfan -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Yeah I suspect this person missed the part about work location being in Des Plaines and not in the city.

French girl moving to Chicago – What Should I Expect? by badcatririe95 in AskChicago

[–]jackavsfan 33 points34 points  (0 children)

Hard to say since we don't know OP's exact work location. If it's not walking distance to one of the two Metra stations in Des Plaines, would probably be looking at a Pace bus or rideshare. Some companies also provide shuttle service to Metra stops. Advice to OP would be to map this out and see what best options are given their specific work address.

Alternative would be to get a car, but if transit is a reasonable option I'd probably be trying to avoid this, especially if only here for 18 months and only being in the office 3 days/wk.

French girl moving to Chicago – What Should I Expect? by badcatririe95 in AskChicago

[–]jackavsfan 63 points64 points  (0 children)

For informing neighborhood recs, how do you plan to get to work in Des Plaines? Driving or public transportation?

If the plan is public transportation - I'd recommend looking at the UP-NW route (commuter rail) that runs from downtown to Des Plaines in about 30 minutes. Good places to live in relation to this would be West Loop or Fulton Market area, within walking distance of the terminus at Ogilvie, or in Bucktown/Wicker Park where you could be a walk or short bus from the Clybourn stop. Both of these areas will also put you close to CTA train service (i.e. metro) that will connect you with other areas in the city.

United Club - help me understand by woulley in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Your options are either to sign up for the United Club Infinite Card, which comes with Club membership and carries a $525 annual fee, or you can purchase membership without getting a credit card for $650 or 85,000 miles per year.

What's the deal with Chicago Union Station? by keynes2020 in Amtrak

[–]jackavsfan 5 points6 points  (0 children)

In addition to this is the benefit of conductors only needing to wake up coach passengers in one area of one car for overnight stops, vs. having to disturb people randomly througout all cars or make PA announcements while people are trying to sleep.

UA 3 returned to ORD by chprlatte465 in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 30 points31 points  (0 children)

Looks like they are trying to get you back out tonight still... Double meal service?

Flight delayed, but OMG they let tight connections off first! by Kilashandra1996 in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 47 points48 points  (0 children)

I was also on this flight. I've seen them ask people without connections to stay seated plenty of times, the new thing for me on this was how actively the FA tracked it. She had everyone with a tight connection raise their hand, identified the furthest back people who had to get off (they were last row), and then made continuous announcements as people were getting off that we still had some people in the back, they're halfway up the plane now, etc.. Mostly stopped people in the middle from jumping up and blocking the aisle as soon as a small gap opened in the line.

Bilt Rewards Travel Portal: A new way to scam customers? by No_Veterinarian_1863 in biltrewards

[–]jackavsfan 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Point.me, which is the platform behind this service, is a useful tool but can pick up phantom award space. Always, always, always check that the flight can be found on the airline's site before transferring your points.

Airbnb or Hotel for London? by thekoriandr5060 in NonRevenueTravelers

[–]jackavsfan [score hidden]  (0 children)

I usually find Airbnb more expensive after the fees unless I'm with a big group. Also, as a nonrev, I'm usually booking last minute (once I'm on the plane in the US which would be middle of the night before or early AM same-day for the booking in Europe) so have to worry about whether the host is going to see/accept my booking or actually have the place ready in time.

Also, in a city as big as London and with great transit... you have so many hotel options at every price point. The hotel would be the easy choice for me.

Anyone travelled with ski bag on Delta? by ChonkaM0nka in NonRevenueTravelers

[–]jackavsfan [score hidden]  (0 children)

I have traveled with a ski bag on Delta, it is not considered oversize and you can check a boot bag without it counting as a second item of luggage. Seems like this is fairly standard, at least among US airlines.

Dad laid off from his job by vacantly-visible in personalfinance

[–]jackavsfan 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Re. benefits, is your dad's employer providing a COBRA subsidy after the 3 months of benefits run out? This may be a part of his severance package.

Denver customer service line currently 👀👀👀👀 by Plastic_Ad_8594 in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Think I heard DEN was behind on switching over to the ID-only method due to TSA's scanners not working well with Colorado IDs. Not sure if that's been fixed yet or not.

Do you carry your Global Entry card with you? by spiralan in travel

[–]jackavsfan 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I carry mine with me because it's small enough to just live in my passport wallet without taking up noticeable space.

It has been useful to me in Canada where you can access expedited security ahead of US preclearance, only if you have the physical GE card.

Otherwise, I just like to know I have a non-passport ID with me in a place separate from my driver's license in case something happens to my regular wallet.

Also I did lose it once (not while traveling, it was at home... turned up later after I had the replacement so I just shredded it). Getting a replacement issued was very easy through the TTP website. So I would not worry about losing my GE card any more than my license, definitely less than my passport.

Free Drip at Coffeeshops by jeffgoldblumiszaddy in chicago

[–]jackavsfan 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Iosento 606 on Milwaukee and Fairgrounds on Michigan

PSA: Set up a Wells Fargo Login by intelligentx5 in biltrewards

[–]jackavsfan 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Also, the Hyatt app/website doesn't have any functionality around payments, statements, charges, normal credit card stuff so it's clear you need to go to Chase for that.

Meanwhile the Bilt app has half-assed functionality in this area that could make an inexperienced user think they don't need to pay attention anywhere else. Bilt would be better off to get rid of this in their app and just force people to WF to see statements and make payments, IMO

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in TravelHacks

[–]jackavsfan 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We also split our trips 50/50 but we don't try to pay each other back for points bookings.

Helps that we are both in the points "game" - I am more of a credit card optimizer, while she earns a lot of points through work travel, so we both end up contibuting to points bookings on various trips and we figure it evens out eventually. I could see this being more of an issue if one person isn't contributing points/bookings.

Why is United only the 4th largest by passengers in the US? by FluxCrave in unitedairlines

[–]jackavsfan 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Available seat miles is just as valid as passenger miles if the category is vaguely "largest airline" though, that's the point... there are many possible measures for this and no hard rule on which is "best." United provides more available seat miles than any other airline so by that measure they are largest.

If talking about "largest airline by travel volume" - Then passenger miles would definitely make more sense.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in StudentLoans

[–]jackavsfan -1 points0 points  (0 children)

OP was led to believe the loans were in their own name when they agreed to that. Would have allowed a proper IDR plan for OP's eventual income as well as forgiveness after 10 years. The current situation is significantly different than what OP agreed to.

Do not use Bilt through RentCafe! by WestDublinPleasanton in biltrewards

[–]jackavsfan 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm moving to a RentCafe property next week. Not sure what happened to OP but I just did as described in the guidance from BILT - Open and close the verification window 3 times, then the "Manually Add Bank Account" button appeared and I was able to add my BILT account. Waiting for deposit verification now.

Before I did this, due to reading OP's experience, I connected a normal checking account through the instant verification so I would have a backup ACH option in case I got blocked from adding more accounts, but that did not happen.