My top 10 most popular (and one least popular) posts of 2015

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In the spirit of shamelessly ripping off Frequent Miler, I thought it would be interesting to see what my most popular new posts in 2015 were. Since I don't use Google Analytics for, well, anything, it took me a little while to figure out how to assemble this list. In other words, accuracy not guaranteed, but I found it interesting and thought my readers might as well.

Without further ado, here are my 10 most popular posts written in 2015, ranked by total unique pageviews. I've placed an asterisk(*) next to the techniques that are still working or relevant today.

Any lessons here?

I basically write whatever I feel like writing about, so it's pretty much luck of the draw when that coincides with what readers want to read about. With that in mind, are there any lessons to be learned from this list?

  • Lots of people want to read actionable tips for upping their travel hacking game. My post on the Chase Sapphire Preferred is the only popular post that was more analytical than action-oriented. None of my posts on imputed redemption values or other methods of analyzing miles and points redemptions made the cut.
  • No one wants to read about my award redemptions. My most popular "Anatomy of an Award Trip" post in 2015 got just 363 unique pageviews.
  • The game is always changing. Of my top ten posts of 2015, only 6 are still actionable or relevant: it's become much more difficult to automate American Express offers over Twitter; American Express gift cards are no longer a lucrative method of manufacturing spend; Amazon Allowances now have a minimum of $5, making them less useful for meeting transaction requirements; and Uber no longer allows anyone to purchase gift credit.

What was my least popular post of 2015?

Just for fun, I thought I'd scroll down to find my blog post with the fewest unique pageviews. For whatever reason, that post was:

In fact, 5 of the 10 least-viewed posts were "Do this now" posts about registering for various promotions.

Expect this to have absolutely no effect on the content of my blog in 2016. Old dogs, new tricks, etc.

The 5.5 cards I'll use to manufacture spend in 2016

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Happy New Year's Eve to all my readers (and especially to my beloved subscribers)!

2016 is almost upon us, so I thought it might be interesting to share my manufactured spend strategy for the first half of next year.

Here are the five cards I'll be doing virtually all my manufactured spend on for the next 6 months, plus a bonus card to fill in the remaining gaps.

Wells Fargo Rewards

I applied for this card back in March while opening my Wells Fargo checking account, but was declined for income verification reasons. When I received a pre-approval offer in the mail, I jumped on it and was approved with a $10,000 credit limit.

This card earns 5 Wells Fargo Rewards points per dollar spent at gas stations, grocery stores, and drug stores for the first 6 months, making it my manufactured spend workhorse until June, 2016.

Chase Ink Plus

Although gas station manufactured spend is no longer available in my area, I will continue to order $300 Visa gift cards from Staples and earn 1,545 flexible Ultimate Rewards points for $8.95 — about 0.58 cents each.

As a Hyatt Diamond in 2016, I plan to make a lot of Points + Cash reservations, which both earn elite qualifying stays and are eligible for Diamond suite upgrades. For those reservations, I'll be transferring in a lot of Hyatt Gold Passport points from Ultimate rewards.

US Bank Flexperks Travel Rewards

This card earns "up to" 4% at grocery stores when you redeem your Flexpoints for air travel. That's less valuable and less flexible than my Wells Fargo Rewards card, but when that card's credit limit isn't available, Flexperks Travel Rewards will be my backup card at grocery stores.

American Express Platinum Delta SkyMiles Business

Even less valuable than Flexperks, I'll spend $50,000 on this card in order to earn 70,000 redeemable SkyMiles and 20,000 Medallion Qualification Miles, enough to secure Silver Medallion status for 2017. Then I'll call American Express to ask for either a retention bonus or a product change to a more valuable card.

American Express Hilton HHonors Surpass

Thanks to my Hyatt Diamond status in 2016, I won't be staying with Hilton as consistently as I did in 2015. But I still plan to spend $40,000 on the Surpass in 2016 in order to both secure Diamond status for another year and earn another 240,000 HHonors points, which I'll redeem when Hyatt properties aren't available or are too expensive.

Bonus card: Barclaycard Arrival+

I won't be using Arrival+ nearly as much in 2016 as I did in 2015, but there are a few ideal use cases where I'll continue to generate some spend: funding Nationwide Visa Buxx cards, opening bank accounts, and my actual expenses outside of the Wells Fargo Rewards bonus categories.

Conclusion

As you can see, I keep my manufactured spend practice pretty simple: start with the most valuable cards I have available, set realistic goals, and work my way down from there. That has the additional benefit of giving me the clarity to see immediately which cards would see reduced spend if my ability to manufacture spend suddenly contracted.

Pro tip: keep your free bags when crediting Delta flights to Alaska

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Background

From my local airport, Delta is by far the most convenient airline to fly. With daily flights to Salt Lake City, Detroit, Minneapolis, Atlanta, and New York City, it's possible to fly virtually anywhere in the country or world with a single stop (although our New York flight is to La Guardia, so a bus transfer is sometimes required).

Moreover, with an American Express Delta Platinum credit card it's easy to reach Silver Medallion status each year by manufacturing $50,000 in spend and earning 20,000 bonus Medallion Qualification Miles (and simultaneously dodging Medallion Qualification Dollar requirements).

Unfortunately, Delta gutted their redeemable mileage earning this year by linking it to the price of your purchased airfares.

Fortunately, Alaska has continued to allow Delta flights to be credited to Mileage Plan based on distance flown, at a lower rate for discount economy fares and a higher rate for first class fares.

I love checking bags

If you just read travel bloggers, you might get the impression that airlines only remain in business out of glee at losing checked bags. Sure, it happens sometimes, but I love being able to throw any old thing I think of into my biggest suitcase and pick it up at my destination.

And I especially love doing it for free, which Delta Silver Medallion status lets me do, for up to 9 people traveling on the same reservation.

On outbound flights free checked bags are easy

Even if you plan to actually fly on your Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan number, it's easy to take advantage of Delta Medallion status to check bags for free on your outbound flights: simply check in with your SkyMiles number on your reservation, then once the airline has possession of your bags change the frequent flyer number on your reservation to your Mileage Plan number (note that this is impossible if you've requested a Medallion Complimentary Upgrade).

On return flights it's slightly trickier

Once "travel has commenced," that is to say, once you've actually boarded any flight on a single Delta reservation, you can no longer change the frequent flyer number linked to your reservation.

What I discovered on my return flight from Salt Lake City after Christmas was that check-in agents are able to honor the free checked bags you receive for having a co-branded American Express credit card, even if you aren't flying under your SkyMiles account number.

To do this, after checking in on a Delta terminal, choose however many checked bags you wish, and when prompted for payment choose to "pay with cash." You can then show the baggage check agent your co-branded American Express card and ask them to honor the free checked bag.

Conclusion

I'm sure there are agents at some stations that are either unwilling or simply don't know how to waive checked bag fees for co-branded cardholders flying on non-SkyMiles frequent flyer numbers.

But I'll be using this technique whenever possible to check my bags for free when I find myself flying on Delta roundtrip itineraries.

Things US Bank told me about Flexperks Travel Rewards

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It's difficult to know how to frame information you receive from US Bank over the phone. For example, a US Bank representative once told me I could product change my Club Carlson Business Rewards card to a Business Edge Cash Rewards card. I couldn't.

But after someone on Twitter reached out to me with a question about some language in the Flexperks Travel Rewards terms and conditions, I decided against my better judgment to call and ask what the heck they meant.

The $120,000 cap on Flexperks Travel Rewards earning

If you visit the website of the US Bank Flexperks Travel Rewards credit card, you'll find the following description of the card's rewards structure:

"Yearly Award Level: For Net Purchases less than or equal to $120,000, earn one FlexPoint for every $1. If during the calendar year, Net Purchases exceed $120,000, all FlexPoints for the remainder of the calendar year are earned at a rate of one FlexPoint for every $2. Exemption: FlexPerks Travel Rewards Visa Signature AutoPay Cardmembers who select the full payment option on the first available payment date after their statement date."

I've mentioned before the $120,000 calendar year purchase limit on FlexPoint earning, but never noticed the "exemption" for people with AutoPay set up. So I decided to call.

My representative had no idea what he was talking about

This is pretty much par for the course when calling US Bank, so I wasn't terribly surprised. But I kept asking for clarification, so he put me on hold and talked to someone who had worked at US Bank for all of 2 years(!), and who gave him the "complete" picture.

My representative's (secondhand) information was that if you have autopay set up to pay your bill in full, then there's no limit on Flexpoint earning. If you don't have autopay set up, then you have to make your payment on the first available payment date after your statement closes.

That sounds like nonsense, and strikes me as vanishingly unlikely to be correct.

A quick aside on base points and bonus points

There's some important credit card terminology that's relevant here. Typically, a credit card will earn some number of "base" miles or points on purchases everywhere. The American Express Hilton HHonors Surpass earns 3 "base" HHonors points everywhere, the Chase Sapphire Preferred earns 1 "base" Ultimate Rewards point everywhere, etc.

Then in certain spend categories, a credit card will earn "bonus" points. The HHonors Surpass card earns 9 "bonus" HHonors points for purchases made at Hilton properties, for example, and the Sapphire Preferred earns 1 "bonus" Ultimate Rewards point at restaurants and on most travel purchases.

That's not how the Flexperks Travel Rewards terms and conditions are framed

The language I quoted above was from the second clause of the rewards structure. The third clause reads:

"FlexPerks Travel Rewards Visa cardmembers may earn additional FlexPoints for purchases at merchant locations in the following categories: airline, gas or grocery (each, a "Category"). You will earn FlexPoints at a rate of two FlexPoints for every $1 in the one Category in any given monthly billing cycle that has the highest total of Net Purchases charged to your Account (the "Highest Category")...FlexPerks Travel Rewards Visa Signature cardmembers will be awarded FlexPoints at the rate of two FlexPoints for every $1 in Net Purchases during the current month's billing cycle for any merchant location that classifies itself as having telecommunication services/products."

There is no language about "base" FlexPoints and "bonus" FlexPoints: these are simply given as the earning rates for a variety of purchases. The same is true of charitable contributions, in the fourth clause:

"FlexPerks Travel Rewards Visa Signature cardmembers will earn FlexPoints at a rate of three (3) FlexPoints per every $1 in Net Purchases during the current month's billing cycle for any merchant location that classifies itself as a Charitable and Social Service Organization."

But that is how FlexPoints are actually earned

Here's a screenshot from one of my US Bank Flexperks Travel Rewards statements:

As you can see, US Bank is actually following the usual practice of awarding "base" and "bonus" points separately on each statement.

Conclusion: I have no idea what's going on at US Bank

I've never bumped up against the $120,000 limit calendar year limit, so I don't know how it's implemented in practice. But it seems to me there are three possibilities:

  • Earning is actually capped at $120,000 in total purchases, and all spend beyond that earns one FlexPoint per $2 spent, unless you set up AutoPay and pay your entire statement balance on the first available date after your statement closes. If you do, your earning is uncapped. This would be the simplest reading of the terms and conditions as written.
  • The above, except bonused spend at gas stations, grocery stores, air travel, and charitable contributions is completely uncapped, whether or not you set up AutoPay. This would be another literal reading of the terms and conditions, but would conflict with the above — only one of the two can be true.
  • A hybrid, based on how FlexPoints are actually awarded, whereby "base" points are earned at one FlexPoint per $2 spent above $120,000 but "bonus" point are uncapped. This would mean charitable contributions continued to earn 2.5 FlexPoints per dollar, which would still be a fairly strong choice for making Kiva loans.

Of course it's theoretically possible that the version I was told by my US Bank representative is actually correct: that if you have AutoPay set up at all, then you're not subject to any limits on FlexPoint earning. Possible, but unlikely.

So I'm turning it over to my readers who do even more Flexperks Travel Rewards volume than I do: what's your experience earning base and bonus FlexPoints once you've reached the $120,000 calendar year cap?

Overpay by booking Cathay Pacific premium seats with Avios

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There's a tempting intuition that says high balances across a variety of programs are a goal worth pursuing, since they allow you to deploy the right rewards currency for the right job. That's never been my view: I prefer building up balances in programs where I have planned, or at least foreseeable, redemptions in mind. That's why I don't hesitate to accumulate Delta SkyMiles, since even if I don't have planned Delta travel, I fly Delta often enough that I'm certain to be able to redeem them at some point. The same is true with Hilton HHonors points: there's no risk that I won't be able to redeem them, since there are Hilton properties everywhere.

Of course, being focused on a small number of rewards currencies has a downside: by definition, it's more expensive to book flights if you don't have the currency that makes those flights cheapest.

For example, until March 22, 2016, American AAdvantage charges 67,500 miles to fly between the United States and Hong Kong in first class on their oneworld partner Cathay Pacific, with minimal taxes and fees.

That's a great deal, and if you have a slew of AAdvantage miles and a flexible-enough schedule, it's certainly the best way to get to Hong Kong. Since I don't hoard AAdvantage miles, I'm out of luck, right?

Not so fast.

British Airways charges a lot for long premium cabin flights

The conventional wisdom says to redeem distance-based British Airways Avios for short-haul domestic flights or a few select "sweet spot awards" that fall in the top of their distance bands, and redeem region-based awards for longer and premium cabin flights.

And indeed, if you had huge quantities of every rewards currency, for any given award you would want to redeem the fewest miles or points possible, using a tool like AwardAce.

But if you don't want to accumulate huge rewards balances speculatively, you have another option: simply overpay.

British Airways doesn't charge that much for long premium cabin flights

A Cathay Pacific first class flight from Los Angeles or San Francisco to Hong Kong costs 140,000 Avios each way, plus about $50 in taxes and fees:

After American Airlines' March 22, 2016, devaluation, they'll charge 110,000 AAdvantage miles plus the same taxes and fees. Of course, the American award, in addition to being cheaper, allows you to depart from anywhere in the United States, not just the west coast, and connect onward from Hong Kong.

140,000 Avios cost $1,400 in cash if you transfer them in from an Ultimate Rewards account, giving you about 6.66 cents per Ultimate Rewards point in value for that $9,367 flight.

If you earn your miles and points primarily through manufactured spend, 140,000 Avios are likely easier to earn than 110,000 AAdvantage miles, thanks to the Ink Plus bonus categories of office supply stores and gas stations and the quarterly Chase Freedom bonus categories allowing you to earn 5 Ultimate Rewards points per dollar spent in rotating groups of merchants.

But even more importantly, using an Ultimate Rewards point transfer to British Airways to book this flight keeps your overall miles and points strategy simple. Instead of signing up for one or more American Airlines co-branded credit cards, requiring multiple credit pulls and bearing the risk of your application being denied, you can keep doing what you're doing: aggressively earning Ultimate Rewards points in bonus categories.

If you end up finding award space for dates that work for you, transfer the points and make the reservation. If you don't, transfer them instead to Hyatt, United, Southwest, or even redeem them for cash. You haven't lost anything by earning "extra" Ultimate Rewards points. You just have to slightly overpay for your award when you decide to book it.

Speaking of award availability...

There's a reason that I've used Cathay Pacific as my example throughout this post: it's because award availability on Cathay Pacific is quite scarce, and can't be searched on American's website. Instead, you're likely going to be using British Airways to search for award availability anyway, since they display it online.

Not only that, but British Airways allows reservations to be made further in advance than American does! Take another look at the search result above: it's for a first class flight departing December 10, 2016. That's 354 days from now, while American only allows reservations to be made through November 17, 2016 — 331 days from now.

As you'd expect, award availability tightens up quickly once American's award booking window opens. Given that Cathay Pacific frequently makes just a single first class award seat available, those 23 days may spell the difference between getting your first class award or having to sit in business class.

In that sense, you aren't overpaying for Cathay Pacific first class by using British Airways Avios; you're simply paying the only price at which the first class seats you need are, in fact, available!

You should never buy points for what they're worth

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The frame of reference for my manufactured spend practice is not usually the cost I pay per point that I earn, although I naturally privilege cheaper techniques above more expensive techniques, and there are certain techniques that are too expensive to fit into my practice at all.

Rather, my analytical framework is based on opportunity costs: am I better off manufacturing a hotel or airline loyalty currency, or using the same technique to manufacture cash back instead?

In the hotel sphere, it's easy to calculate "breakeven" points, which I call a property's "imputed redemption value:" the amount of cash you have to save in order to justify earning sufficient points to make a redemption instead of simply paying for a stay with cash.

It's also possible to buy points

There is a clutch of high-profile bloggers who write exhaustively about the constant stream of airline offers to sell miles at a discount compared to their normal prices. For example, American AAdvantage normally sells miles for about 3.19 cents each, but during their current promotion you can buy them as "cheaply" as 1.81 cents each (because of the fixed $30 processing charge, the rate will always be lowest when you buy the maximum allowed number of miles).

So the question is, should you buy American Airlines miles for 1.81 cents each? There are two ways to look at that question.

How much are AAdvantage miles worth?

If you redeem your AAdvantage miles for expensive flights with low or no fuel surcharges, your answer to this question might be "far more than 1.81 cents each." After all, until March 22, 2016, 67,500 AAdvantage miles and some nominal fees will get you from San Francisco to Hong Kong in Cathay Pacific's first class cabin, a $9,367 value next fall — 13.9 cents per point!

If this is your view, then paying anything less than 13.9 cents per point is a straightforward win: you get a $9,367 flight, but pay only a small fraction of that amount. Alternatively, you could pick a "realistic" valuation for the flight and use that instead. For example, if you think Cathay first class is worth just twice the price of economy, you could use that value instead ($1,486 for the same dates), and get a valuation of 2.2 cents each — still more than the 1.81 cents American is selling them for.

How much do AAdvantage miles cost?

If you manufacture AAdvantage miles instead of using a 2% cash back card, your answer to this question should be "2 cents each." In this case you might consider buying AAdvantage miles in bulk for 1.81 cents each, and direct that manufactured spend back towards your 2% cash back cards, ending up with more value overall.

On the other hand, if you earn AAdvantage miles by signing up for their co-branded credit cards and spending $3,000 to earn 53,000 AAdvantage miles, your answer should be "0.11 cents each" — that's your $60 in foregone cash back spread over 53,000 AAdvantage miles. In this case, you'd be crazy to overpay by 15 times for miles you could earn so much more cheaply.

Of course, if you're a rich weirdo, you may be burning AAdvantage miles more quickly than you can earn them exclusively through signup bonuses. In that case, the important thing is your marginal cost: how much are you paying for each additional AAdvantage mile, and is it more or less than American is currently charging for the same mile?

Never buy points for what they're worth

Travel hacking is ultimately about the spread between the price you pay for your trips and the price travel providers would like to charge you. In other words, acquire travel cheaply but redeem it dearly.

That means a basic mistake to avoid is overpaying for your miles and points. If you're currently buying AAdvantage miles for 2 cents each and an opportunity comes along to buy them for less than 2 cents each, that's a no-brainer.

But another way you can overpay is by allowing a high theoretical valuation induce you to narrow the spread between your cost of acquisition and value of redemption. For example, one of my regular readers values Hilton HHonors points at 1 cent each, since that's they value he's able to get from them as a Diamond elite with the program. If you take that valuation seriously, you'd conclude that he would be better off earning 6 HHonors points per dollar at grocery stores than 5% cash back — buying HHonors points for just 0.83 cents each.

But a moment of reflection shows that's crazy: instead, he could earn 5% cash back at grocery stores and use his American Express Hilton HHonors Surpass credit card for non-bonused spend where he'd otherwise earn 2% cash back — buying his HHonors points for just 0.67 cents each instead!

My Hyatt Gold Passport Diamond tier match experience

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Background

As my regular readers no doubt already know, on November 19, 2015, the official Hyatt Concierge Twitter account sent out a tweet asking, "Looking for a new loyalty program? DM us and let’s talk."

The travel hacking blogosphere subsequently went absolutely nuts. Things then seem to have proceeded in three stages:

  1. In Stage 1, the first few hours after the tweet was sent out, Hyatt was matching all elites in other hotel loyalty programs to their Diamond status. So a Hilton HHonors Gold elite could be matched to Hyatt Gold Passport Diamond status, as long as they could show a stay with HIlton in the last year.
  2. The door quickly shut on Stage 1, and in Stage 2, only Starwood Preferred Guest Platinum elites were being matched to Hyatt Gold Passport Diamond status. Elites with programs besides Starwood Preferred Guest could be matched only to Hyatt Gold Passport Platinum status (the same status that comes with their co-branded credit card).
  3. Shortly after that, even Starwood Preferred Guest Platinum elites were only being matched to Hyatt Gold Passport Platinum status. As I understand it, this is the current state of play, and Stage 3 continues to this date. For way, way more datapoints read the FlyerTalk thread on the topic, starting at the end for the most recent datapoints.

My tier match experience

I sent my first e-mail to Hyatt Gold Passport on November 20 with my Hilton HHonors Diamond status information. Since the door had already closed on Stage 1, I was told that only Starwood Preferred Guest Platinum elites were being matched to Hyatt Diamond status, and that I could only be matched to Hyatt Platinum status.

Since I wasn't at home, I replied with a screenshot from the SPG app on my iPhone. A few days later, they replied that they couldn't use that to match me to Hyatt Diamond because it didn't have my Starwood account number.

I replied again with a screenshot from the desktop version of the Starwood Preferred Guest website, and again a few days later they replied that they couldn't read the file I sent them.

Finally, I printed the screenshot as a PDF file and they were able to open that. Again, after waiting a few days I finally received a response that I had been matched to Hyatt Gold Passport Diamond status, which was immediately reflected online.

The total time my tier match took was 23 days from my initial submission on November 20 to my final tier match confirmation on December 13, 2015.

The key lesson is that it seems people were entitled to treatment based on the "Stage" during which they submitted their original request. In other words, even if they required additional documentation, the earlier you submitted your first request, the more likely it was to be honored.

Life as a Diamond

After being notified that I'd been matched to Hyatt Gold Passport Diamond status, I had three priorities:

  • Where it makes sense, rebook stays I currently have with other chains at Hyatt properties instead. For example, for our upcoming trip to New York City, I was able to replace a $473.90 Hilton reservation with a $503.12 Hyatt reservation which will earn me 3 elite night credits and an elite stay credit.
  • Where possible, apply suite upgrades to my paid Hyatt reservations.
  • Match my Hyatt Gold Passport Diamond status to Mlife Platinum status.

Suite upgrade rules are confusing

Much digital ink and already been spilled on this topic, so the only point I'll make here is that each Hyatt brand — and even property — refers to their "base-level" suite differently. The Grand Hyatt Berlin has a "Grand Suite King," the Grand Hyatt New York has a "Junior Suite," and the Grand Hyatt San Francisco goes straight to "Executive Suite."

In other words, unless you're familiar with a particular property, you don't have any way to easily check whether the suites for sale online are the suites that are eligible for Diamond suite upgrades.

Mlife Platinum status doesn't seem to be instantly available

As soon as my Diamond tier match was processed I went to this page to request a match to Mlife Platinum status. While the request was processed successfully, my Mlife status wasn't updated!

I asked around on Twitter and my guess is that Hyatt only occasionally updates the database of Gold Passport elites which it makes available to Mlife. Since that process isn't instant, you won't have immediate access to Mlife Platinum benefits.

Since Hyatt Gold Passport is offline until December 19, I haven't been able to try again, but I'm optimistic I'll be matched to Mlife Platinum once the system comes back online.

Conclusion

I've mentioned to multiple folks going through the process of tier matching that this offer, while woefully mishandled and generating a lot of ill-will on the part of people who felt they'd been cheated, is still going to be a business coup for Hyatt.

That's because people like me who are already top-tier elites in multiple programs would never consider earning up to Hyatt Diamond from scratch, but as matched top-tier Hyatt Diamonds will make sure we requalify each year with 25 stays or 50 nights, which have to be either paid or "Points + Cash" reservations.

Kiva loan duration and repayment schedules

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I don't write about making Kiva loans very much anymore, mainly because I don't make Kiva loans anymore! But Kiva loans are a still-working technique to manufacture an uncapped amount of spend in a potentially lucrative bonus category.

I say "uncapped" and not "unlimited," because Kiva loans are very much limited — they're just limited by your ability to find loans that fit within your risk tolerance, not by Kiva's online loan system.

Even if you're just interested in using manufactured spend as a part of your overall savings portfolio, Kiva loans are a strong choice: earning 3% cash back on 6-month loans generates "something like" 6% APY — and you get paid your interest up front (or at least when your next statement closes).

Kiva loan repayment schedules are rarely uniform

At the most recent Travel Con Matt from Saverocity made an important and I think overlooked point about Kiva loans: a loan's repayment schedule is rarely uniform. In other words, a 6 month loan will almost never be repaid in 6 equal installments. Instead, it's more common to see a repayment schedule like this:

If you make a loan to Eliza today, despite the loan having a "7-month" repayment term, you'll get 64.7% of your money back by April 1 — just 108 days from now.

Why it matters (and why it might not)

I take saving seriously, despite not doing enough of it myself. That's one reason why I get upset at so-called "robo-advisors" claiming to do things they cannot do.

If you do want to include "alternative" investments in your savings portfolio, it's important to evaluate them critically; it's just as easy to make mistakes valuing a high-interest savings or checking account as it is when picking a mutual fund.

Fortunately, in the case of Kiva repayment schedules, you have a big advantage: you get to pick the loans with the repayment schedules that best suit your needs! By picking "front-loaded" repayment schedules, you have access to more of your money faster, letting you put it back to work and increasing your actual APY above the 6% a simple "6-month loan" model would suggest.

That's the good news. The bad news is that Kiva isn't enthusiastic about people cycling money in and out of their accounts rapidly. After doing so for a few months, I was told that I could no longer make online withdrawals, but would instead have to request paper checks. They did not, in fact, enforce that restriction (I was still allowed to request withdrawals online), but as a general rule it's not ideal to use techniques with manual oversight as aggressively as we do techniques that are largely or entirely automated.

In other words, while Kiva loans are a great and still-working technique to manufacture uncapped amounts of spend, you probably can't replace your entire savings portfolio with short-term, high-quality loans.