My AGR card was coming up for renewal this month, and having just taken a trip on the Chief (which was fantastic!), and not having any planned in the near future, I decided to drop the card. I'm just not seeing the value any more. Even if the AGR points aren't technically devalued, if you have to use a slew of them to do a roomette on the LSL and get a cold box dinner as your dining experience, what are those points really worth--because who knows how much more and how soon Amtrak will be dismantled? The coupons that come with the annual renewal aren't worth much to me; I do overnights in sleepers, and I find the rules for the coach coupons so convoluted and exception heavy, I don't have the patience to try to use them to make the fee worthwhile.
Since you chose to use a roomette on the LSL and use a 'slew' of points, I decided to do some math...
(Disclaimer: I've worked through the numbers 3 times and made changes every time. Please don't shoot me if my calculations are STILL in error!)
I just used Amsnag to check the fares of a roomette with one adult on the LSL NYP -> CHI for the month of February. Trying to use any dates closer would reflect the escalating prices as the holiday travel season approaches. As of 2 minutes ago, every departure from NYP for a roomette shows $340, so that's what I'll use. As a side note, prices are hitting $660 for a roomette during December.
$340 ticket yields: 340x3 = 1020 points compliments of using the BofA Amtrak card (fee based)
+ 340x2 = 680 points when you actually travel from Amtrak Guest Rewards
total: 1700 points
Using the 'standard' 34.5 points per fare dollar redemption rate 34.5 x 340 = 11730 points. I just now confirmed this via the Amtrak site getting the fare in points for a February trip.
Now, how many trips does it take to get a free one? 11730 / 1700 = 6.9 (call it 7) trips to get a free trip. Hardly the 'buy two get one free' at your local supermarket. But then, your supermarket intentionally loses maybe a dollar if all you buy is the 3 bags of potatos, or whatever. But they actually MAKE $10 or more profit as most shoppers will buy another $50 or more of groceries just to save a buck on the potatoes.
But with AGR, you're not 'locked in' to making 7 trips to get a freebie. Suppose you make two of those trips during 'double points' days, which run for about 2 months apiece, twice per year (one in effect right now!) resulting in an additional 680 points for each of those two trips. Now it's 6.1 trips to get a freebie.
And if you've ridden with Amtrak enough to get 4K points and spent $5K or more to get an extra 1K TQPs from BoA, to make it to AGR 'Select' status, you get and extra 25% points for every trip. So, that works out as follows:
1 ticket yields = 1700 points (includes 3 pts / $ from credit card)
+ 25% AGR Select bonus points (340 x 2 x 0.25) = 170 points
total = 1870 points
Using 11730 points to get a free ticket = 11730 / 1870 = 6.27 trips to get a free trip.
If two of those trips were during double days, that's an extra 810 points (340 x 2 = 640 + (640 x 0.25 = 170)) for each of those 2 trips, now it's down to 5.5 trips to get a freebie.
Don't look now, but 5.5 trips/freebie works out to an 18.2% return on your 'investment'. Not too shabby. And unlike various other rewards programs, your accumulated points don't vanish by themselves every year, as long as you take a trip every now and then and/or use the CC.
As for the freebie upgrades and companion coupons, it's pretty straight forward. The upgrades can only be used for full fare (Value) tickets. I don't recall if buying the ticket as a senior requires a couple extra bucks or buying it as Saver requires a couple bucks when making the upgrade. About 1/2 the time I get it right, the rest of the time, it's another $5-10 to do the upgrade to business class. I've only used the upgrades on Acela business class to first class 3 times, but that was some years back. Upgrading to sleepers is not allowed, and, like the airlines, blackout dates around holidays don't permit upgrades, either. I've never used my companion coupons, but I think they follow the same rules as upgrades except they don't have a close-to-departure time limitation.
In all, I'm very satisfied with my BofA AGR credit card. I just wish they'd stop sending me blank checks on that account that if they fall
into wrong hands, they've got a windfall. That's why I tear them in half with one half to recycle and the other in the trash.