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I am considering this card. Has anyone used it before? Is it as good as it appears? No blackouts, No fees, Any airline? What's the catch?
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Don't know much about their rewards program, but I got a Cap 1 credit card a few months ago before an Australia trip because they don't charge a 1-3% typical foreign transaction fee. One negative is that they usually only start you with a small credit limit (for the first 6 months). I sent them a small pile of cash before the trip so that I could take advantage of charging more than $2000.
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I am considering this card. Has anyone used it before? Is it as good as it appears? No blackouts, No fees, Any airline? What's the catch?
The redemption levels for the Capital One car are based on the cost of the ticket-- i.e. 35,000 points for any ticket costing $150 to $350, so if your ticket was $200 you would have to pay 35,000 points. The value is very bad for a rewards card, consider the premier pass elite card if you fly a lot already (purchase points matched with flight miles, 25,000 points for domestic ticket) or the starwood amex if you do not fly that much (covert to most airline programs besides UA and CO at 1:1.25).
Capital One hassles thread:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=637827
PremierPass Elite no annual fee thread:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=652211
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The redemption levels for the Capital One car are based on the cost of the ticket-- i.e. 35,000 points for any ticket costing $150 to $350, so if your ticket was $200 you would have to pay 35,000 points. The value is very bad for a rewards card, consider the premier pass elite card if you fly a lot already (purchase points matched with flight miles, 25,000 points for domestic ticket) or the starwood amex if you do not fly that much (covert to most airline programs besides UA and CO at 1:1.25).
Capital One hassles thread:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=637827
PremierPass Elite no annual fee thread:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=652211
I agree that Capital One is not a good deal. If you don't want to fool with airline miles, you would be better off getting a straight cash-back card. There are many cards that offer at least 1% cash back on all purchases (some offer more for certain categories such as stand-alone supermarkets or gas stations).
The only benefit of the Capital One card is the low foreign transaction fee.
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I agree that Capital One is not a good deal. If you don't want to fool with airline miles, you would be better off getting a straight cash-back card. There are many cards that offer at least 1% cash back on all purchases (some offer more for certain categories such as stand-alone supermarkets or gas stations).
The only benefit of the Capital One card is the low foreign transaction fee.
There is a Fidelity visa card that gives 1.5% back if you have a brokerage account with them.
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There is a Fidelity visa card that gives 1.5% back if you have a brokerage account with them.
There are other great cash back cards too. Depending on how much you spend total and how much you spend on gas, groceries, and drugs, the AmEx Blue Cash may be a better option. Citi Driver's Edge is another good one with 6% on EDP in the first year. Citi Professional is also quite compelling for some spending profiles. (You can quickly compare your estimated rewards with these cards and others using the rewards calculator at http://www.creditcardtuneup.com/.)
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The redemption levels for the Capital One car are based on the cost of the ticket-- i.e. 35,000 points for any ticket costing $150 to $350...
Merrill+ VISA would be a better choice if this is the sort of program you prefer. No annual fee. Spend $25,000 to earn 25,000 points redeemable for any airline ticket up to $500 on American, British Airways, Continental or Delta. Prefer another airline? Redeem 30,000. Prefer a more expensive ticket? Redeem 2,500 points per $25 above $500. Moreover, unlike Capital One you can choose from many other types of rewards including British Airways miles, gift cards, etc.
No need to have any other relationship with Merrill Lynch and I like the website because it shows "pending" charges instantly.
https://cards.ml.com/MLRewardsCenter/View-Cards/MERRILL.htm
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The Capital One has a number of good points. They don't seem to nickle and dime you like other card companies do. The is particually good for international travel. Their statements for international travel are extremely easy to follow. Each transaction has an exchange rate listed with it. There's no question what something cost you. No spreadsheets you have to create to figure out what they were charging you.
Other things is they do not use Universal Default. I.e. if you're late with one CC company that doesn't change your rates with them.
I'm not sure about the issue Zarf4 was having with the limits. They gave me a five figure limit out of the gate.
I do agree their travel card is so so. I like the cash back card and found it fairly straight forward. The return is fairly compeditive.
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rewards are bad
company is good
im getting one of their online savings (5% apy and can write checks) soon
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It's called "Crap One" that should tell you alot. The card offers a no foreign transaction fee which is good. Everything else about the card and the service is bad.
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rewards are bad
company is good
im getting one of their online savings (5% apy and can write checks) soon
IMHO,
company is really lousy--entire business plan is based on ripping off customers. :td:
rewards are lousy, too. :td:
Do have entertaining ads. Just glad I am not paying for them. :)
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Among credit people it is considered mostly as a sub-prime card-----although they must have many persons with excellent credit also.
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Among credit people it is considered mostly as a sub-prime card-----although they must have many persons with excellent credit also.
I think Capital One has huge amount of Alt-A (sub-prime) mortgage paper, which does relate to it's card business. However, their delinquency rates keep going down every quarter, I think a lot of it because they are attracting the more affluent customers with their exchange rates and marketing blitzes.
I have the card. I use it almost exclusively for international vacation travel. Otherwise it's Citi domestically.
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Today I applied for the Capital One No Hassles credit card just to avoid the international fees of 3% charged by Citicard. I pay my credit cards off in full every month and the mileage aspect of the Captal One card means nothing to me as I have all the miles I need.
However after applying, I did some searches on the internet and found a few sites loaded with complaints about Capital One and their tactics. I'm sure there are negative sites on all credit cards but was wondering if any of you who have this card have had problems such as receiving statements late causing finance charges, unauthorized credit protection fees, inability to reach a human in customer service, ect?
I figured I would use this card only for my travels to China and the UK and continue to use my AA Citicard for all other purchases. No annual fee and no international service charges are what I was looking for.
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YES! It's all true! And there are not near as many complaints on other cards.
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I have excellent credit and they won't raise rate above the joke rate (4 digits) they first gave me. I keep the account around just to help with age of accounts and credit used/credit available ratio.
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Today I applied for the Capital One No Hassles credit card just to avoid the international fees of 3% charged by Citicard. I pay my credit cards off in full every month and the mileage aspect of the Captal One card means nothing to me as I have all the miles I need.
However after applying, I did some searches on the internet and found a few sites loaded with complaints about Capital One and their tactics. I'm sure there are negative sites on all credit cards but was wondering if any of you who have this card have had problems such as receiving statements late causing finance charges, unauthorized credit protection fees, inability to reach a human in customer service, ect?
I figured I would use this card only for my travels to China and the UK and continue to use my AA Citicard for all other purchases. No annual fee and no international service charges are what I was looking for.
Last summer I got the No Hassles card. I'm in the same boat as you, and I got the card for the same reasons you mention.
I've only had two problems. First, CapOne security kept freezing up my card when I tried to use it overseas, even though I told them ahead that I was going to be where I was. It took several calls before they finally opened up my card, after which I had no further problems on that trip. However, I recently started using it again for overseas charges and again it froze up. I have recently taken a direct approach to getting the problem solved-I'll post back when I know more.
The second problem was that when calling CapOne you get (within a half hour of calling over and over) people in Asia, Canada and several locales in the US. No one could solve the problem outlined above, until one of the security people figured out what to do.
I'm still measuring all this and, as I said above, I am hoping for some better news. With the 1% cash rebate and avoiding the foreign currency fees of 2-3%, anyone with significant charges overseas can save a lot of money. I'm willing to put up with some hassles to get those savings but I need to know that when I pull out the card, it' s going to work.
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Stay away from this card.
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I can't speak for the other members, but I've had no problems at all with Capital One. I've just used my reward miles for the first time, and everything went as explained. There are no tiers on the rewards....no black out dates...and any airline/ticket is redeemable. The way it worked (for me anyway) was.....Purchase your tickets (I purchased 2) with your Capital One card...wait for 7-10 business days for the purchase to appear...call capital one and request them to apply your miles/rewards to the transaction. When I received my statement the next month there was a purchase from the airline and a credit for the exact same dollar amount. No Problem, no Hassels. The redemption conversion is a straight 80 points per dollar spent. For me it worked out as follows: $168.80 per ticket($337.60 total), and the reward miles I used was 80 X 337.60 = 27,008 reward miles. The ONLY problem I've had is that they only offer it as a visa card (Mastercard not offered). If anyone knows of a good Mastercard offer and travel rewards program please let me know. I frequently go to Sam's Club and they only accept Mastercard.
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"The ONLY problem I've had is that they only offer it as a visa card (Mastercard not offered). If anyone knows of a good Mastercard offer and travel rewards program please let me know. I frequently go to Sam's Club and they only accept Mastercard."
Ramblinmann:
I've been using the Citicard AAdvantage Mastercard for several years and have no complaints. If you fly AA, the dollars you spend on the Citicard are credited to your AA account and even count as lifetime miles which helped me hit the 2 million level with AA.
Two bits of advice if you decide to pursue this card. First look for a promotion which should give you at least 20,000 bonus miles for signing up plus no annual fee for the first year. Second, if you use the card alot and pay your bills on time, they don't want to lose you. Every year when the annual fee is due, I call to cancel the card (I refuse to pay the annual fee) and when I give them my reason, they give me a $50 credit to offset the fee...just have to ask for it.
Here is a link to the Citicard...20,000 mile bonus for signing up, no annual fee for the first year, free companion ticket and $50 off discount coupon for AA travel
http://www.aa.com/apps/netSAAver/ViewPromotionsDetail.jhtml?repositoryId=16018556&repositoryName=PromotionContentRepository&itemDescriptor=PromotionContent
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They suck!!!
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The ONLY problem I've had is that they only offer it as a visa card (Mastercard not offered). If anyone knows of a good Mastercard offer and travel rewards program please let me know. I frequently go to Sam's Club and they only accept Mastercard.
Received in the mail today an invitation from HSBC for a Mastercard that earns one point per dollar. "7500 points are redeemable for a $100 credit toward the purchase of airfare. 25,000 points are redeemable for a $400 credit toward the purchase of airfare." However, it's unclear if you can make multiple redemptions against the same purchase. For example, if a ticket cost $900 could I redeem 25,000 + 25,000 + 7,500 = 57,500?
Some information here...
https://www.hsbccreditcard.com/ccssa/HSCustomerCare?cmd_Redirect=AboutCard
HSBC Platinum MasterCard® with Cash or Fly Rewards, but the website description of the flight awards is not as detailed as the printed invitation.
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I had an experience with Crap One where when I travelled overseas there was not a foreign fee but they did hold the transaction because it did not show on my online for about 2 weeks and then guess what? They went back and posted it on the highest exchange rate day during the whole time I was gone.
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Well from my experience with the CEO yesterday. . .
Flew in to Naples FL on his Prvt Jet 30 mins late and stayed for 45 mins then went backt o teh airport and flew out, not to personable at all.
But as far as the card. . not sure, don't have one in my wallet.
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I don't have one of their cards, but I've read a few good things about the card, in particular that there are no foreign transaction fees as already mentioned, they give a 30 day grace period for payments (as long as you pay before your next statement, you're good, like a charge card), and they often send out "purchase checks" that you can use and are treated as purchases and not cash advances, so you can get up to 60 days float on that money.
As far as I can tell Cap One has somewhat of a bad reputation because they do deal with subprime markets to a greater extent, and folks who don't pay their bills tend to have trouble with lenders more than those that do pay their bills, so there is a lot of complaining. There is also the issue with them not reporting credit limits on their cards, but see my previous note about "purchase checks" which can take care of that.
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I've had no problems with Capital One. They do not have high credit limits (I have one each, a MC and a VI), each around 5000 limit. I use an AMEX for large purchases. I've never had the card frozen when abroad. I'm in Europe and South America 4x per year.
Likes: Zero foreign surcharges; full 60 day grace period (pay off in full every cycle of course); never challenged when disputing a charge; quickly paid in full the 1 rental car accident.
Dislikes: Low credit limits; rumored weird reporting mechanism to the credit bureaus; nonliquid loyalty scheme (I prefer airline miles/ hotel points)
As long as you keep other lines of credit to keep a high FICO and for large purchases, this is a good card to have for charges abroad, including rental cars abroad.
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This CEO has a long history of trying to profit from foreclosing and collecting from small consumers.
Well from my experience with the CEO yesterday. . .
Flew in to Naples FL on his Prvt Jet 30 mins late and stayed for 45 mins then went backt o teh airport and flew out, not to personable at all.
But as far as the card. . not sure, don't have one in my wallet.
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I still wonder what's up with the low limits most poeple get at Cap One. From my point of view I don't put nearly as many miles or $$$$ through my credit cards as most FT's around here do. But for whatever reason I didn't have any issue getting a 5 digit limit out of Cap One.
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I still wonder what's up with the low limits most poeple get at Cap One. From my point of view I don't put nearly as many miles or $$$$ through my credit cards as most FT's around here do. But for whatever reason I didn't have any issue getting a 5 digit limit out of Cap One.
I keep my CapitalOne card for foreign transactions. They have some unique policies:
1. They do not report credit limits (which is a problem for some)
2. They do not offer high credit limits usually unless you do a balance transfer.
3. They do not engage in universal default and INMO have high-transparency on rate changes, fees, etc. I like this stance.
4. They offer low rates for consumers with good/excellent credit history
Unfortunately Capital One's rewards/benefits programs are not robust enough to keep them at the top of my wallet.
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Cap One offers 1.25 points/dollar spent so that's nice even though their award redemptions are based on dollar value (35,000 miles for a ticket up to $350). From what I can tell all other cards only offer 1 point/mile. Cap One has been a little proactive w/ security as they have frozen my card on several occasions. Personally, I like it because I feel like they're watching for fraud. Tickets I've redeemed have been easy and they've increased my limit a couple times (albeit it was low in the beginning). I rack up about 5K miles/month in purchases so it seems to be working well for me.
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Cap One offers 1.25 points/dollar spent so that's nice even though their award redemptions are based on dollar value (35,000 miles for a ticket up to $350). From what I can tell all other cards only offer 1 point/mile. Cap One has been a little proactive w/ security as they have frozen my card on several occasions. Personally, I like it because I feel like they're watching for fraud. Tickets I've redeemed have been easy and they've increased my limit a couple times (albeit it was low in the beginning). I rack up about 5K miles/month in purchases so it seems to be working well for me.
If you fly a lot, you might find that the PP elite card to offer better rewards. 25,000 points (which can be had for $12,500 spending if you have the matching flight points) gets you a domestic RT ticket without any price cap (provided it meets the 14 day/SN stay requirement). Otherwise, there are cashback cards that give at least 1.5% cash back, which is better than cap one (1.25% back if your tickets are exactly $350).
Also, many users here view card freezes as a big inconvenience. It shouldn't matter to you whether or not they are "watching for fraud", since you are typically only responsible for up to $50 of fraudulent charges (many issuers waive the $50 as well).
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Cap One offers 1.25 points/dollar spent so that's nice even though their award redemptions are based on dollar value (35,000 miles for a ticket up to $350). From what I can tell all other cards only offer 1 point/mile. Cap One has been a little proactive w/ security as they have frozen my card on several occasions. Personally, I like it because I feel like they're watching for fraud. Tickets I've redeemed have been easy and they've increased my limit a couple times (albeit it was low in the beginning). I rack up about 5K miles/month in purchases so it seems to be working well for me.
Many other cards offer more than 1 pt per $:
1. Citibank Premier Pass / Premier Pass Elite
2. Citibank Dividend
3. AMEX Starwood
4. Fidelity Visa Signature
etc.
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There is also American Express Blue Sky card earning 1.33%. Spend $7,500 to earn $100 travel credit.