Question
I need some expert advice in charging over 1 Million USD to a credit card per month for the next year. I can use any credit card (AMEX, VISA, OR MASTERCARD). I don't have to pay anything extra in terms of merchant fees and do not receive any cash discount. I am also not interested in any cards that provide a ceiling on their rewards or cashback (like 2% upto 50K in charges). I need a card that will provide me with a benefit for the entire sum of my charges. I am looking for a benefit that would range about 2% and can be more "tangible"
I am already aware of the following options:
Amex Membership rewards: Generally poor option as limited redemption options for airlines and cash back/gift cards doesn't exceed 1% usually
SPG Amex: A great option but don't want to tie that many SPG points. After all, I can only stay in hotels for so long.
Not sure about other card options. Is there any card out there that can provide a benefit in the 2% range that is tangible and cashable?
Thanks for all your help.
Mike
Answer
Why not SPG Amex--you can transfer out into other plans, etc? I'd make sure you transfer out (in smaller batches) up to 1.6MM SPG to AA and get life plat on AA. As well, you can put a variety into other plans if you want, or just keep in SPG for now and transfer as you need.
Answer
If you can get sufficient credit on the SPG Amex, put most of the spend there.
IIRC Fidelity has a card that offers 1.5% back with no cap, deposited into a fidelity account. That doesn't get your 2% threshold but is real money, isn't capped, and isn't 1%.
Answer
I am 99.5% (yep that leaves .5% that I am wrong) you will not be able to use any amex credit card product for a million dollars a month. The only amex product you will be able to use is a Amex charge card such as a green, gold, plat or centurion card and only after a rectal exam because you going over 100k a month of exposure. You see you we will be activating all kinds of guards besides credit issues relating to the United States Patriot Act which translates to “know your customer” and amex will really want to know someone well with a million dollar exposure. Besides Amex that leaves Visa and a Visa Signature product such as Status Rewards White Card but your real relationship would be with the issuing bank which is US Bank and once again you will face a rectal exam from US Bank. Good luck and yes all the above applies even if you are depositing the money before you use your card.
Answer
If you decide to accumulate points rather than cash, you may wish to consider the financial condition of the company issuing those points. I would feel much more comfortable with a large balance sitting at American Express or Citibank (Diners Club) than at Starwood or at any airline.
dennis
Answer
Centurion's discussion expands on my above caveat, "If you can get sufficient credit on the SPG Amex" .. the reason that I carry an Amex charge card which earns Membership Rewards isn't because I value those points more than SPG points... My SPG Amex has a nice limit but they'll never let me stick 6-figure charges on it. I use the charge card for that. And yes, I have been the subject of a financial review. More than once.
Answer
You may also consider splitting the charges up on to several card accounts if the business you're dealing allows that. This way you can select several reward options and aren't tied up in just any single one.
Answer
The 2MM AA Lifetime PLAT is a no brainer, whether you ever fly them or not.
You will have massive miles to redeem, and PLAT status for Life of you or the program. Then move on to any other airline that has a lifetime offer. SPG is a good way for a 25% bonus, but there may be a yearly cap.
You can give the EVIP's and Stickers to me if you don't want to use them. :)
Answer
mikeinseattle,
I don't accrue at your pace, but I make a good run at it. I spread my efforts across three or more cards in the approx proportion that I want to accrue them...
starwood amex is my primary. Let's say 75-80% of my effort is directed to this card. I load and pay off my cl several times a month. I would urge you to not take using hotel points lightly...in the world of affinity miles conversion to value received, hotel rooms (lots of them, high level as possible, resorts, during peak season) is highest and best value to point I can find. I have a buddy who charges $200-$250K a month to an AMEX cash-back program and he swears he is on a true 2% cash back, no cap affinity card...he's even offered to give me the affinity promotion code, and he has been on it for 2+ yrs so he should know if its truly yields 2% cash back...but I am not giving up my starpoint program for even a 2% cash back. As much as anything, you should dump ALL air-only affinity cards (Citibank/AAdvantage, Bank One/United MP), since spg lets you cover most major airlines through spg to airline mile conversion, and gives you a bonus to boot (starwood/amex is not useful if you fly United because of that uniquely-poor 1:2 ratio), but for most others it effectively displaces ANY need to hold that airline's affinity visa or mc).
So about 75% of my earning effort goes to spg/amex.
Next backup is a MCard tied to a little known program, USAA's eagle point program, which is modeled after Capital One's program, where $25K spent = 1x domestic tix of my choice. Distractions to this program are 21-day advance rule and SAT night stayover requirement...so it is loaded w/ gotchas to a degree, but in my analysis, not any more than airline-centric affinity programs (Citibank AAdvantage) and the freedom to choose the airline new outranks "value" of staying loyal to an airline. Believe me - I was sitting on a pile of aadvantage miles when AA slipped in their horrible milesaaver program spring, 2004, and it totally nailed me for my flight needs. So, its taken me over a year, but I've worked off those aadvantage miles and I never accrue them again preferentially. Some Citibank exec may be wondering where my 7figure activity went in a flash...then again, I doubt Citibank cares, nor does AA.
Last, I had been using SWA airlines to get to a companion pass level (100 credits in a year)...but with LUV's new implementation of capacity controls, I am re-thinking this one.
I had some idea Diner's Club / MC would be an "up and comer", but DC has really killed all off their embedded perks and the annual fee is so darned high to offset the primary rental insurance perk. Plus, many are posting of difficulties w/ dealing with the DC insurance program when support is needed, so I am now lukewarm on the DC card.
Finally, of all the oddities, I have an AMEX CENT card but use it the least possible...and because the underlying affinity program, Membership Rewards, has lost SO many partners, and never lasso'd the two world's largest airlines (AA and UA), and because AMEX can never seem to offer a respectable EARNINGS promotion where I can get a little more bang (more MR points) for my CHARGING activity (AMEX's MR only seems to rely on their affinity partner to underwrite a REDUCED RATIO conversion promo, like starwood is currently doing w AMEX/MR right now and like Delta seems to be doing all the time)...who wants more moriund, boring MR points ?
So...I guess my conclusion is that you, and I, face diminishing choices at best. One "coming trend" is that many affinity programs are starting to offer more lucrative point level conversion choices (gifts, autos, etc), both in auction format as well as direct conversion, so there may be a day where MR points become useful and active accumulation of directed airline miles w/ an airline centric affinity ccard becomes in vogue again...but right now it is an odd time for high value accumulators.
I will say I am genuinely surprised these so-called ultra cards (white Visa for example) don't offer much extra value for the fees involved, and I think they miss an exciting and lucrative segment of the market. I am very underwhelmed w/ the Centurion benefits, and true to form, AMEX is slowly letting their bundled CENT perks dilute, degrade, and die, without appreciable replacement. So, I know where CENT is headed in my charging priority. When CENT lost Hyatt Diamond it suggested to me that AMEX was not inducing [enough incremental] business for Hyatt and they felt it not worth their bestowing their top-level elite status.
IMO. YMMV.
Answer
jabrams72 & ja_user,
Are you saying you can earn elite status on AA just by having a million miles from your credit card and not miles flown? I too charge several million dollars to my cards each year. If I have 1 million miles in my AA acct, that will give me Platinum status with them?
Answer
Visa Signature product such as Status Rewards White Card
This is know as the Visa Infinite Card.
I looked at the website: http://www.visa-infinite.com/ and noticed that the only countries in which it looks like it is offered are European, Asian and some South American. Looks like they don't let you see much on the website unless you are able to login.
Answer
jabrams72 & ja_user,
Are you saying you can earn elite status on AA just by having a million miles from your credit card and not miles flown? I too charge several million dollars to my cards each year. If I have 1 million miles in my AA acct, that will give me Platinum status with them?
AA gives lifetime Gold (their lowest elite level) for 1 million miles accrued and liftetime Platinum (their mid-tier) for 2 million miles accrued. (You don't have to keep them in your account, either. You just have to get to 2 million total lifetime.) Unlike most other programs, these miles can be from *any* source, not just flown or "EQM". That's why getting 1 million only gets you the low tier. If you make Million Miler on UA, for instance, you get liftime Premier Executive, which is the mid-tier, but to get that you need to get a million EQM (mostly flown, although there are other ways to get EQM with promos these days).
Answer
AA gives lifetime Gold (their lowest elite level) for 1 million miles accrued and liftetime Platinum (their mid-tier) for 2 million miles accrued. (You don't have to keep them in your account, either. You just have to get to 2 million total lifetime.) Unlike most other programs, these miles can be from *any* source, not just flown or "EQM". Really? Would that include miles earned from AA affiliated credit card?
Answer
Really? Would that include miles earned from AA affiliated credit card?
Yes. Nice, isn't it?
Answer
Yes. Nice, isn't it?Hmmm... that's very interesting indeed. What about a transfer of points - say I transferred a mill from HHonors.. would that also qualify? Even if I transferred the points back out again?!
Answer
Really? Would that include miles earned from AA affiliated credit card?
Yes, or hotel stays, rental cars, shopping, wherever you can earn them. It's a nice bonus, and sometimes I wish I had focused my mile earnings (mostly unflown) on AA as that would give me a much better shot at elite airline status than anything else I'm likely to do (all my biz travel is by car, so I'm now busy earning Hertz ZE1 points and maybe will actually attain status there). What actually happened is I got partial to UA and started putting a lot of miles there before I ever learned about the extra AA benefit. For whatever reason, even before I focused on UA (and after, for that matter; this weekend I have a jaunt on WN, oh joy), even when I was a kid, I never ended up flying on AA, except for one flight on Eagle (memorable, actually, on a Shorts 360).
Just rambling, but yeah, focusing on AA for non-flight miles can be advantageous, at least for the first 2 million. :D
Answer
All points count toward lifetime status, the source does not matter. However, inasmuch as Hilton transfers to AA 10000:1500 you would need nearly 6.7 million HHonors points to generate a million miles. It would then take several years to transfer them out of AAdvantage to another program, and you would lose much of the value in the process.
Hmmm... that's very interesting indeed. What about a transfer of points - say I transferred a mill from HHonors.. would that also qualify? Even if I transferred the points back out again?!
Answer
Hmmm... that's very interesting indeed. What about a transfer of points - say I transferred a mill from HHonors.. would that also qualify? Even if I transferred the points back out again?!
Far as I know, yes, transferred in qualifies too, hence the mention above of using the SPG Amex to get 2 million AA miles (1.6 million SPG points because they give you bonus when you transfer).
Once you've earned the AA miles from whatever source, how you *spend* them doesn't matter, and you don't need to keep that balance, just earn 2 million. So if you spend them to transfer back to HH, I don't see what the problem would be, although you do lose some in that process don't you? Even if you don't, it's just a matter of if you'd rather have AA miles or HH points.
Answer
Thank you for your guidance. I have a large business-related credit card spend, and currently have VS and HH cards, and earn a lot of miles/points. I hadn't spotted the rubbish HH->AA ratio.
SO, what I might do is get the Citibank AA card, and start using that.. earn the AA miles, but transfer them out to HH. Hmm... any maximum limit on transferring AA miles out?
Answer
Thanks for all your advice. It seems that most people are suggesting that going with spg is the best route although at some point I don't want to risk the devaluation possibility. Cashback (or something very close to it) is the best out after a few million miles in various airline/hotel accounts. The fidelity card seems like a good option with a 1.5% cash back. Any other suggestions out there?
Mike
Answer
Thank you for your guidance. I have a large business-related credit card spend, and currently have VS and HH cards, and earn a lot of miles/points. I hadn't spotted the rubbish HH->AA ratio.
SO, what I might do is get the Citibank AA card, and start using that.. earn the AA miles, but transfer them out to HH. Hmm... any maximum limit on transferring AA miles out?
Why would you transfer your AA miles to Hilton. Seems to me that AA miles are better than Hilton pts. Then again I think Hilton stinks, so YMMV.
Ken in Phx
Answer
Thanks for all your advice. It seems that most people are suggesting that going with spg is the best route although at some point I don't want to risk the devaluation possibility.I think you have less devaluation risk with SPG than any other program - just because there are so many 1:1 transfer choices (+ the 25% bonus). Starpoints are to frequent flier/hotel programs as the euro or the dollar is to the world currency market - everyone wants them, almost everyone takes them, and you don't get hosed on the conversion.
For those looking at the CitiMC for AA miles, be advised that unless you're already gold or plat with AA, there's an annual cap on the number of miles you can get from their cards. You can get around it by taking the gold (or plat) challenge and doing a mileage run. I ran into this a few years ago - one 36-hour mileage run to NRT & back and I had lifetime gold by the end of the year. It was the best $500 I ever spent.
Answer
transfer them out to HH. Hmm... any maximum limit on transferring AA miles out?
Oh, yes. The transfer partners are here (https://redeemaamiles.points.com/home.jsp .) The maximum is 150,000 miles per year, but you cannot necessarily transfer that full amount to one partner. Diners Club, for example, will accept only 50,000.
dennis
Answer
Anyone consider the travel package for MR progrom? It seems to me a good value. Especially, you earn more miles when there is promotion for transfering.
Answer
is it even possible to get a credit card that is approved for $1 million in credit?
Answer
jabrams72 & ja_user,
Are you saying you can earn elite status on AA just by having a million miles from your credit card and not miles flown? I too charge several million dollars to my cards each year. If I have 1 million miles in my AA acct, that will give me Platinum status with them?
The other way to rack up a bunch of AA miles is to have a Bank Direct account and a lot of money. Pays .75% interest plus 100 miles for every $1000 every month.
This was good when interest rates were low, but they have the same formula now and getting 4% interest is much more appealing currently.
They do an average daily balance check, so the money doesn't need to sit to collect the miles.
Answer
Taiwan's AE Platinum card gives you lifetime 2x MR points, and conversion rate to Asiamiles is 1:1.
1 MR point = NT$30 charged (US$ 1 ~ NT$32.5 as of today)
So in effect, every Asiamile is earned by charging NT$15, that is about 47 cent USD per mile. With 1M, you can rack up 2.1M Asiamiles.
60K miles for a round trip Business class between North America and Europe.
Answer
You need a mix or cards. Not just one card for that sort of huge volume. I suggest MBNA Merrill Lynch card. 50K will get you a few perks plus AA Admirals membership for a year as an extra perk. I think they have Delta Crown Room as well.
Starwood AMEX. 70K gets you 50K in any airline account plus cat 4 hotel for 5 nights. Cant beat that deal. No blackout dates.
Bank Of America Power rewards 50K gets you 1000.00 credit to spend on anything anywhere. I dont know if there is a yearly limit.
AA card is good once but watch the 100K a year in points unless you get t gold status and can go unlimited.
good luck
Rob
Answer
AA card is good once but watch the 100K a year in points unless you get t gold status and can go unlimited.
Can you explain that bit?
Answer
Unless you have AA elite status (Gold, Plat, Exec Plat), you are subject to max miles you can earn on Citibank AA card each year.
You can easily get Gold status on AA with a Gold Challenge, the details of which can be found in the AA forum. Once you cross the $1M threshold, you get lifetime Gold status on AA anyway, so you no longer have to worry about annual mile earning limits.
Answer
Unless you have AA elite status (Gold, Plat, Exec Plat), you are subject to max miles you can earn on Citibank AA card each year.
You can easily get Gold status on AA with a Gold Challenge, the details of which can be found in the AA forum. Once you cross the $1M threshold, you get lifetime Gold status on AA anyway, so you no longer have to worry about annual mile earning limits.
And to clarify, you should read the AA stickies about the challange. Wherever you are, you can get Gold in one or two flights, for probably $500 or less. Then your card will have no limit, until you are Gold no longer.
If you really rack up that many, you will be PLAT in 2-3 months for life.... So it won't matter to you after that.
Answer
I emailed Citibank and they said there was no limit to the number of miles I could earn.....
Answer
I emailed Citibank and they said there was no limit to the number of miles I could earn.....
You got bad info. 100K limit unless gold status or higher. I learned this a few yrs ago before I was gold and it cost me over 20K in points.
rob
Answer
To the OP: if you really are charging a million dollars a month, you should be buying your own bank. Then you can make the bank's spread on whatever card they offer, rather than the portion of that spread that they choose to pass along to customers to entice them.
Answer
McCoy is in the UK. The rules may differ from the US card.
You got bad info. 100K limit unless gold status or higher. I learned this a few yrs ago before I was gold and it cost me over 20K in points.
rob
Answer
McCoy is in the UK. The rules may differ from the US card.That's interesting, and you may be correct! Double-checked with Citi and read all through the card T&Cs, and definitely no limit! Gosh.
Answer
You could try the Lexus Pursuits Visa Card (www.lexuspursuits.com)
It offers 1.5% on all purchases and 5% on purchases at Lexus dealerships. No annual fee and you could use the points to get free Lexus servicing or up to 10% off a new Lexus. One month's spend at the levels you are talking about could get you there. And then there is an optional travel program for $60 annual fee to use you points on any travel - not just airlines but hotels, spas, etc.
Disclosure - I work for Lexus.
Answer
That's interesting, and you may be correct! Double-checked with Citi and read all through the card T&Cs, and definitely no limit! Gosh.
I worked on the launch of this card several years back. The European issued Citi AAdvantage cards (UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Belgium) have not annual mileage cap - even if you do not have airline status. This is indeed different from the US-issued card which does have a mileage cap unless you have airline status
Answer
If 1) you can't/don't want to fly AA, and 2) you have status on another airline: get the Merrill+ Visa, spend 20K on it quick, voila you're elite on AA and the earning limit (for US) on the Citi AA card is gone.
Answer
I worked on the launch of this card several years back. The European issued Citi AAdvantage cards (UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Belgium) have not annual mileage cap - even if you do not have airline status. This is indeed different from the US-issued card which does have a mileage cap unless you have airline status
Thanks for that confirmation... so, game on.. last one to a million miles is a sissy..! :cool:
Answer
UA Visa and DL Amex both have been offering double points for several months each year.
Juniper's US Air MC is offering 1.5 miles per dollar for the first 12 months. That ratio is hard to beat.
The Diners Club MC has offered a summer transfer bonus to BA of 1.5 miles per dollar/point for the past few years. There have been occasional smaller bonus to other airlines, and it's nice to have the flexibility of many airline partners.
The Starwood Amex permanent offer of 1.25 miles per dollar/point for 20K+ transfers is a good combination of value and flexibility.
Those are the best offers I know for large volumes of charges.
Answer
If you can reach $20 million by December 31 you can get a sub-orbital space flight (http://www.membershiprewards.com/ProductDetail.aspx?clgid=1&catid=109&aid=56823) from AMEX. :D
Answer
Man, What the OP could do with 12 million Starpoints. That would dwarf Gleff's Tatian Vacation. Thats a lot of 400k pt vacations. 30 of them. That could keep me busy for a few years.
SPG AMEX should be a lay up for the OP if he can get a LOC that high.
Answer
Unless the OP owns his/her own business, wouldn't it be ethical to run this by your employer first? If you bring home $15K+ a month in additional income, because of your employer's expenditures, I would think they'd want to know about it.