Question
My parents are fed up with AA. They travel exclusively on award tickets earned with credit card miles.
Now they're interested in getting a credit card that allows you to fly on any airline with award tickets. But, the market they fly, ROC-LAS, usually has fares of $600-700 when they want to fly, and my searches through this forum have only found credit card programs that have a limit on fares of $400.
Are there any programs with no limit, or a high limit on award ticket fares?
BTW, the card must be Visa or MC, the suppliers they deal with only take these two.
Thanks
d
Answer
Try giving a look at Citi's Travelocity card.
Answer
I have tried the Travelocity Card (before Starwood), and I do not think it will fit your needs. The deal is that you earn $100- off on your airfare for each 8,000 points (1pt/$1). That would put you in the $300 dollar range for a standard 25,0000 mile reward redemption.
Orbitz has a Mastercard with a similar program, although it is slightly better with only 7,500/$100-off, and they give you double points on Orbitz purchased airfares.
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That 2.67% rebate from Orbitz sounds pretty good until you realize they charge you and extra $6/ticket for the privilege of buying from them. If you buy $200 tickets that's costing you 3%.
QL
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Since you goal is to: "get a credit card that allows you to fly on any airline with award tickets".... how about the American Express Starwood Card.
It is the card of the Starwood Hotel Program (Sheraton, Westin, W Hotels, FourPoints, etc). Now, you ask, why get this card to fly any airline? Well, here is the scoop:
- Every Dollar charged gets 1 StarPoint. 1 StarPoint is convertible 1 for 1 to almost ALL airline frequent flyer programs. AND, if you transfer 20,000 points, they give you free 5,000 points. So, in essence, every Dollar charges get 1.25 freq. flyer points.
- NO annual fee first year, $30 each year afterwards
- You have the option to redeem it for Hotel stays as well.
The great part of this is that you are earning actual freq. flyer miles that can be used in ALL programs. You pick which one that you want to transfer it to (and it can all be done online at spg.com).
For more info, see: http://home3.americanexpress.com/cards/benefits/redir_cb.asp?card=32
(Disclaimer: I am not in anyway affliated with AmEx or Starwood, just a happy user!)
p.s. - I do realize that you wrote Visa/MC only - I just figured that the above may be useful to somebody as this is a public board and other people may find it useful.
[This message has been edited by steve100 (edited 07-17-2003).]
Answer
Yeah, the Starwood card would have been my first choice for them too. The 20,000 -> 25,000 bonus would end up netting them a lot of extra free tickets. And they wouldn't be hassled by the maximum number of miles per year that you can earn with the Citi/AAdvantage cards.
d
Answer
Originally posted by Doppy:
My parents are fed up with AA. They travel exclusively on award tickets earned with credit card miles.
Now they're interested in getting a credit card that allows you to fly on any airline with award tickets. But, the market they fly, ROC-LAS, usually has fares of $600-700 when they want to fly, and my searches through this forum have only found credit card programs that have a limit on fares of $400.
Are there any programs with no limit, or a high limit on award ticket fares?
BTW, the card must be Visa or MC, the suppliers they deal with only take these two.
Thanks
d
Are your parents willing to consider an alternative airport? Southwest flies BUF-LAS, and Southwest's Rapid Rewards Visa has unlimited earning potential, and you only need $19200 in spending to earn an award ticket (as long as you earn that $19200 in less than 12 consecutive months), and then (except for less than a dozen blackout dates a year) that award ticket it equivalent to a WALKUP fare (meaning if there are only two seats left on plane, they can still get those seats as awards). But the award ticket expires a year after it's issued (it's a true "frequent" flyer system, unlike most other airlines), so this would only work for them if they can charge at least around $40k a year and if they want such an award at least once a year.
(Go to http://www.iflyswa.com/rapid_rewards/visa.html for more info on the card.)
Obviously, lots of restrictions, but the award quality to earnings ratio is not going to be matchable by any "any airline" Visa/MC I've ever heard of.
Btw, not only is the Starwood AMEX an AMEX (so it doesn't meet your requirement of being a Visa/MC), there is another restriction: While it's true that you can transfer points from Starwood to lots of airlines, you have to transfer first, TRY to get the award second. It may be a bit tricky if you're not sure which airline will have availability on the flight you want the day the transfer actually deposits in the airline.
Oh, one more thing about Southwest. Let's say they don't mind driving to BUF, but don't want to use Southwest. Well, there's still the "Southwest effect": Since Southwest only charges $600ish MAXIMUM for a WALKUP fare BUF-LAS, and charges less than half of that for advance purchrase, I bet any other airlines that fly BUF-LAS have much lower fares for that than they do for ROC-LAS (where there is presumably no low-fare competition). So no matter which airline you actually decide to fly, fares tend to be better from airports that Southwest (or another aggressive discount airline) flies from than airports it doesn't serve.
Answer
They hate flying out of BUF, but now that you mention Southwest, that might actually be a really good deal for them.
I think their spend is high enough for them to earn a companion pass, which would basically give them twice as many free tickets, since they could use the award tickets for one of them, and have the other travel free.
I'll run that by them and see what they think.
Thanks for the suggestion.
d
Answer
Scorecard Rewards has no limit, but they choose the airline on the 20,000 point domestic ticket. They require a 21 day advance purchase & sat night stay. I think they cater to smaller banks and credit unions. I've always earned miles flown on their award tickets.
You can also get about $300 off on your choice of airline with no restrictions or rules for 20,000 points.
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Last time I checked, Capitol One set limits of $500 and $1000 for domestic and international tickets, respectively.
There is no annual feel for their MC card.
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Chase Travel Rewards also has a $500 limit.
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While there are some better fares out of BUF, I just did a search on Orbitz for mid Sept and came up with fares out of ROC ranging from $30# to $391.
I have a great travel agent in Rochester if you need a referral.
Larry
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check out the Citi.You card It offers rewards on any airline and lots of other things too. It is a bit like Citi's answer to Amex but as a MasterCard.
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