We live a 2.5 hour flight away from DHs family and really need to make more of an effort to visit. We're looking into getting a credit card where we can build up miles to use for these trips, but it's really hard to compare them all. We prefer to fly Southwest, but aren't sure we want a dedicated southwest credit card.
What card to you have to accumulate airline credits? Is it specific to one airline or can you use it anywhere?
GOLD / watermelon / 14076 posts
Any of the Chase cards that accumulate Ultimate Rewards points would be a good option because they have several transfer partners (including Southwest and United). Examples would be the Chase Sapphire Reserve, Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase Freedom, Chase Freedom Unlimited.
The Reserve is currently offering 100K points (but you have to sign up in a Chase branch....the online offer recently dropped to 50K). IMO it's the best card/offer currently available.
ETA: You have to have the Reserve or Preferred to be able to transfer to the travel partners. The Freedom/Freedom Unlimited are technically cash-back cards but when used in conjunction with the Reserve or Preferred can also be used to transfer points to airline/hotel partners. (Sorry, it's sort of confusing...)
nectarine / 2460 posts
My husband is newly obsessed with this stuff and we just got the Reserve with the 100k promotion @lawbee11 mentioned. The only downside is there is an annual fee of $450 but you get a $300 credit each year on travel so really its like a $150 fee. IIRC you also get triple points on dining, so if you eat out a lot then its extra great.
coconut / 8430 posts
If your travel goals are to travel the short distance to your family (and the flights are reasonably priced), I would look at getting either a cashback card or a card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred card which allows you to earn extra points for travel spending and pay cash for your airline tickets (though the Chase Sapphire Preferred also allows you to redeem 1 pt for 0.0125 in travel -- aka 50,000 points will buy you a flights for $625).
Reason being, airline miles & points can be restrictive on when and where you redeem (when you redeem through the airline). Also, the best redemptions tend to be those which are expensive (e.g. first/biz class long haul international).
To give a personal anecdote, we just booked 3 tickets for a short 2.5 hour flight for $700. To redeem miles for this itinerary was going to cost me 120,000 miles, which I value at a minimum of $1200 so it didn't make sense in this situation. In contrast, we flew to Japan in biz class a few years ago and I redeemed miles for that trip because the cash price was $3500 per ticket. IIRC, I "spent" 92,500 miles which I valued at $925 so it was a great redemption.
eggplant / 11824 posts
For airline-specific cards, I've had good luck with the JetBlue mastercard (used to be amex) and Delta skymiles amex. I do find that Delta seems more stingy/cheap with their miles and has higher fees associates with points flights than JetBlue is with theirs.
grapefruit / 4278 posts
@lawbee11: @JennyPenny: Do you find that you can find reasonably priced travel through the chase portal?
@sunny: That's my concern. I'm pretty good at finding decent flight prices, but soon we'll have to buy 4 tickets and will be restricted to travelling during school breaks. That makes it harder to find a good deal.
GOLD / watermelon / 14076 posts
@kiddosc: I have never booked anything through the Chase portal (except for rental cars that I pay for with cash...they have amazing deals on rental cars). I transfer my miles directly to the airline or hotel chain (usually United, Southwest, or Hyatt) and book through them. The great thing about Southwest is there are no blackout dates, so you will always find availability (unless you wait until the last minute to book a flight or something like that). The other awesome thing is the number of points required for a flight is based on the price of the flight, whereas with United (and most other airlines) it's a set amount like 25,000 round-trip for a domestic flight. I recently got my DH a flight to Chicago on Southwest for 10,500 points round-trip. IMO Southwest is the best choice for domestic travel.
http://mommypoints.boardingarea.com/2017/01/13/why-traveling-families-love-southwest-rapid-rewards/
grapefruit / 4649 posts
@kiddosc: we've always had luck with the chase portal. We almost exclusively fly Delta and it usually works out better than using our Delta sky miles (we have their card too) and it has always or almost always been equal to or less than paying cash through any other website (we calculate the value based on the cash back option on the card I believe.) We've also had exceptionally good luck with car rental through them and while we've never actually booked them, the pricing for excursion type deals has always been impressive, below the ticket prices and typically better deals than I can find by hunting for coupons etc.
nectarine / 2460 posts
@kiddosc: We only got ours a few weeks ago so we haven't used it really. But we're planning on using our bonus points towards 3 plane tickets to France this summer. Currently they're either $1400 each or 60,000 points. So it seems worth it...
grapefruit / 4584 posts
@sunny: @kiddosc: This. We used to redeem miles all the time for international flights when we lived in Asia. We have not redeemed once since we retired to the US over two years ago because the value just isn't good for short flights. We are planning to switch away from a card that eats miles.
ETA: I'm referring to not liking my airline-specific card.
pear / 1558 posts
I highly recommend Capital One. We put everything on this card, pay off each month and then redeem at least one airline ticket each year.
Major pros to me include:
-Low annual fee (less than $100, but I forget exactly how much... $60 maybe?)
-You don't have to book through their rewards portal, you can shop for your travel with any carrier, then request reimbursement (account credit after purchasing with Capital One card) for travel within the last 90 days
-Reasonable exchange levels (ie: 35k "miles" gets reimbursement up to $350) after earning 2 miles per $1 spent.
**The cash back or non-travel reimbursement is not as good, so I really think this is best if you know you want to get travel benefits.
grapefruit / 4278 posts
@lawbee11: Thanks, I didn't realize you could transfer points 1:1... That would be a really good compromise for being able to have Southwest rewards, but not be limited to flying Southwest, thanks!
@Cole: Thanks for the insight. Browsing through some reviews it looks like they are competitively priced for flights. They don't seem as good on hotels, but we mainly travel to see family and don't need a hotel.
@PinkElephant: I think that a program that lets you use any airline would work better for booking domestic flights. But I guess we really just want to move towards getting some benefits out of our spending. We'd use the card on regular purchases and pay off every month, so we might as well get something out of all the spending we'd do regularly.
@GoGoSnoGirl: Thanks, I'll check this one out too!
wonderful kiwi / 23653 posts
I love my Chase cards! I started with Freedom, then got the Sapphire (does have annual fee but it's a small fee and worth it). I would want the Reserve but didn't want to sign up for so many cards but I really should b/c we are planning on a huge international trip next year...
cantaloupe / 6751 posts
Chase Sapphirr Reserve.
I opened one last month and received 100k bonus miles for meeting spending goals. You also get $300 or $350 - can't recall which - in travel credits each year. If you book travel on your card, you'll see a credit in that amount applied. We basically ended up getting our hotel for Disneyland for free with these credits.
They also give you a credit to use towards the TSA pre check program, and you get free admission to all lounges.
nectarine / 2460 posts
@snowjewelz: We had the Sapphire and then got the Reserve. We called and they were able to roll our credit line from the Sapphire into the Reserve so we still got all the benefits to our credit score of not "cancelling" the Sapphire, but with all the practical effects of closing out the card. It was a super easy 2 minute call!
nectarine / 2460 posts
The TSA precheck and lounge admission stuff that @pinkcupcake mentioned is really cool, but only applies to cardholders. And its worth noting that there is an additional fee for an extra card holder.
apricot / 424 posts
I have Amalgamated Bank of Chicago. You can use their "Amalgamiles" for many things, but one of them is airfare in the continental US. $1 spent = 1 point (some items are double points at times). There is a $29/year fee for the card. You can only earn a maximum of 5,000 points per month or 50,000 per year. You can call within 2 weeks of a flight and as long as the ticket is under $500 you can cash in 25,000 points and pay a $10 fee for a free round trip ticket. Or you can use 5,000 points for $25 off a flight with 72 hours+ notice. Additionally, you can get $700 off a worldwide round trip ticket. Points expire after 3 years.
If it falls within the parameters you can use any airline.
You can use these points for anyone's flight not just your own.
persimmon / 1316 posts
We use citi AA card. We use our credit card for everything then pay the whole balance off each month to get the most points. AA pretty much is the main airline out of where we live and we fly across the country a lot and usually get a free flight each time we go.
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