Whats your best travel rewards tips? Just took a travelling job for a year. How do I minmax my position? I'm thinking
>Get an AMEX Platinum card
>Get in a frequent flyer program
>hotel rewards
>TSA pre-check
Anything I'm missing? Will a year of traveling between like 6 cities net any rewards worthwhile?
is this true?
i really don't know why "platinum" is still the top level. these days platinum is only worth about half as much as gold
5x on airlines, $200 hotel credit, $200 airline credit, Uber credits, lounge access etc. It’s nowhere near as valuable as when it had a $450 annual fee but it’s very different than the gold.
They also have fully complementary Walmart+ membership, CLEAR credit, and Global Entry credit now which is several hundred dollars worth. Rumor mill is the lounge access on pretty much every 'premium' travel card is going to get severely cut back or even eliminated from a lot of them because the lounges are so crowded with normalgays now they've lost their class and function.
Taking away lounge access ain't happening.
That's 80-90% of the cards appeal to most normies, as they buy toasters with the points or don't know how to redeem for anything worth while.
oh i actually meant platinum and gold as in the actual metals. currently gold is about $1900 per troy ounce while platinum is about $925 per troy ounce.
if they wanted to have a real exclusive tier they should introduce a rhodium card
Top level lounge access alone is worth whatever the annual fee is. Priority Pass is ok depending on airport, but most airports don’t have a good priority pass lounge
don't know if I'd use all of these honestly
Then it likely isn’t worth it for you at the current annual fee.
Because for a long time Platinum was rarer and more valuable than Gold. The reason it's cheaper now is Gold is simply in higher demand than Platinum.
Thanks sherlock
Anyone can get an Amex plat. I even have one as a 21yo neet
do you actually save money doing this shit?
no idea never traveled enough to warrant it
I have the AA card and the bonus points on bullshit like gas I have to buy anyway that I can bill through work adds up to quite a bit. Whatever I go somewhere the flight is basically free.
You can save money using credit cards, but for most people, the premium travel credit cards aren't the best deal. These cards are good for people who already do fly a lot. Most people would benefit more from getting some cards that give them cash back. You can maximize it and eventually have a setup that gives you 5% on a lot of major categories, and most of these cards don't have annual fees.
For most, no. AMEX Plat is imo the worst travel card in existence since the others are just superior in every way
>chase has the $95 annual fee one with a good amount of credits ("free" stuff) and has a points multiplier plus transfer to partners pretty much globally
>capitalone has the VentureX which if used right pays you $5 annually
There's just no reason to get the amex plat. Before it used to have a 10x point multiplier for travel expenses which was amazing and made the high annual fee a bit justifiable, but now it is 5x just like these other cards that are either free or cost far less. The Plat credits are nice and you can definitely make use of it, but if you can't maximize those credits every single year then it really isn't worth. Personally, I don't hang out in airports. I get a proper meal before ubering into the airport and then speeding through security with carry ons so I never have a use for lounges. I'm more than ok at an airport bar during long layovers (havent had one last more than 2 hours in like 8 years now either) so its really overrated.
>will a year of travel between 6 cities net any rewards?
Depends on the cities. An airline card using miles over dollars may be worthwhile if the distance gets you FF status. If you have to pay for the flights yourself then putting it all on a venturex or sapphire preferred could be worth it (especially if you hit new cardholder bonuses). More likely, cashback will do you better if you don't travel frequently. You're supposed to have 2 or 3 cards from one company to maximize points and use it all on either rewards or cashback. This is the way to do it. The AMEX trifecta is massively expensive though with annual fees, Chases costs $95 for 3 cards, CO isn't super pricey either but i hate their portal so fricking much.
I get about $900 of value out of my card per year and the true fees are $200/yr. Only works if you pay it off in full every month though. Don’t accumulate interest or it defeats the purpose.
>Will a year of traveling between like 6 cities net any rewards worthwhile?
No, lmao.
Rewards cards are for people who travel extremely frequently, with a LOT of money in order to gain anything from them.
Something fricked up too, is that if you have a lot of savings and SPEND high amounts on your credit card to get rewards, if out of line with your earnings, you'll really hurt your credit score. Lets say you earn 3k a month but have 40k in savings, then spend 2.5k on your credit card each month for a year (even if paid off on time) - it's viewed by credit brokers as reckless/irregular spending since you're barely saving. This exact thing happened to me.
THE SINGLE BEST thing you can do, is look for rewards cards/hotel rewards that have big welcome bonuses. i.e- spend 5k in the first 3 months with us and we'll give you 100k points. AMEX platinum offered this in my country for a while a few years ago and I managed to pay off some flights/high-end hotels with that offer alone.
Frequent flyer programs are basically a scam. Simply because, you have to stick to one airline/airline group. Then a flight with that airline might be 3x the cost of another airline for the same route, meaning that you're basically obligated to pay 3x extra just to earn a few measly points.
These schemes exist for a reason, you need to learn how to play the,
>are for people who travel extremely frequently
is fly every two weeks or so for a year not extreme frequency?
It is extreme frequency. As I mentioned in my post though, unless you're sticking to one airline the whole time you probably won't get much out of frequent flyer programs. IMO, the only people who really benefit from FFP are people who do regular routes, say NYC-LON every few weeks, often in business. Trust me, these people exist and a lot of them. It's not for the average person.
In terms of regular credit card points though, I'm sure you'll get something. Just be mindful of how much you're spending in relation to your earnings.
rewards cards exist to scam company compensated travel. it's a guaranteeed price insensitive source of income. the consumer isnt paying for it, the stock market is, but the consumer gets rewarded for it. tbh it should be illegal and anyone that has ever used one should be put in prison
>rewards cards are for people who travel often and frequently
Not really, even if you take it easy you rack up points over the years. Being able to have 2 trips a decade where you fly in first class and stay in nice hotels for free is appealing to a poorgay. It's not as nice as a richgay having multiple trips annually, but its still better than nothing.
>you'll hurt your credit score if you spend out of line with your earnings
That's not true at all. What probably happened is you went above and beyond to maximize points without resetting utilization for the monthly snapshot. If you're above like 20-25% of your credit limit (for individual and avg of all your cards) your score gets hit negatively, the workaround is to pay off all but like $1-5 per card before the statement is prepared so that when they make your monthly statement and send it to you, it shows that you owe $1-5 per card, lowering your utilization to under 1%.
>look for big welcome bonuses
this part's all correct, the welcome bonuses are worth, especially if you hit the cap by purchasing a flight and booking a trip.
>programs are basically a scam
I'm guessing if it's company travel he doesn't have a lot of choice in the matter, I'm thinking they'll book his travel but he gets to accumulate the rewards and it's gonna be one of the US big 3 or maybe Southwest, so why not try to take advantage as much as you can.
Almost everything in the US accepts AMEX these days.
It has lounge access. That's huge if you're traveling for work. You get to avoid the whole finding a place to eat at the airport or before your flight. Heck some of them have a shower. If you're doing it every 2 weeks the $25 you don't spend on food absolutely pays for the $600 membership. If you're getting per diem even better you can just bank that money and eat at the lounge.
Idk. SAN doesn't have a centurion lounge but I think you can use it to get into one of the other airlines lounges though flights are pretty limited at SAN. I personally have an Amex but not the high tier and a credit card from my bank that has like 3-4% off on groceries, gas and restaurants. I use it for those things. Amex is great for booking hotels. I feel like you get better service. I live in SD too but don't travel often for work but I think a lot of the posters here are looking at this like it's personal travel, it's not exactly the same.
Class upgrades imo aren't worth it in the US. Max flight time is 5 hours and that's only like NY to LA. You don't need to be in first class for a 2 hour flight I can put up with the zoo for 2 hours. What you want is lounge access. Just get an upgraded economy that includes wifi and a reward program that gives you checked luggage.
It's pretty easy to spend $10k if you put food and gas purchases on it.
It's stupid, to fly to Thailand i would need to pay $300 for a flight from SD to LAX. It's cheaper to just take a 2 hour drive, hang out in LA then take my flight. The Capital One lounges in LAX is even worst, hell all their lounges are bad there. LAX is by far my most hated airport.
This is wrong on many levels. This is the current level of financial literacy in the states.
You'd want global entry, not pre-check.
You'd want to enroll in an airline you fly often.
You can do other sperious shit like walmart+/hulu/disney which adds up and the $20/month uber cash which helps.
You also want to get a good point redemption when you sign up, 60,000-100,000 points for 3000-5000 spend. That is easily 2 round trip biz tickets if you redeem them properly, e.g. 6k normal for biz class so 12k.
No it isn't easy anymore, you'd probably have to transfer points and book a year out but you can do it. I got my first taste of biz/J thanks to amex points and ANA flying to indonesia and a 2 week stopover in japan (made it custom so I landed in NRT, and took off from HND to save the 90min train ride to NRT from Tokyo) but I'm an experienced traveller and such - it's a joke really that I played the points game and now I get free flights (nonrev) from airline.
the priority pass is also good too with the card. I pay $500 a year for the annual fee, but I get back 5k+. My fav is the hotel/resort credit, it covers $250 hotel and I get like $100 credit so it's really $350.
But for 99% of you larpers it's useless, you also can't be subprime, or to shit subrprime. Probably 710+ to qualify for the amex plat.
Amex will give their charge cards to anyone with mediocre credit these days. Their high end normal credit cards like the Aspire and Bonvoy Brilliant still have some bragging rights imo.
If you want to LARP as old money, you could get the UBS visa infinite. You have to mail them an application like it's the 1980s, but that's the preferred bank of a lot of WASPs.
I just use a credit card to earn Qantas points (ausgay here) i have already earned return flights to London just from daily spendings and utilising points deals.
idk if they are good whilst on holidays but probably helps getting to locations.
You are much better off doing an upgrade of a paid ticket than the outright flight, also oneworld partners usually have a better deal, Qantas planes are fricking old and garbage now.
> t. return business class to Heathrow for basically nothing from paying my rent with a credit card
Airline cards are a scam and you’re better off with a card that lets you build transferable points. Are you going to be able to book everything on your cards and expense them? Flights, meals, hotels, car rentals etc?
Can you spent $8000 on it in the next 6 months? The current sign on bonus is one of the best they've ever ran. If you spend $8000 you get $1500 worth of points if you find a referral link. I'm not going to post one since I'm not a shill but it should be easy. $695 a year is a lot of money, you better be maxxing out every benefit in order to get your money's worth.
I just dropped 140k points on a transatlantic flight in biz for my wife and i. It is not free. Nothing is free. But you can play the system to spend less on certain things than you would otherwise
Where would you even use an AMEX credit card? I've barely ever seen any place around here accept anything other than Master Card or Visa.
Are you in Europe?
Yeah
Then this is pretty pointless for you, especially if you’re German.
Amex, much like Discover, are pretty much only useful in America. Though Amex is slightly more useful for high end hotels and restaurants as these usually take Amex in yurop. Discover is absolutely useless though, no one takes it.
I have never seen a place that took Amex but not Visa/MC, at least not in this century.
Amex usually gives cardholders better conditions though but it's still annoying to have to carry a second card for anywhere outside North America.
>it's still annoying to have to carry a second card for anywhere outside North America.
yeah i mean those cards are really heavy and take up so much space
>I have the AA card
that's cool dude, i mean being an alcoholic doesn't have the same stigma attached to it that it used to, it's good that you get special offers and stuff as well
AMEX has been paying teeniebopper influencers on tiktok and instaprostitute to shill Platinum. It is a vulgar nouveau riche/faux wealth symbol now. American Express sold out their mirage of class hardcore in the 21st century. It's just tacky now.
This kind of credit card culture was never a thing where I'm from. What makes certain cards like Amex Platinum exclusive? High annual fees or mandatory minimum income?
Both but also rewards that are geared towards the wealthy (a poorgay would probably have little use for free airport lounges if he can't afford to pay). There's no verification of a lot of stuff though. I told Amex I earn 90k and I earn 1/2 that.
Usually rewards are worth it for those who travel for business or spend a lot in their cards. Besides that, it can be worth it if you have moderate expenses in your card and travel at least twice a year and your points do not expire (or have at least 3 years to spend them). For most people cashback cards are the best option.
But yes, if you spend 30k usd/month and buy business class/first class tickets a few times a year you would get 4+ roundtrips business class tickets for "free" (but you would still have to research the best way to use your points to get the most out of them). And would have to have a flexible travel schedule.
People that get most out of it are those with business cards that put all their business expenses in the card, get a shitload of points and then redeem for personal travel. Those guys do travel 6 times per year in business/first and pay 1/5 of hotel rates to stay in luxury places.
Besides that, you can get sometimes a priority pass without paying for it (gets you lounge access) and some "free" travel insurance. Not worth it paying a card fee for those if you travel few times per year (you can usually buy lounge access at airports) though.
whats the annual fee up to on Amex now? for a metal card and a fancy box. seems like a rip tteeeebveeeeyyychhh
I used to do this bullshit and at the end of the day its a loser game unless you are a business owner putting business expenses on it. I know for fact basically none of you are, and neither am I.
instead of thinking about how you'll get $.02-.05 back on airfare for every dollar you spend on goyslop or consoomer electronics...why not just not spend the dollar in the first place? that's how you really save for travel.
Not all of us are melaninated enough to shoplift without consequences, so trying to get as much back from necessary expenses is a worthy goal.
Travel cards aren’t really designed to save you money. If you want that, get cash back cards. They’re for people who want to enjoy travel perks and transferable miles. If you’re willing to put in a little effort and figure out how to best redeem your miles, you can get tens of thousands of dollars of value out of them. But if you don’t have much in the way on ongoing expenses, your best bet is to open a card, get the initial bonus, and then move onto another card. If you’re a neet who can only afford to stay in hostels, they likely aren’t worth it for you.
Just to add to this. If you are not spending at least $10k per year on credit cards then just get a 2% cash back card and use that. If you do spend more than $10k per year and you're willing to carry multiple cards for different purposes then figure out if either Team AmEx or Team Chase has the best list of travel partners for who you want to travel and stay with. Team AmEx has the Plat/Gold/Green combo. Team Chase has the Sapphire/Freedom Unlimited/Freedom combo.
If you're starting, don't be loyal to one single airline, if you have a branded card with a specific airline, check if you could be getting better benefits with another one, and once you get past the first years and know where are you traveling the most and which airlines offer the best service for your budget, you can go to the next step, that is having two branded cards with different airlines
I have an Lifemiles (Avianca, Star alliance) and Avios (Iberia, Oneworld) card, the Avianca one gives me United flights at Spirit prices, while the Iberia one gets me to europe for less than 1k in business class round
I have a Venture X, I really want the Amex Plat but I really do not use things like Uber or Streaming services. I do use 2 miles for everything though.
Why do you really want it?
What is your home airport?
San Diego
I've traveled six times in the past year. though four of those were booked on my gov travel card. Is it worth it for me to get this card? I'd enjoy the lounge access and I wouldn't mind getting Uber eats/hotels a couple times per year.
I just booked a bunch of business travel with agoda and got 14% cashback
then I will pay with my credit card that gives 3% cashback
I have the sapphire reserve and it’s gotten worse over the last few years. Minimal flight options through their portal and they charge about 30% more than booking directly. Decent for hotels and rental cars. I’ve been using the pay yourself back bonus more than travel booking lately, gotten $500 in bennies using that
>he doesn't transfer the points out to partner airlines
You're missing out. The point behind the chase trifecta is easy point accumulation rather than actual benefit at a low annual cost. You should almost always be transferring your points to an airline account to then buy the flight with points on the airline's site. You usually get like 3 cents per point, sometimes up to 6 or 7 cpp instead of the 1.25 or 1.5 the sapphire cards get you.
>lounge access
If you travel that much for work then sure, it may be worth it. If you don't though, then its likely never worth it and most people here don't travel for work. Even OP says this travel job would only be for a year.
The thing about team chase is: $95 annual for all 3 cards. Team amex however? Plat is $695, Gold is $250, Green is $150. Blue and Blue Pref are $0 and $95 respectively. So the cheapest trifecta for amex is Blue Green Gold at $350 annual, at worst it hits over a thousand dollars a year. It's really hard to justify that fee when the chase offer is so much cheaper for similar point accumulation rates.
If you use a free credit card or a cashback card, then you actually save money in the long run if you use cards responsibly.
I’ve transferred them before. Unfortunately my home airport is mostly Southwest so I use their card to book most flights.
I use the Venture X and if I can't get the flight/hotel through the portal for the 3%-8% gains, I just put it on my card like normal through the airline website and then just use the rewards to pay back myself. Hotels tend to be much more expensive on their portal, while I can generally find the flights with a little finagling -- BUT it fails to book the ticket about 50% of the time.
I use the Chase Sapphire Preferred. Think it's only $95 a year. My main draw was the 25% increased redemption when booking through their Chase Rewards portal. Not worth it if it's not your "daily driver" but it is for me and it's nice.
Oh and the $50 yearly hotel credit and some other bullshit delivery service. I forget the bennies but it's easy to offset the annual fee. Good value imo.
Is there any beneficial credit card shit I can even do as an euro (for travel)? I honestly faded them for 30 years because it seems our cards don't do anything a debit card doesn't do
>using debit cards
>for anything but well-trusted vendors
European credit cards pale in comparison with American cards, but you still get basic protections for free.
>don't have to be rich if you aren't moronicl
ol this thread just proved that I hang out with a bunch of brainlets. Rewards Maxing enabled me to see the world in my young 20s off of a 20k-a-year income.
Sort of same. I churned the frick out of sign up bonuses and have stayed at several 5 star hotels/resorts for "free" all over the world. Obviously this doesn't work if you're manufacturing spending that you don't need to, but if you're buying a house or making some large purchases anyway, the sign up bonus game is awesome.
Downside now is that I've practically run out of shit to sign up for that doesn't have $300+ annual fee.
Just give it 2 years and do it all over again. Capital One, AMEX, American Express, Hilton. After you hit bonus, wait a year and then cancel. Hits the Goy Score, but frick it.
Glad someone else cashed in on this and I didn't even have to mention manufactured spending. Cheers bro.
Thanks man. Yeah I'm in the process of closing cards just to reset that 24 month cardmember threshold. I think one of these Chase cards says 48 months between accounts to be considered a new member. Stingy frickers.
The two year threshold is just cards opened in the last two years. You don’t need to close cards.
For people who are in the 'I travel internationally twice a year, and domestically several times a year' I tend to find that the best card structure is:
>AmEx Gold
Stack this for all of your groceries and restaurants, take advantage of the Uber Eats and Grubhub credits and you basically have a $10 annual fee (only do this if you are already using the services each month, do not modify your behavior to satisfy a card).
The free room upgrades for some hotels, and the transfer partnerships, really help the card exercise its value.
>Chase Sapphire Preferred
Largely similar points earning structure to the Gold, not as good for groceries and eating out but equivalent for booking through the Chase travel site, plus slightly different transfer partners, and a considerably cheaper annual fee. You can use this one as either a Gold replacement or not get it at all. But, I use it because it gives you a points modifier when booking so any points earned through Chase are worth 1.25x their original value, which leads me to the last card.
>Chase Freedom Unlimited
The 1.5 points on all purchases, plus the focused earning categories, means that I put basically everything that isn't dining or groceries onto this card, which I then transfer over to my Sapphire Preferred when it comes time to book things to give me that 1.25x modifier.
If you really wanted to hack your points, the Chase trifecta is still probably the way to go, but I find the Gold card provides enough benefits to make the annual fee worthwhile. I've gotten several upgrades on rooms over the past three years which has amounted to probably ten grand in savings compared to if I had booked those suites outright.
I find the Platinum is not a super compelling offer unless you fly fricking constantly. I will use my points from these three cards to get seat upgrades, or I will just pay for business outright. Lounges are a fricking joke these days and are full of people.
Amex BCE is an extremely underrated card ever since they made the stealth change a bit ago where all "online purchases" get 3% cash back. I buy pretty much everything online now so a flat 3% cash back cannot be beat. No fricking around with points and point shifting and whatever. Combined with its 3% on groceries as well, and it has no annual fee, its a fantastic card.
Neat trick that Amex still hasn't patched is even though Walmart is specifically excluded from the supermarket category, if you order your groceries through the app or just use the app to pay in store it counts as an "online merchant" and you get the 3%.
checked, and yep i've been using freedom unlimited and flex to stack points from my daily spending, then cycling preferred and reserve to fund United tickets to japan/asia for the last two years
>That 2nd factual explanation.
That egodrip, UwU keep me locked in samsara Yama -kun
switching from delta platinum to amex gold. delta fricked up. not worth it for me now, even being in a delta hub.
Tell me more, I'm a delta hub liver and have been running an amex gold for over a decade (used to frequent fly for business, now just a few times a year for pleasure). I wager there are better travel cards if I looked at all the current offerings but this is my second oldest credit card so I just don't really think about it.
I did notice that Delta's most cheap basic flights won't give you miles anymore, is that what you're talking about? I haven't paid attention to miles much I know I've got 140k of them or so but haven't bothered trying to use them yet.
They're called SkyPesos for a reason. Delta co-branded cards are worthless beyond using them to get waivers for status.
basically you can't earn status through flying Delta and using their card anymore. It was pretty easy to get the card spend waiver and then you could fly long distances to get status. Now it's all all about card spend and they've doubled the tiers for each status. 1 Delta Dollar for each $1 spent on delta flights or rentals/hotels/packages and in addition to 1 Delta Dollar for every $20 spent on your card.
So in a given year if I spent $20k just on the card and $5k additionally on delta flights, that's 1,000 delta dollars + 5,000 delta dollars, or 6,000 total, which is the bare minimum to get the lowest tier, silver.
>Get an AMEX Platinum card
Not necessarily the best travel card anymore. You have to really look into your compatibility with what it offers for statement credits as well as Centurion lounges. If you don't use Equinox gyms or have a Centurion lounge at your home or frequent destination airports, you're probably better off with another card that can give you the basic perks for a lower fee.
>Get in a frequent flyer program
Well they're all free to join so you should get numbers from all of them. If your job pays directly you still earn miles as the traveler if they include your frequent flier number on the reservation. If you book yourself and get reimbursed then of course you should have more flexibility in sticking to one airline to accrue status faster, although this is becoming harder as now American, JetBlue, and Delta are completely based on dollars spent and have nothing to do with flight segments. You can literally earn top tier status without ever setting foot on an aircraft.
>hotel rewards
No harm in registering with them all, but they work a bit differently than airlines in that the booker is getting the rewards rather than the traveler if those two people differ (if your job books the hotel for you).
>TSA pre-check
This is the most important thing you can do. Not having to take your shoes off alone is worth the price of admission (not that enjoying the pre-9/11 security apparatus should cost money but this is what happens when you live under occupation). Any credit card with an annual fee over $100 should credit not just this but Global Entry as well, which includes PreCheck.
Any tips on my setup. I only have
>Amex Marriott Brilliant
>Barclays AAdvantage Red
I'm banned from Citi and Chase so my travel cards are limited. I'm staying in hotels a once per month on vacation and flying AA/JAL a couple times per year.
How the frick did you get banned? Too much churning or fraud claiming?
Maxed cards, missed 3 payments and they closed my accounts. They forgave the debt and sent me forms where I had to claim the balance amount as income so they could write it off at the time 6 years ago. Some posts online say it takes 10 years before you can have another card with them. I try yearly but just get denied, was surprised Amex/Barclays let me in.
Name the cards, Mr. it's pathetic to get excited about credit card rewards unless you're me.
>It's not "rewards" if it's cash back.
It literally is. Be less of a tryhard in the future.
>Alliant Cash Back Visa Signature
You mean the card that requires a $1000 deposit in a no interest checking account? I wonder if you're coming out ahead on the opportunity cost. I'm sure you know that answer of course since you know everything.
Credit card points are for poor people like coupon clipping was in the 80's.
My leisure time like shit posting on SighSee is way more valuable then giving a single frick about any given credit card.
If I want to go to an airport lounge I just walk in and pay the nominal entry fee. ez pz.
>aaaaaaaaaaa I'm too stupid to spend five minutes thinking about this I'll just pay hundreds of dollars instead
lmaoing at you
Chase Ritz Carlton is the most broken one on the market, but you have to get a mediocre card and wait a year before you can convert to it.
US Bank Altitude rewards is also pretty broken but you have to get one of their other products first, and they are very picky about new members.