Credit Card Programs - newbie - signing up for credit card to get from AUS to JAC

I am flying to Jackson Hole, WY from Austin, TX in late August. I am likely taking my family back there in early September (may not happen due to my work schedule). I would need to buy only two tickets for the second trip.

I also haven't gotten any new credit cards in a while. So my plan is to get two or three cards that will help me get 1, 2, or 3 tickets for these trips, but also to build up miles in general. I have about 5,000 Delta Miles and 25,000 AA miles.

I currently have a Thank You points card, but try to use those points for hotels as they are not well priced for flights (in my experience).

My original plan was to get a Delta and an AA card that would hopefully cover 2 or 3 tickets. But I looked at the Delta cards and they don't offer nearly as many miles as I had hoped, as I have noticed that they don't offer nearly as many low miles tickets as they used to.

I am also unsure about other cards that have their own points systems. I got an offer from AMEX Business Gold Rewards Card in the mail for 50,000 points, but I don't know their system or what that is worth. I have also seen the Chase Sapphire preferred card that offers 40,000 points up front.

Lastly, I read a little bit about getting multiple cards and using multiple browsers or computers, but an not sure how that should play into my strategy. I am thinking about doing the AA, AMEX, and Chase for maximum points and flexibility. This also seems easy to do since they are on different programs, with different banks, but maybe it isn't that easy.

Any thoughts? Any help?

maybe I am being impatient, but I could really use some help.

anyone?

To be sure I understand correctly, your plan is to apply for credit cards in mid-June, make the qualifying spend in the first billing cycle, receive the miles in mid/late July, and redeem for award flights a month later?

Looking on ExpertFlyer I see that service is provided by AA, DL and UA.

AA miles can be earned with AAdvantage cards issued by Citi, and also with the Starwood Preferred Guest credit card issued by American Express. AA flights can also be booked using Alaska Airlines and British Airways* programs, but only if AA has sAAver award seats available.

DL miles can be earned with Skymiles cards issued by American Express, and also by transferring from American Express Membership Rewards.

UA miles can be earned with Mileage Plus cards issued by Chase, and also by transferring from Chase Ultimate Rewards.

*Note that Membership Rewards and Ultimate Rewards both transfer to British Airways, which creates a fallback possibility of redeeming through BA for travel on AA if other options do not work.

Thanks so much for the reply. Really appreciate it.

To answer your question - YES. I have procrastinated unfortunately, thus I am a bit impatient and am trying to do this the best way possible.

Given all my options, do you have any recommendations on specific cards?

I am thinking about an AA (50K miles), Chase (40K miles), and AMEX Biz (50K miles), but do you have any other suggestions? Should I be able to apply for all three at once? Is there a strategy I need to use?

-Bryan

... Chase (40K miles)...

Are you referring to a United Mileage Plus card or an Ultimate Rewards card?

There is a "two-browser" trick for AAdvantage cards. Basically you apply for two cards at the same time, using two different browsers (i.e Internet Explorer and Firefox).

Also, there is a better offer for a United Mileage Plus Explorer card if you already have some MP miles in your account. You can get these by opening an MP account, signing up for the Dining Rewards program, then going to a restaurant. If you do a search, you will find some bloggers who explain exactly how to get the better United offer.

Keep in mind however that all these offers will take time. Most have a minimum spending requirement, usually $3000 in the first three months. (For some it is lower, for some it only requires that you use the card once.) While there are ways to boost spending (http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/milesbuzz/1215231-getting-spending-up-without-mint.html), you have to be able to somehow handle the minimum spend requirements. Then you have to hope that once you have the miles in your account that you can find award tickets.

There's no real reason not to apply for a lot of cards at once, assuming that you can meet all the spending requirements. If you can only spend $1500 a month, even with the spending tricks, it would be foolish to get three cards that will require you to spend $9000 in 3 months and only make the spending requirement on one of them, leaving two bonuses to go to waste. Note that the Amex business cards usually require $10,000 spend in 5 months, although there are other offers around.

I can tell you that for Chase, I have applied for the card, as soon as I have gotten it I have charged $3000 and paid it off immediately, and in these cases (did it once for me, once for my wife) I got the bonus within about a month of the initial application.

I'm also going to assume that if you get more miles than you need for this trip, you will find some way in the future to use them for another trip. (Just make sure not to let them expire.)

I would look at availability on UA, DL, and AA, and then focus on the carrier that seems most likely to still have award space available by the time you get your miles. Also check out BA for travel on AA; their award structure is different. It's possible that you will get a better deal using AA if you are willing to drive to DFW. (BA redeptions are based on segments, so a trip that cuts out the AUS-DFW leg may save you a fair number of points.) But don't sign up for more cards than you can make the minimum spending requirement on. Basically, you can (probably) get two AA cards for 50K miles each (make sure you use the right link to get these - the general offer is 30K now, but there are still some 50K links around), each requiring $3k spend, or you can get the Chase SP card for 40K points transferrable to UA and the UA Explorer card for 55K (again with the right link and having done what you have to do to get points in your account) with $3K spend on the SP card and just one use of the Explorer card.

Right now, Amex/DL is probably your third choice. DL availability is the worst of the major (possibly of any) carriers, the bonuses right now are fairly stingy, and they have not had a transfer bonus in a while and none are foreseen.

Thanks so much for the reply. Really appreciate it.

To answer your question - YES. I have procrastinated unfortunately, thus I am a bit impatient and am trying to do this the best way possible.

Given all my options, do you have any recommendations on specific cards?

I am thinking about an AA (50K miles), Chase (40K miles), and AMEX Biz (50K miles), but do you have any other suggestions? Should I be able to apply for all three at once? Is there a strategy I need to use?

-Bryan

First question would be how quick can you make a minimum spend, and how much could you spend. If you can make minimum spends pretty quick, that means you'll probably be able to get the miles after the first billing cycle closes. This is still pushing it, as by the time you get miles, there might not be availability left. However, worst case scenario is you buy a ticket from Austin to Jackson Hole and bank those miles for trips in the future.

One thing you could consider is flying out of Dallas-Fort Worth. Not sure if this is a possibility for you at all, but if it is, you could use British Airway miles and it would only cost 15,000 miles a person for a roundtrip ticket. If you were to fly from Austin, it would be 24,000 a person.

There is the BA Visa that gives you 50,000 miles after your first spend. You wouldn't have to meet any minimum spend requirements and so you could probably get the miles to post pretty quickly.

Of course, you'd have to find availability, and when I did a quick scan, I couldn't find any availability in economy from Jackson Hole to Dallas or Austin. I was able to find some economy availability in the beginning of September, both going from Jackson to Dallas and from Dallas going to Jackson.

OK - Thanks to everyone for all of your help.

I have narrowed this down to 5 (or 6) cards and figure I should as many as I can at one time that I can meet the minimums and then hope that one of them works out for my trip(s) in September.

Here is the list:

1 - BA Visa - Chase - 50,000 miles on first spend - http://www.britishairways.com/travel/chase-avios-bonus/public/en_us?openxzoneid=310&openxcampaign=Chase-Acquisition-2012&openxbanner=11691&openxtype=click

2 - United Mileage Plus - Chase - first spend and add user/card (my wife), 30,000 miles - http://www4.chasecreditcards.com/MPConsumer40kAFW.aspx?CELL=H8X&AFFID=PPkX79_c.b0-9sPgqAeJ7.Qb8SCp9sl5LQ&pvid=165534FOF501467456

3 - Chase Sapphire - Chase - spend $3K, get 40,000 points - https://creditcards.chase.com/credit-cards/sapphire-preferred-card.aspx

4 - AA Biz - Citi - spend $3K and get 50,000 miles

5 - AMEX - Business Gold - Spend $2K and get 50,000 points

I spend between $2,500 and $4,500 on my credit card per month (average around $3,500). I have an insurance bill that I can pay as soon as I get the card for about $2,000. So I know that I can get all of these bonuses (if I signed up for all of them) over the next few months. But, I could probably only get one of the bonuses that require a spending minimum immediately (Sapphire, AA, or Amex).

So here are my last few questions before doing this.

1 - Any better offers out there other than the ones I outlined (ie, more than 30,000 miles on UA)
2 - Is there a link for a personal AA card and I can get the biz and personal at the same time using the two browser trick?
3 - Should I go for all of these at once? Will there be any issues that I am applying for 3 cards offered by Chase (Sapphire, UA, and BA) at the same time?
4 - Finally, if I go with this plan, which of the Sapphire, AA, or Amex bonuses should I try to get first and would be most likely to help me in September.

Thanks for all your help. Even if this doesn't work out for September, it looks like I will have plenty of miles/points to cover my future vacations!

1) I don't know about Citi Biz and Personal, but I know that I got both the Citi Amex and Citi Visa about 2-3 weeks ago with the two-browser trick.
2) For United, there is a better bonus, but you must have some miles in your Mileage Plus account. What I did was open a MP account, then sign up for their dining rewards offer, went to a restauant, a week or two later I had some miles. Then I went to the United website and logged in, and saw the better offier. It's possible that I used a link on one of the travel blogs - I really don't remember.

Regarding Chase, they may be a little sticky on credit limits. When I got my SP card they gave me a $25K credit limit. When I applied for Hyatt they turned me down, saying I had too much credit with them, so I dropped the SP to $5K and they gave me Hyatt with $5K. When I applied for United, they said I have too much open credit with them, but when I said I'd be fine with $5K on the United card they approved me. I've heard other advice that says don't give up all your credit line, give up only as much as you have to, so that you have more to bargain with later. Anyway, the main point is that if you're declined, call the reconsideration line and bargain over credit limits.

redtop -

do you have the links to the AA cards that you got?

this is the one I have found, but if you have found a better one let me know - http://creditcards.citicards.com/usc/Travel/AA/SHV/Nov/2011/CBAA/50k/default.htm?promocode=fly8&BT_TX=1&ProspectID=01E270BC7E724DBEB324252E7E7CDD72