Originally Posted by steve100
To answer your question of "What are the opinions out there about the ease of use of their miles?"
--> I am not sure that you get what the SPG program is about. It is the "Starwood Preferred Guest" program (basically the Sheraton/Westin hotel chain) Every dollar you charge gets you 1 SPG point. SPG points can then be transfered to virtually any airline program on a 1 for 1 basis (but transfering 20k SPG points gets you a bonus, so you get 25K in airline points). So, the ease of use of the miles is all dependent upon which airline you transfer your SPG points into. (You can also use the SPG points for hotels, which, in my opinion, is a better deal than using air miles, but I digress)
I appreciate that but think I do understand what it is about. I was only interested in it for the conversion bonus of 25%. I have a Hilton honors card which I use for the free hotel nights and own 2 timeshares. I was interested in the card because of the bonus but wanted to know how difficult it was to redeem those miles or if I should just stick with my cash rebates from my other cc.I guess I was just asking generally how is it getting a seat with miles since I do not have any experience with it currently. Owning a timeshare I do not have flexiblability with my travel dates so I did not have the option of "fooling around" trying to get seats on an airplane using miles.