Future Churner & RTW Traveler
 

I guess I got started in the credit game younger than most - I'm a 19 yr old kid from the block. CapitalOne Journey student rewards card under my belt for a year now, and just approved for a Chase Freedom last night (thanks to the recommendations of this board). AMEX Prepaid in the mail.

Currently at a fair credit score down from excellent because my monthly spending has been 90% of my limit. Amateur mistake. Though, never have carried a balance and never plan too.

Career has presented domestic traveling opportunities, and hopefully just as much international travel soon. I've been looking at the high end AMEX Platinum/DL Reserve/SPG as a lifetime card- perhaps a year or more of usage on my prepaid would put me in a better position.

Any cards I should take a close look at in the mean time?

Future churner once I have rock solid score and history

Not sure if this will help, but assuming you have the funds available, you might pay your bill before it arrives. Using a bill-pay out of your bank account, payment is usually posted in 1-2 days. If your statement date is the 25th, log in on the 20th and find out how much you owe and pay it. Or even pay it more often than that.

Amex Plat has some great benefits, but it's not great for earning points. If you do have the potential for a lot of travel, you should consider:

1) Lounge access
2) Foreign transaction fee waived
3) Annual fee
4) Type of points earned (airline-specific or transferrable, and if so, transfer partners)
5) Elite Qualifying mile bonuses
6) Bonus categories and annual bonus thresholds
7) Tie-in with any airline you want to be tied in with.

In my experience, the Bank of America student cards were a good way for me to rebuild my credit and weren't hard to get (albeit with a low limit). Some of them even offer $100 in cash back when you hit $500 in spend.

Hope this helps and good luck!

All are decent cards, but I'm personally more attached to the Chase Sapphire Preferred. The downsides I see to each are this:

Amex Platinum is $450 a year, and although it has some awesome perks, that's alot of money. Also, I feel like Amex points are limiting in their airline transfer partners. They have no good Star Alliance transfer partners and their OneWorld transfer partner, BA, charges ridiculous fuel surcharges on most of their international flights. That leaves their only decent transfer partner as Delta, and "decent" is used liberally. Finding award availability with Delta is like banging your head against the wall.

The DL Reserve card earns Delta points...enough said.

SPG is certainly a strong card. One downside is that you'll pay the 3% foreign transaction fee when traveling abroad.

If I were you, I'd couple the SPG with the Chase Sapphire Preferred. CSP transfers to United (an awesome Star Alliance partner because you'll never pay fuel surcharges) where as SPG can transfer to AA (a great OneWorld option). That way you have all your bases covered.

Plus, the CSP will give you 2x points on travel and dining and a 7% bonus at the end of the year, helping to cancel out the annual fee.

Oh, and I forgot to put in last post...Welcome to Flyertalk! Wish I had been smart enough to get involved in this hobby at 19 instead of 28. Missed out on a ton of miles, so congrats on getting a nice head start on most of us!

That's a good option. I usually run it up and pay when close to limit, which I haven't had an issue with except now seeing the effect of that being reported as balance.

Freedom is putting me on track to CSP. I spent some time looking into CSP and I'm liking it as an everyday card.

What's the downside of Skymiles? I know a few people who have medallion and couldn't give me any cons.

Didn't know that. I see CSP has none.

Cheers! And thanks for all the info

$200 of the annual fee is refunded as statement credits each calendar year.

Membership Rewards has three transfer partners in each of the three alliances:

• SkyTeam: AF, AM, DL
• OneWorld: BA, CX, IB
• Star: AC, NH, SQ,

Chase Ultimate Rewards has one, and only one, partner in each. When that partner makes an unfavorable change to their program you are stuck. This may not be important if you redeem as you earn, but if you accumulate Membership Rewards is safer. Also, Membeship Rewards frequently offers bonuses on transfers to their partners, Ultimate Rewards does not.

Never is a very long time. All programs have some method of balancing award seat availability with demand.


2.7%


Sparse availability of awards at the lowest redemption level on many routes.

1 I only need to enter PP lounges (KE, DL, etc.)
2 is useful as I need a USD card.
3 I don't really mind
4 I transfer to AC

I am having trouble decoding this sentence, but to my knowledge no Delta lounges accept Priority Pass. They do accept American Express Platinum when flying DL.