Credit Card Program Advice
 

Hello,

I am fairly new to the whole credit card "churning" process but wondering what my best options are. I just started working full time little over a year ago. Currently in my wallet I have:

Amex Blue Cash Preferred - my main card, I run as much as possible on this
Chase Freedom - only used when Amex is not an option - or one of the rotating categories is higher than the Amex
Amex Green Corporate - for work

I am signed up for membership rewards on the corporate card and put an estimated $50K-$75K a year on it. Now I can also use my personal cards if I wish (and I have the credit lines to do so as well if needed) to rack up my own points, and with each airline ticket being $4K+ this could add up nicely.

I currently fly Delta for work and fly overseas an estimated 10-20 times a year (USA to Asia/Europe). I currently am a Silver member and only 7K miles away from Gold. With current trips planned this year I will probably hit Platinum level for this year.

I am pretty happy with the cash back options and personally would rather redeem money or other items instead of miles. I already learned the hard way that miles transferred from Amex MR to Delta do NOT count as MQM's.

Any advice/new cards I should look at? I am interested in a personal card with no Forex fees however all seem to have a yearly fee? Unless I could get one at a reasonable rate (i.e I'm not interested in the Amex Platinum card just yet) and transfer all my business spending and personal spending to that card? I haven't done the math but I'm very happy with my return so far between the Amex Blue & Chase freedom and have redeemed over $1000 this past year.

Hi sethmac86. Welcome to FT!

Just curious, where are you located? 10-20 times to Asia/Europe seems like Diamond would be a goal for me :p

But that's besides the point. I see that you redeemed $1000 (this is in cash, right?) this past year. That's not bad. But most of us FTers prefer miles. For example, for my Chase UR points, for 100k points, I could get either $1000, or 100k miles on UA. For 110k miles, I can fly roundtrip from JFK to Asia in business. That's worth far more than $1000, and a regular ticket in coach could cost that much as well. Thus, you see the benefit. Of course, DL has one of the worst redemption rates, compared to UA and AA.

What are your goals? What do you want? If you want cash back, I think you're doing just fine. The Chase Freedom and Amex Blue Cash would be two of my cash back cards of choice. If you want miles, the Chase Sapphire Preferred is a great card, and is currently my everyday card. No foreign transaction fee, flexible transfer options with UR, etc. You can read about the benefits here or elsewhere on the web. It does have an annual fee of $95, but I think it's worth it, especially since the sign up bonus covers that for several years. You can find cards from Capital One with no annual fee and no foreign transaction fee.

Credit card churning mostly has to do with getting cards for the sign up bonuses. The best one I can think of right now is the double Citi AA cards for 100k miles. Since you fly plenty on DL, perhaps you can get miles with other carriers. Miles on DL are the least valuable anyway (we call them Skypesos).

If I had $50k-$75k per year in spend and could put it on any card I wish, I would be quite happy. What are your biggest spend categories? The Amex Platinum isn't the best card for rewards. It's generally for the benefits (lounge access, etc).

Also, if you're a bit short on MQMs to meet Diamond, you could look at the Amex Delta Reserve card. Gives you 15k MQMs for 30k spend, which you have. I think 15k more with 60k spend.

Edit: Rereading your post, I see that you said you prefer cash back instead of miles. But my post still stands, and I make the case for miles above, mainly that you can usually (or always) get more bang for your buck with miles. But if you only want cash back, your cards are fine. You can certainly still churn cards for the sign up bonuses (40k on the Chase Sapphire Preferred equals $400 cash back), we do it mostly for the miles.

Hello,

I am based in MSP for now. Diamond will probably be next year, fingers crossed.

Yes I have redeemed over $1000 credit between my Amex Blue Cash and Chase rewards card.

I don't really see myself (right now) redeeming many skymiles for tickets. That being said I did redeem some for a domestic flight (which I've been sternly told to never do again) only cause I had them and didnt know what else to do with them.

I suppose my overall goal would to be putting everything (business and personal) onto one card to maximize my benefits. However I must have no forex fees to make this possible. I could run flight tickets through my Blue Cash and everything else on my corporate Amex when overseas as there are no forex fees on that.

You mention the Chase Sapphire Preferred, can I still get cash back option or transfer the points into miles? I suppose my other question is there a decent rewards card out there with no forex fees AND no yearly fee?

Thanks

I am pretty sure that Capital One has some cards with no annual fee or forex fee. But sometimes paying a fee is worthwhile.

Chase Sapphire preferred has no forex fee and 2x points on travel. If you are spending $40-$80K/yr on airline tickets, that's a lot of points for a $95 fee. If you have the option, you can also get Amex Preferred Rewards Gold which is 3X on airfare, but does have a forex fee and the annual fee is higher.

I'd suggest Chase Sapphire because it gives you diversification in transfer partners, i.e. you can transfer to United.

Keep in mind too that your Amex points can be transferred to Air Canada (and some others) and used on Star Alliance flights, or to British Airways and used on Oneworld. Both of these airlines have periodic transfer promotions (the Air Canada is usually late in the year and has a max of 25% of 100K points transferred, so it's not as good as the 40-50% bonuses on British).

CSP points can be turned into cash at 1 cent per point, or used to buy tickets at 1.25 cents. These are still probably less attractive than using them to book overseas premium cabin tickets.

You will find that getting points is only half the battle, redeeming them is the other half. It does take work. I'm not sure why you said "I don't want to redeem points on DL." if you are Medallion on DL, it's probably a good thing, as you probably get other perks even on award tickets. Yes, availability can be tight, but it can be had.

But I have found that point diversification can be very good, i.e. having points that can be booked on all three alliances. (BTW, Chase UR points can be transferred to British Airways also.)

Ok doing some research, I'm thinking of doing the following.

1. Redeeming all my Corporate Amex MR points onto my Delta Sky Miles.
2. Cancel the Corporate Amex MR program (saving $75 a year)
3. Signing up for the Chase Sapphire Preferred, with 40K bonus ($400) after $3K spending (will reach that in a few days with corporate spending). No fee till year 2.
4. Make the new Chase Sapphire my "main card" running everything through it.
5. Will have to investigate my current spending on the Amex Blue Cash Preferred to see if the 6% and 3% are still cancelling out the yearly fee. If not I will then downgrade to the basic one still getting 3% and 2% back at grocery and gas.
6. Keep the other chase card for the rolling 5% bonuses and just be aware of which card is giving me the most back.

By doing this that would leave me with:
6% or 3% back for groceries
3% or 2% back for gas
2% back on dining
1% back on everything else
5% back up to $1500 on rolling bonuses with chase card
a single $95 yearly fee on the Chase Sapphire (and I could keep the Amex Preferred for 1 more year as I just paid the renewal fee last month)

Only downside with the travel booking bonus is that we have to book through a travel agent which is terrible!

You might want consider transfer the MR points into BA instead of DL, particularly if you have a need for short haul flights within the US (as BA is a distance based system): you can redeem BA miles to fly with AA on such occasions.

You other chase card is likely Chase Freedom card, for many its a great companion card with Chase Sapphire Preferred card. Both would earn Chase Ultimate Reward points and can be combined (into Sapphire Preferred) to transfer all such points into a variety of airline/hotel programs (to maximize travel redemption options).

One thing most "civilians" miss when they think about credit card rewards is sign up bonuses. All those rewards you get with actual spending (if you don't hack) are mere peanuts. To me it sounds as you don't really get what churning is about. What would you rather do--get 50,000 miles/points for filling up the application or for spending $50,000 on personal expenses? Unless you can run business expenses through your credit card to the tunes of $millions a year spending won't get yo too far. However, if you are willing to sign up for several credit cards at a time (then rinse and repeat), then I'm sure you'll find helpful replies to your question. Good luck.

If you like cash back - look into US Bank Cash+ card 5% on two categories you pick.

Also, Citi Forward 5x TYP on Dining and Bookstores (amazon). You can get cash back in the form of a (100 points = $1) check made out to your mortgage or student loans - though some report success, if you don't have a mortgage to just name the bank where you keep your checking account, the check comes payable to that bank and you just deposit it. They also have gift cards that at times exceed the 100 points =$1 rate.

That said, the value to be had from applying for cards, hitting spend and harvesting a bonus exceeds the category spend perks. I started in January and I have picked up about $5K in card bonuses in that time (100K AA; 55K UA; 60K DL; 40K US, 70K Marriott; 115K HHonors; 30K SPG; 50K Citi TYP; 2 nights Hyatt).

Going forward, my basic plan is Amex BCP (groceries, 6%); Forward (dining + amazon, 5%); whatever card I need to hit spend on (everything else). When I get Ink Bold I'll move telecom and office store purchase (5x UR) to that card.

With your spend you are leaving money on the table if you grabbing bonuses.

I also prefer cash back these days, as I have enough miles to meet my airline needs for the next couple of years.
I use the AMEX Blue Cash whenever I can get 6% or 3% cash back.
For everything else, I use my Priceline Visa which gives me 2% back on everything (plus a $50 bonus on the first purchase):
https://www.pricelinevisa.com/
FT thread is here:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/credi...verywhere.html

The Penfed Travel Rewards card is something else to consider. It has no forex fees, no annual fee, and has a 20,000 point sign up bonus. 5 points on airfare purchases and 1 point for everything else with no cap. You do have to join the credit union but it is only a one time $20 fee.

https://www.penfed.org/PenFed-Premiu...-Express-Card/

Update!

I have received the Sapphire Preferred card and have passed the minimum spending (mainly due to a $2,900 airline ticket, which also got me almost 6,000 points!). I then used it on a recent business trip to the EU, my first months statement (it ended 2 days ago) gathered over 50,000 points, including my 40K spending bonus! This month I'm also on track to get another 10K points. For me personally the travel & dining bonus points help out tremendously as thats all I'm charging on business trips.

I have come across an issue where in the EU I needed a damn chip and pin... and sure enough today I get an email from Marriott promoting their Marriott Premier Rewards card. Seems like a good deal and keeps me at automatic silver level for Marriott for $85 a year. I would then only have my Chase Sapphire fee and this Marriott one and be covered for any Chip & Pin situations.