Diversifying Transferrable Points Programs
 

Hi all, first post here from a long time lurker. This year, I was finally able to get approved for the Chase SP card. I was wondering if there was any benefit to joining any other transferrable points program (ie. Amex everyday, ThankYou points)? I have the United MilePlus Explorer as well, but am thinking of canceling that if its a good idea to join another program. To give you all a background on my spending, I'm a graduate student, so not too high spending but I travel between Boston and California decently frequently. I also use Amtrak a bunch.

If I should join another points program, should I go with the Southwest card with their current signup bonus or the Citi AAdvantage?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Welcome to FlyerTalk. There are five programs which offer transfers to a broad range of airline and hotel partners:

American Express Membership Rewards
Lowest cost card: American Express Everyday, $0
Transfer partners: 17 Airlines + 4 Hotels

Chase Ultimate Rewards
Lowest cost card: Sapphire Preferred VISA, $95
Transfer partners: 6 airlines + 3 Hotels + Amtrak

Diners Club Rewards
Lowest cost card: Diners Club Premier MasterCard, $95
Transfer partners: 14 airlines + 7 Hotels + Amtrak

Starwood Preferred Guest
Lowest cost card: SPG American Express, $65
Transfer partners: 30 Airlines + Redeem at Starwood Hotels + Amtrak

ThankYou Rewards
Lowest cost card: Citi Premier MasterCard, $125
Transfer partners: 9 airlines + 1 Hotel

Many cards offer a first year waiver of the annual fee. I have listed the fee which would apply after the introductory offer.

If you prefer United Airlines note that only Chase offers cards with 1:1 transfers to Mileage Plus.

American Express and Chase offer a much larger number of card which participate in their rewards program than do the others. This creates more opportunities to earn new card account bonuses over time.

Awesome thanks for the help! Considering my limited spending, but semi-frequent (4-5 RT tickets a year) travel across the country and overseas, is there any point in applying for another credit card where you can transfer points? Should I just spend all my money using my CSP?

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Well there can be lucrative sign up bonuses if you meet the minimum spend.

Once you hit min spend in CSP, evaluate the best use of your next 5k in spend. Most times you will get better return by hitting min spend on a new card.

Probably, but we need to know which airline(s) you use to provide useful advice.

That really doesn't tell us anything. Crunch the numbers and see if you can use the sign on bonuses and your spend. Another program could be beneficial but, on the other hand, spreading your spend too thinly could make it take longer for you to get where you need to be to redeem rewards.

What airline(s) have you actually flown?

If you've not flown either AA or Southwest, do you know whether you will want to fly them?

For example, assuming you have no status (though you could get first level status if you fly BOS<->California decently frequently with the same airline each time), you'll have no assigned seating on Southwest (but ability to choose your seat from the remaining ones as you board), while you'll have forced assigned seating on AA (often no ability to select anything other than middle seat without paying extra, until day of check-in). I thus don't know if you should pick an airline solely by picking its credit card first.

On the other hand, once you have elite status at AA (after 5 paid round trips BOS<->LAX in the same calendar year, for example), you'll have much better selection of seats, including half-price on Main Cabin Extra (extra legroom seats) in advance and free Main Cabin Extra at check-in, and you'll occasionally even be able to get an upgrade. While flying 5 paid round trips BOS<->LAX on Southwest won't change your flight experience much.

The status works a little differently at UA, because UA requires that you spend $2500 on those paid trips (not just that you fly 25000 miles), so it depends what sort of fares you're geting on your BOS<->California trips whether UA would get you to first-level status as quickly as AA would (AA at least for the next year doesn'te care what you pay, just that you fly 25000 miles).

But 5 BOS<->LAX trips is just barely over 25000 miles. So if you only do 4, you won't get any status.

Thanks for the help everyone! I fly Southwest and United frequently, and travel internationally via the Star alliance most of the time. I guess this reply was my biggest concern. Is it possible to spread my points too thin between two programs?

Who pays?

Southwest points redemption cost is proprotional to Southwest money ticket cost, so on paid Southwest flights you get a fairly fixed percentage of "cash back" equivalent. So if you're paying for all your Southwest flights yourself already, you presumably know how far the 50000 points from a Southwest Visa will take you (because you presumably already have a strategy for when to use Southwest points vs when to pay, even though the price of both goes up and down together).

United / Star Alliance redemption is by zones, so that's non-linear always. That means that if you can find "saver" redemtpions where the money ticket cost would be high, you get a much higher rate of return.

So with UA miles, you can pay for the flights which are cheap and redemptions are costly, and can redeem miles for the flights which are expensive and redemptions are cheap. With Southwest points, you don't get that "leverage"; it's just that one card signup with some spend can get you some number of free flights once.

So is your goal to save a couple percent "cash back" equivalent, or is your goal to save on the most expensive flights? If the latter, then it would seem to make sense to collect more UA miles in more ways than worrying about collecting Southwest points (especially since Southwest uses the same bank, Chase).

Btw, where do you stay after you get off the plane? Are you mostly visiting friends/family and staying with them, or mostly paying to stay somewhere? If you airline mile collection makes most sense on UA (and thus Chase), you may think about whether it's hotel points you should diversify to, and in that case pick hotels that have cards with banks other than Chase, so that you can concentrate your Chase applicaitons on getting more UA miles and balance that with applications to other banks to get hotel points.

I was definitely thinking of saving up on UA miles, and just apply for the two SW cards to get the 100K bonus towards the companion pass. I was also thinking of getting a card thats part of Amex MR or the Barclaycard Arrival+. I guess, like I stated before, Im just concerned with spreading my payments too thin over too many credit cards. Is that possible?

I guess the root of my question is as follows: Since I fly UA a bunch, I'm probably going to keep the CSP even year after year even with the AF. Is it worth getting another transferrable rewards card to keep with an AF? Or should I focus most of my spending on the CSP?

You can only earn United miles with cards issued by Chase. You could add a free Chase Freedom card. Chase markets Freedom as a "cash back" card but it actually earns Ultimate Rewards points, and each quarter there are categories which earn 5 points per dollar (registration required). You cannot transfer directly from Freedom to United, but you can transfer from Freedom to Sapphire Preferred, and then to United.

Do most people carry two "transferrable points" credit cards (ie both CSP and Amex Blue)?

Most people in what world? :)

FlyerTalk members are not representative of the general public, not even of the general frequent traveler public. Most people carry zero "transferrable points" credit cards. So I presume the number of people who carry one is greater than the number who carry two and that is in turn greater than the number who carry three, etc.

Also, another question worth asking is "carry for how long?". Ie, have had two briefly (Amex Gold twice), but only held one long term (Diners Club US).

Btw, Amex Blue is not a transferrable points card, unless you also have a "full" Membership Rewards card with Amex. I hold an Amex Blue, but I hold it just to keep some small MR points for expiring, but until I get another transferrable MR card, I can't move them anywhere with just the Blue.

Oh, and some people consider the SPG Amex a transferrable points card, though I don't (I consider it a hotel card, and I realize that every hotel program has points transferrable to airlines; but "true" transferrable points cards IMHO transfer to both multiple airlines and multiple hotels, but of course the SPG points that the SPG Amex earns are not transferable to any other hotel programs. Anyway, I have one, but I'm keeping my SPG points as SPG points for the foreseeable future, since I never know when I'll need an award stay at an SPG hotel somewhere (where there is other brand of hotel that's available on points).

So would you say you're against having two cards with an AF (ie the CSP and an Amex MR card)? I'm just having a lot of difficulty weighing the pros and cons.

There is no need to pay an annual fee to participate in American Express Membership Rewards. Apply for an Everyday card. The core issue is not the fees, but rather accumulating points which are not transferrable to your primary airline.

No, I wasn't saying what I for or against at all. I was explaining what I have done as an example of some people having some transferable points temporarily rather than permanently.

The big point you seem to be missing is that most people cannot earn as many points with even one or two years of spending only on one card as they can in a couple months with the bonus from a new card signup. So many people sign up for transferrable points cards, earn the bonus, transfer the bonus, cancel the card, then a couple years later repeat. They thus earn way more points doing that than getting one card and holding it. They're not so much cancelling to avoid the annual fee, as cancelling so as to qualify in a couple years for doing it all over again.

Now, having said that, that is no longer possible with Amex personal cards:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...etime-usa.html

So my example from the past (getting an Amex Gold card twice, transferring the 25k signup bonus points, then cancelling it) is not repeatable.

But Chase UR cards are still (slowly) churnable. So you can get a Chase Sapphire (no AF), keep it (for the rotating benefits), get a Chase Ink Plus, cancel the CSP, then a couple years later get another CSP, cancel the Ink Plus, and slowly repeat.

I'm not saying you should do that. Only you know your own credit history, only you can decide if churning credit cards is right for you, but you asked what other people do, and that's one thing that other people do to maximize their transferrable points earnings.

Another thing other people do is Manufactured Spending, but that's such a big area that there's a whole separate forum devoted to it:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/manuf...-spending-719/


... Meanwhile, as to Amex Blue, I think you got that confused with Amex Everyday. Both are no-AF cards, but Blue is an old (and no longer actively promoted) no-fee MR card, and is much more limited in its MR implementation than the new Amex Everyday card is. (Blue doesn't let you transfer to partners, Everyday does.)

There is also a card with a confusingly similar name: Blue Cash Everyday. This card is not the same as the Everyday Card, and does not participate in any version of Membership Rewards.

Solid Credit Card Combo?
 

Hey all, just wanted a quick audit of my plan going forward with regards to miles. To preface, I'm a graduate student living in Boston, so my spending is limited. I travel back and forth between coasts around 3-4 times per year and try to travel internationally either every year or every other year. I also travel on Amtrak 3 times a month between Boston and New York.

So recently, I have been approved for the CSP, the Amex Everyday Preferred, and the Arrival+. My plan was to use the CSP to get 2x points on travel and dining. Then, I planned on using the Amex Everyday Preferred for all of my grocery purchases (3x). Then, the rest of my spending goes on the Arrival+ (2x on all purchases). This includes $1000 MS for rent through Amex Serve.

I also have around 70k in United Miles and 20k in Amtrak miles.

Does anyone forsee any problems with the scheme? I'm thinking of just swallowing the annual fees when they come around because the benefits may outweigh the annual fees. What do you all think?

I have a hard time believing that all three annual fees would be justifiable, especially for someone with limited spending.

According to my calculations, I would only need to spend $316 in dining/travel and $250 in groceries per month to make the AF worth it. This is calculated based on the lowest valuation of the points.

Depending on how much you value Membership Rewards points, I'd actually suggest using the EDP for the rest of your spending instead of Arrival+. With at least 30 transactions per month you get a 50% bonus on all points earned, bumping grocery up to 4.5X and 1.5X on everything else (I'd take 1.5 MR points over 2.2% cash back).

I might actually add Freedom, because there is a promotion going on and earn that 20k UR (+2.5K when add a AU). That spending requirement is not high at all (500USD in 3 months) and I think it will provide you with some flexibility. It also have no AF.

Personally, if I were in your situation where UA and Amtrek are the preference, MR points are actually not useful at all as it is not a transfer partner. I might as well use the Arrival to get 2.2cpm instead. But surely, if you are planning to expand the usage in the future, banking the MR points to start might be a feasible option.

HTH
-Pete

Check your math on that. The lowest valuation of the points is...1cpp?

$95 AF for EDP, and you're getting 3% on groceries vs 2% on an all-around card. So you need to spend 95 / .01 = $9500 / 12 = $792 on groceries per month to make it worth it.

$95 AF on CSP will never be worth it at lowest valuation compared to a 2% card.

Have you considered just a 2% card for all your spend? If you spend > $40K year (or a significant portion of your spend is with merchants that don't take Amex), go with Arrival. If < $40K, go with Fidelity Amex. By the same token, even if you go with a multi-card solution, you need to be putting $40K+ on Arrival for it to offset the AF compared to Fido Amex.

If you really want to maximize with multiple cards, consider Amex Blue Cash Preferred for grocery @ 6%. EDP @ 3x doesn't match that at any conservative MR value. If you're not getting the 50% bonus for EDP via 30 swipes/month, I don't think it's worth it. That said, it's a great card for pretty much everything if you are doing 30 swipes/month.

The long-range planning you are doing guarantees you will pass up most of the best opportunities in favor of lesser ones. With your spending, there's no reason not to open a new card as soon as you're not meeting min spend on the previous card. Then you will be earning 5-50 points per dollar on ALL spending. But learn what the best offers are for different cards, and only open them when that offer is available.

Sapphire Preferred can be downgraded to Sapphire with no fee to keep the few points you haven't transferred out and continues to give 2X on dining, and then you can open another CSP 24 months after getting the bonus on the one you currently have. Fees cost more than the second-year benefits of nearly every card unless you do heavy MS on that card.

Sorry let me rephrase: with regards to travel redemption, using the "pay with points" in UR and MR, the redemption rate is 1.25 and 1 cent per mile, respectively. Therefore, at 2x the points on dining and travel, $3800 annual spend will equal $95 in redemption. Using the same scheme, $3166 on groceries wil lget back the AF on the EP too

$3800 in travel spend on the CSP equals $95 in rewards, if you value Chase points at 1.25 cents. This breaks even, in absolute terms, compared to using no rewards card at all.

However, $3800 in travel spend on the Citi Double Cash card is $76 in rewards, with zero annual fee.

In order for the CSP to be better than just using the Double Cash (or another no-fee 2% card), you would need to spend $19,000/yr.

Similarly, the Arrival+ merely nets you an extra 0.2% over the Double Cash. You would need to put $44,500/yr on that card ($89 / 0.2%) in order to make it better than the Double Cash.

In short, your math is wrong because you are comparing using those cards against using a non-rewards card. Really, you should be comparing them against using the best no-fee card.

Just use Double Cash or another 2% no-fee card instead. Get the bonuses on other cards, and then cancel those other cards and revert to Double Cash.

So you're saying paying the AF is never worth it? I like some of the benefits that come with the card.

Getting a fee waiver for arrival + is easy and Amex gives retention offers often as well as doing a product change from CSP next year is quite possible and in this case you would hardly pay any yearly fees

When is it justifiable to pay the AF? Also, in the short term at least, will this credit card combination be sufficient? Should I add any more?

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If you plan to redeem your AGR points for free Amtrak travel (as opposed to transferring the points out to other programs or redeeming them for non-Amtrak items), I would -- at some point -- get the Chase/AGR MasterCard. It has no annual fee, has a sign-up bonus which can range from 12,000 to more than 30,000 AGR points, and it gives you a 5% discount off of AGR redemptions for Amtrak travel.

Is this a trick question? Pay the AF when the benefits are greater than the AF. But quantify benefits truthfully. Consider Fido Amex / Citi Double Cash (2% on everything) as the alternative to everything. So only calculate the amount of rewards that beats 2%, because you are giving up the opportunity to get 2% cash back by using a different card. If there are other card benefits that you profit from (i.e., free checked bags from an airline card), then include them in the valuation. But avoid the "and there are other benefits I like so the card is obviously worth it" argument.

I already have the AGR mastercard and loved it. Probably going for the BA card next..

Its interesting to read how people value the AF and the bennies associated with the cards.

Moderator action
 

Two threads started by the same poster have been combined to provide more context.