One of my best friends owns a retail store, and he currently pays his suppliers with an Amex card. He is putting about $100,000 a month on the card on average. On a big month, that can triple.

Currently, he is using the Amex points to pay for free travel and hotels through the Amex travel agency, he calls and tells them he wants air travel and hotel to Geneva, they book the tickets and debit his points balance. Clean and easy, but....

His major supplier has told him that they will no longer accept Amex. No cajoling or convincing otherwise.

So, he is looking for a Visa or Mastercard with the same similar services. I don't think he wants, say, an American Airlines Citibank card, because he doesn't want to be held to just AA, and he wants hotel stays too.

What card has the travel services he's used to, and offers the best point value?

I am sure the experts here have a suggestion or two. Thanks in advance for your help!

Have you considered Diner's? I don't have it but since it is now cobranded with MC, you might consider it ..

If he is actually doing 100k plus per month. and can fly AA, do that for less than 20 months and he will be PLAT for life. But you have to be elite to have no yearly cap.

Not sure its out there. I am in the same boat. Own a retail store and chalk up on average about $50,000 per month - my suppliers will not take AMEX either. The best I can offer is maybe US Air card which gives you access to Star Alliance + Marriott or some other hotel card. I also like the Merrill + card which will easily get your friend 4 nights at the Ritz Carlton.

Mike_Margolis, I would say your friend is in a fix. After amex/starwoods points, there is a gaping black hole in terms of value proposition. I sense he was accumulating those membership rewards points, IMO another questionable effort. If not, what type of points does he accrue that AMEX travel can somehow convert straight into tickets ? I am not familiar with this.

When I run into situations where I can't use my AMEX/SPG card, I back this up w/ a USAA/Eagle Points M/C (accumulates generic points similar to CAP ONE's program), and then finally let my charging spill over to Bank One/SW Airlines since LUV's program is, again, one of the most simple out there with ample flexibility and MASSIVE award availability (limited blackout dates). Finally, in limited occasions I use my AMEX/CENT and accumulate some token MR points for rainy days.

AA/Citibank - I would caution not to get boxed into AAdvantage ever again - milesaver has assured us that we cannot get more than a couple of seats on a given flight, unless you're willing to pay double points. Between my spose and myself, we have over 7MM lifetime AAdvantage miles...and we're down to less than 1MM between us both...and will never again accumulate AAdvantage miles due to milesaaver and the obvious inability to get five seats on a given flight for my family to fly on awards. AAdvantage is nothing like it was prior to spring, 2004.

For hotel/flights, another option is the Citi Hilton card. I believe it only earns 2pts/$ (Amex Hilton earns 3pts/$). Hilton converts to many mileage programs at 10k->1.5k rate. But yeah, I think Diner's is probably a better bet.

Another consideration is if you're charging $100k/month, you probably need to get a business card to support that level of credit limit. This may further limit your choices.

This is a layup. The DIner CLub card. Avail to transfer to all major hotels and all major airlines. If he is doing 100k-300k a month thats plenty to get you anywhere/thing you want. The best part is that you can transfer DC pts to your major hotel accounts directly SPG Hyatt etc etc

ken in phx

Why not just use a combination of several of the high-end Visa cards - does he have to have it all on one airline or card?