Not in all countries. IN europe if you use the points you accumulate through business purposes (ie your employer pays, even if you own the business) for personal use such as a vacation, it is a taxable benefit and at least in Austria must be declared!:(

I would stick with the SPG card as best option if you like high end resorts and hotels for holidays.

You really recommend every legacy US Airline and mid-scale+ Hotel card but US Airways? (which is technically American West, so US may not really fall in the legacy bucket).

I think I have one even better than that.

Look at all of the hotel reservation sites every year, figure out where you want to go on vacation in the next several months and apply for (if you do not have the card yet) and use the card(s) that will get you the rooms you want and burn through some of your built up Delta Skymiles to get there. Also look at the elite benefits that accrue with some of the cards and try to get to elite status before you travel.

With $1 million + in annual spending you can get a vacation pretty much anywhere in the world every year if you use the right card or combination of cards in the year or so leading up to the trip.

As a fall back card use a SPG AMEX once you have reached the spending level you need for your vacation(s) on your other cards(s).

You are in much the same boat as those of us who spend under $100K a year on our cards. We sometimes accumulate all of the spending on one card when trying to build up a balance of points, and we sometimes spread the wealth in order to reach the magic number on several cards.

Good luck and have a great time on wherever you go.

Depends on where you live I guess. I am not aware that US Airways even exists. I've heard rumors. But that's about it.

Certainly the choice of programs to participate will have a lot to do with where the OP lives and his plans for how to redeem the points.

Best Credit Card for $250,000 Annual Spend
 

Hello everyone,

First of all, if I posted this in the wrong section, please feel free to move this somewhere more appropriate, mods.

Anyway, my folks have recently seen me flying to all these exotic locations in first and business, and have finally seen the light with this whole points/miles game. Their goals are as follows: Fly LAX-ICN (non-stop) together once or twice a year, and alternate that with trips to Europe, mostly Paris and Venice. They're in their early-mid 60's, so they want to fly in business.

I was hoping people could weigh in on what card would best fulfill their goals? From the little that I know, it seems like some sort of Star Alliance based program would be best for their goals, but I would appreciate any/all suggestions. Anything is better than the Korean Airlines card that they're using currently. Here's what I've come up with so far:

1. BofA Asiana Amex - 2 miles for every $1 spent. Lots of miles, but I'm pretty squishy on their mileage based award chart and I know my parents would probably complain about paying fuel surcharges.

2. Chase Sapphire Preferred/Ink Bold - 50,000 sign up bonus, plus hopefully 2 points for every $1 they spend (they own a restaurant so 90% of their annual spend is at Costco, Restaurant Depot, supermarkets). Transfer UR points to Continental or United.

3. SPG Business - The downside I'm told is that you can only transfer 79,999 points into miles annually...


Anyone have any other suggestions? If it were me, I'd also throw in $30k on a Chase BA solely for the companion pass ticket, but my folks are old-school and want it to be as simple as possible... which is why I'm the one that has to keep track of all the miles and book the awards. :) Thinking about it now, I'm probably going to have to sign them up for some hotel cards too.

Anyways, any/all suggestions would be great. Thanks very much!

I don't believe there is annual cap, this is just the daily limit:

"Starwood Preferred Guests can transfer up to 79,999 of their Starpoints® per transaction per program within a 24-hour period to the frequent flyer programs listed below. "

I'd throw in the Amex Platinum for the lounge access (although generally not necessary if always flying business since almost all of the time you'll get that access through the purchased ticket), $200 airline credit, and Membership Rewards program. I like some combination of Chase Sapphire and Amex cards that participate fully in MR because both of those programs have so many airline and hotel transfer partners.

I'd think also about the USAirways Mastercard. Not tremendous signup bonuses, 40K currently, but a very good annual 10K bonus for keeping the card. Recent reports suggest that this card is churnable. In addition, I'd seriously look at having your parents participate in the Grand Slam promo if it's repeated next year. US frequently has discounts on purchased miles, but I found the Grand Slam this year to be a great way to rack up about 110,000 miles for an investment of less than $700, less than half the cost of their best sales. There's more information and a dedicated subforum over on the Airlines board about this year's promo. Since US miles are redeemable on *A, I think it's a great way to build up a pile of miles for a reasonable investment.

A United card or a CO card seems obvious as well. This post from The Points Guy will give you some pointers in that direction: http://thepointsguy.com/2011/11/sund...l-credit-card/.

Given the large amount of spending your parents can do, I wouldn't concentrate all of my spending on any one particular card, other than to meet certain spending thresholds, such as the Chase BA 2-for-1 at an annual spend of $30K.

FWIW, I think the 2x for Chase Sapphire is only on dining and travel, so supermarkets and Costco won't count unless I've missed something. I don't know about Restaurant Depot -- it might count if it is classified as dining. I don't know what it is. For supermarkets, Amex gives you double points, but Chase doesn't.

Chase Sapphire is certainly the "it" card right now, but to me, the number of transfer partners is still too small for it to unseat the Amex SPG for general spending. As far as a one-size-fits-all general strategy that doesn't involve a wallet full of cards, one could do worse than simply using Sapphire for any transaction that earns more than 1x and SPG Amex for everything else.

Maybe pressure from Chase will eventually cause SPG Amex to offer some bonus categories. That could make it surge back into the lead as far as I'm concerned.

Oh, I guess I must've gotten it mixed up. This makes SPG much more attractive! :) Thanks again for the clarification.

Amex PRG also gives 2x spend on gas and groceries which I think you might have been mixing up with the Sapphire preferred. It also gives 3x points on airfare. I personally think that MR points are significantly devalued compared to what they used to be though....

I would agree with other posters in that it would be best to spend different amounts on different cards. This would maximize sign-up bonuses as well as spending bonus (i.e. the 30k companion pass on BA).

You should also keep in mind that some credit cards limit the amount of miles that can be earned on the card unless you have status

why not get the AARP and collect 5% cash back on all their purchases? they're both old enough, so they can each get one for 6 months, right?

my vote would be the prg and sapphire preferred..with possible with freedom thrown in..and basically use those 3 cards to split up all the spending depending on what is being spent on....at least with membership rewards and ultimate rewards you have lots of flex bility...

When I had my catering business, Restaurant depot was categorized as a "supermarket" for spend purposes. Back then I used the Citi Premierpass card which is now that Citi Premier card.

Since they vastly devalued the program to a dollar value for travel, I don't recommend that they get that card, but instead look into other cards with a bonus for supermarket spend that can convert to an airline with a fixed business class awards. IIRC, the Amex gold card offers 2 amex points per dollar for supermarket and gas spend which can convert to 500k amex points a year.

However, MR is missing AA and UA, but has over a dozen other partners so you might want to look at that chart first.

Costco only takes Amex cards.

If they could shop at Sam's Club for the same items at the same prices, they could buy Wal-Mart gift cards with any CC and use them there.

If they are going to be spending $250,000 a year then they might want to look into the AMEX Centurian card. I bet the rewards will trump any others.

Or just pick the airline they want to fly on and get that airlines branded card. $250,000 spending will get them enough miles for the ticket they want.