Hi,

Hellllp! I need a suggestion please. I’m looking for an air miles/frequent flyer card. My airline travel from Los Angeles is mainly for pleasure. This Fall I am going to New Zealand probably on Air New Zealand. Next year I will probably going to Europe or Argentina. I am signed up with U.S. Airlines frequent flyer program and have about 30,000 miles. I already have an Amex Gold Business card and an Amex Platinum Business Cash Rebate card. If I’m not mistaken Amex gives me a point for each dollar spend but if I want to use those points to fly then I only get a percentage.

Which type of card is better, a bank or airline? I have excellent credit and pay my bills at the end of each month.

I assume that any miles I already have can not be combined with the miles from the credit card. I believe that any miles I accumulate on one airline can be in some cases combined with miles accumulated on a partner airline (I.E. U.S. Airways and Air New Zealand.) Is this true?

I read the credit card recommendations on About.com, Credit Card.Com and other sites but would appreciate any specific recommendations someone can make.



Thanks in Advance,
Peter Peril

Hi Peter,

This is a common question and is best answered by doing a search on the forums of Flyertalk. Apart from that search tool, try typing things like 'best credit card flyertalk.com' into google.

You will get lots and lots of opinions - mainly because everyone values things differently and have different experiences.

You will probably find a lot of people praising the Starwood American Express card. It's an awesome card and has a program that is easy to follow. Whether or not you get more value from that or the other Amex cards you have is a matter of personal value. But - I would go with Starwood.

If you fly US Air mostly - I would suggest that you get the free USAir Mastercard as well as Starwood.

Good luck, and welcome to FT!

Hi,
Thanks for the info. I used to fly US Air quite a bit back to Pittsburgh but no longer. I now fly on what ever carrier is appropriate for the situation. USA is in the Star Alliance which seems to have a few excellent members. I was thinking of joining another carrier program but now don't think it's necessary.
I read quite a bit about the Starwood/Amex program. Is worth joining even though I mostly stay at timeshares and B&B's when I travel? Do you have a second choice such as the Chase Travel Plus Platinum, the Delta Sky Miles or the Cap One No Hassle? I do though think that the Starwood is a better card for travel than my Amex Business Gold card. I do use it quite a bit for groceries, gas etc. and was thinking of using the new card for these purposes. I do spend over 1k on month on it.
Sorry for all the questions. You're right there is a lot of info on the web, in fact too much. It can be very confusing. Thanks again for your reply.

Hi Peter,

The reason I mentioned US Air, was because that is the only airline in your profile, which I took to mean that was the only airline you had an association/membership with.

Regardless of where you stay, I would suggest you consider the Starwood card. I would not touch CapOne nor Chase Travel Plus.

Without knowing more specifics of your travel patterns/frequencies nor spending habits, here's my suggestion for you, though other posters may have different ideas:
1. Starwood Amex
2. Hilton Amex (yes, get both)
3. Citi Dividend Card (cash back)
4. Discover Gas card (5% rebate) as well as for certain DiscoverShopping transactions, etc.
5. Instead of #3, you may wish to consider the IHG Chase or Marriott Chase or United Chase or Southwest Chase or US Air Juniper or American Citi or Alaska Bofa or etc... You can alternate between these free/cheap cards as you like, using them for the times that Amex is not accepted. I would get the free cards first, one for each year, unless they offer to waive the second year's fee (since the first year is usually free)

If you fly infrequently, combine your flying into only two airlines and utilize their partnerships to avoid orphaned miles. I stick with Alaska and United for simplicity.

Good luck.

Rob

Rob,
You're right US Air is the only airline that I am signed up with. I will consider signing up with a second one. I will also give a lot of consideration to applying for the Starwood Card. On average I take one big trip out of the country and two small trips in the U.S. each year. I already have the cards previously mentioned plus a B of A Visa and MC. Each time you get a new one or just apply your credit score takes a hit. I'm not sure about adding those from your list.
Thanks again

United has a hub in L.A., and they are part of the Star Alliance...if you wanted to, you could keep your US Air account going and charge any Star Alliance flights for credit to that account.

You first need to decide what you want from all this.

Real airline miles have the most value when there is a lot of them pooled in one account. They have a lot less value when spread around a lot of accounts, none of which have signficant balances.

Therefore, since there are three alliances, even if you choose among more than three airlines, you should probably have one account with an airline in each of the three alliances, and US Air takes care of Star. The only reason to stop collection Star Alliance miles in US Air and switch to United is if you wanted to go for upgrades (or if your further research showed that redeeming US mlies for UA flights is a lot harder than redeeming UA miles for UA lfights). But you'll not likely ever got to the point of upgrades unless you mostly stick with one alliance (and have the minimum number of flights per year on the carrier in that alliance with whom you collect).

Real arilne miles have the most value when used for otherwise expensive trips. 25000 miles for a coast-to-coast trip that you could have bought on sale for $300ish is considered by most a poor value. 25000 miles for a LAX-JAC (Jackson Hole WY) trip, even though way shorter, that would have cost $500-$600 or more cash is a much better valuel. 90000 miles for a LAX-Europe trip in business class (if you can appreciate that), is by far the best value, because business class from LAX to Europe will cost several times more than economy class, yet you only need about double the miles to get a business class international ticket as an economy class ticket.

OTOH, you would mostly use miles for flights that are not that expensive anyway, then what you want is not a "fake miles" card like Capital One but an oridnary cashback card. See, all those "fake miles" cards do is collect points at the equivalent of about 1 point per dollar spent and then turn those points into tickets at the cost of about 1 dollar per point. If you look it closely, that's exactly the same as a 1% cashback card, except with a 1% cashback card, you don't have to wait until you've spent $25,000 before you can get anything from it.

But nothing other than "real miles" will let you "multiple" the value you get, because only with real miles do you get chances to get flights that would have been much more expensive with cash. Neither cash back nor "fake miles" would help you with that LAX-JAC ticket that cost $500-$600 and up with only $25,000 of credit card spending, but real miles (at least in the case of UA) would, in my experience. (I don't have US miles so I have no idea how easy it is to get such a flight with US miles rather than UA miles.)

Hi,
Thanks for the reply. I am interested in collecting mileage. I forgot that I am signed up with the AA program. Unfortunately I have no miles and as I wrote before I have 30.8k with US Air. I used to go on USA a lot but now it's what ever carrier is appropriate for the trip. I am going to New Zealand, probably on ANZ, this year and Europe or S. America next year. On average I would say my traveling will be one big trip outside the U.S. and two small trips in the U.S. per year.
My original question was which mileage credit card to get. I have an Amex Gold BUS. Rewards, Amex Plat. Bus. Rebate and B of A MC and Visa Cards (no miles or rewards.) Even though I stay mostly at timeshares and B&B's most people on Flyertalk have recommended the Starwood Preferred Guest Card. What's your take on it? Some people say it's a sin to convert Starpoints to miles. Do you prefer a different one for mileage? You mentioned getting a cash back card. Do you have any in mind?
I know this is for a different forum but I'm trying to figure out the best airline to NZ, ANZ has the lowest fare right now, so that I can get the most miles when I convert them to USA miles. As I said before I want to jack up that 30k figure. Also the best plane 747 or 777.

Peter,

The Starwood Amex card yields 1.25 miles for every $ spent if converted to airline miles in most (but not all) programs. When you reach 20,000 Starpoints, that can be converted into 25,000 miles in many of the airline programs (but not all).

I stopped using my United Visa card because $20,000 dollars spent = 20,000 miles.
My Starwood Amex card will allow me to convert 20,000 into 25,000, which is enough for a free domestic ticket.

It's not a sin to convert *points to miles if you aren't going to stay at a Starwood property. I will say that *points are much more valuable than miles; and certainly more redeemable.

As an example, that free airline ticket may be worth 1 or 2 cents a miles under everyday circumstances. Maybe 3 or 4 cents a mile if you need to fly somewhere last minute. YMMV (your mileage may vary).
On the other hand, if you cash in 20,000 Starpoints in Europe for 2 night stay, you could save $600 plus (3 cents a point). Many would argue a Starpoints is worth as much as 8 cents a point. This is why everyone on the Starwood board hoard their points. European properties are a worthwhile redemption.


Most folks here, including Inside Flyer magazine, suggest the *wood card.

Welcome to Flyertalk.

No it's absolutely NOT true. Others have given you good advice but I'm not sure if this particular point was addressed clearly - as in "Don't do it!"

You cannot combine miles accumulated on NZ's frequent flyer program with miles accumulated in US's Frequent Flyer program. In general (ignoring the program converters which typically cause massive loss of miles going from program A to program B), it is impossible to transfer miles from one airline to another.

What you're thinking about is this: it IS possible to fly on US and earn in NZ's program. Or fly on NZ and earn in US's program. Or any other Star Alliance airline's program. Since you're already in US Airways Dividend Miles and have a decent balance already, the thing you want to do is give Air New Zealand your US Airways FF# when you check in, or call them in advance and make sure it's in there.

Unless you have a very unusual situation, and already travel over 100,000 miles/year, the general idea is: never actively use more than one airline's FFP within an alliance. Go ahead, fly all 17 airlines in Star Alliance, but pick just one program and credit everything to that.

If you then plan to work your US Airways program as your main FF program, then getting a credit card that feeds Dividend Miles makes sense to me. Either the US Airways cc they're incessantly pushing in the airports and on the planes, or the Starwood Amex, or both.

Hey Great!
The last two posts really cleared things up. I'll go to the USA, AA and New Zealand forums to see what airline and plane is recommended. Thanks

I second the *Wood card!!!

That good conversion rate is not available for United or Continental miles. Last I looked, the rate for those airlines was 2 points gets you 1 mile. The card is great for most other airlines, however. But it has two drawbacks:

• It is an American Express card. Many merchants do not accept that card.
• The bonus for first purchase is not as good as many of the airline cards.

Do take a look at the Credit Card section of my website below. There you will find some of the best offers available for airline cards (and the Starwood card). American, and United Airlines, and U.S. Airways, for example, have some super up front miles offers for first purchase or certain minimum dollar amount purchases (15,000 - 25,000 free miles are typical). Many are free of annual fee for the first year. Then just cancel it before you have to pay the second year fee. Look in both the Free Card and Annual Fee card sections. Many of the best offers are in the latter section, as they are free for the first year, even though they have an annual fee.

There is not reason why you can't carry more than one card. I carry four, one for gasoline, one for 2% rebates on certain purchases (as I won't pay more than 1 cent/mile for miles), the Starwood card, and whatever airline card Visa or Mastercard gives me the miles I most need now.