Best Non-Airline Card
 

Is there a credit card available like the AMEX Membership Rewards that allows tranferring miles to other airlines? Or, what is the best card for earning miles for use on any or most airlines?

Welcome to FlyerTalk, jrpmzp.
You will likely find many here extolling the virtues of the Starwood Amex card. It allows transfers to (I believe) all airline programs, with a 5K bonus every 20K transferred. Also, SPG is a top-notch rewards program on its own, if you like hotel rewards. (Among other things, they have no award black-out dates).

See, for instance:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/008903.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/008921.html
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum1/HTML/008604.html

Thanks for the advice. Since Amex is not accepted everywhere I'm looking for a Visa/MC as a backup. But I don't want a card affiliated with any particular airline.

Consider the free Amtr ak Mastercard.

500 point signup bonus. Miles transfer 1:1 into United, Continental, or Midwest in 5000 point blocks and 1:2 into Hilton as well as being redeemable for Amtrak trips and various other things such as Ritz Carlton suites.

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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

[This message has been edited by gleff (edited 10-18-2003).]

We love having a Starwood AMEX card, along with several UA cards, an AA card, several AS cards (mostly to get the $50 companion certs every year), and a NWA card. We want to have all of our bases covered in our FL-IRA, when we retire.

We were able to trade 120,000 Starwood points last December, for 300,000 Qantas miles (thank you OzStamps, which we in turn used for two free Concorde tickets. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif Awesome!!

Without FlyerTalk, I would never even have dreamed of traveling at the level of luxury-on-a-budget that we now enjoy. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Welcome to FT.

I use the Hilton Honors Visa Card as a backup to places that don't take AMEX.

Best thing, has no annual fee.



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Moderator: OMNI and S.P.A.M.

The signup bonus isn't as generous, but the free Amtrak Mastercard earns HHonors points at the same rate as the HHonors Visa -- but allows for a much wider range of rewards (UA, CO miles for instance).

It sounds like you are shopping for a non-amex backup to compliment something you already have which earns membership rewards points? If so, I'd agree that you should check out the SPG Amex instead. You can do various searches around here, but it tends to be THE preferred card around here by a vast margin because of the redemption bonus when converting to FF miles. You'll do better for FF miles on this card than membership rewards.

In addition to my AMEX cards, I also use a Juniper Bank Orbitz Master Card. This card gives you 1 Pt. per $ you spend plus 2 Pts. per $ spent on the Orbitz site. You need 20k for a ticket on any airline with a value of up to $400. Other lower awards are available for discounts of $100 or $200. If you book a lot of international tickets (esp. Business Class) you can collect a lot of points. Nice part about this card is you can use the points for tickets on any airline sold through Orbitz and you also get FF pts. with the airline for the free ticket since it is Orbitz that gives you the free bonus and not the airline.

I have used a no charge MBNA Elite Rewards card for several years. $1/1 pt. It can be used on any airline.

For a good discussion of the advantages and disadvantages of credit card points programs versus airline/hotel credit cards, see Universal Miles vs. Airline miles

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View from the Wing: A blog about Free Miles and Free Markets

I gather from all of the replies and links that SPG Amex is a popular choice. By transferring Starwood points to an airline program one could overcome the restrictions imposed by "universal miles" cards, i.e. a requirement to book 14 days in advance, a requirement to have a Saturday stay on the ticket, and a maximum cash value for the ticket.

I have done this with the AMEX Membership Rewards program which is very similar.

However, what I'm really looking for is a NON-AMEX card with that same feature, transferring points to airline miles programs, for use when AMEX is not accepted.

I haven't been able to find such a card.

See above -- the Amtrak Mastercard.

Satisfies the 'non-Amex' requirement.

Redeem for Amtrak trips, or transfer to United, Continental, Midwest Airlines at 1:1. Transfer to Hilton at 1:2.

No fee.

I have a friend who uses this and likes it. I have a Starwood AmEx and Travelocity M/C ($100 off cert for every $8k spent). We both had Citibank AAdvantage but got rid of them because of the fee. All three of those named above are no fee for the first year and have generous sign up bonuses.

I also saw an AmEx MR card signup today with a 25K MR points bonus. These weren't the 2:1 points either; they were the "good" 1:1 points.