HCA

Agree with Schwab part, going to apply one soon with other sign up bonus credit cards. (wait for full 6 "month"s before my last applications)

For Priority Pass from Citi Premier Pass Elite: For my understanding, "The $99 membership fee is waived. You pay $27 per person per visit if you choose to do so." I do have Priority Pass from Citi AMEX Platinum with 3 free visits per year.

dracs

Excellent information by all experts.

CAtraveker

Could someone clarify "churning?" I have an AA Citi Mastercard. If I want to maximize my ability to get more free airmiles, I guess I can "churn" Citi cards. Does this mean to apply for the same card a number of times? There is an annual fee. Do you cancel the extra cards before the fee comes due? Does this impact your credit rating?

Does the HHonors Surpass Card require that you keep it for a year in order to get the miles, etc.?

rodrigo

Why hasn't anyone said anything about Discover cards? Are they bad?

In other sites, I've run across some of them, mainly the Discover Escape, Discover Miles, and Discover More. The first two offer pretty nice mile bonuses upon signup, as well as 2 miles per dollar. I think the 'catch' is that they value each mile as 1 cent worth of award travel. So you'd need 100K miles to book a flight worth $1,000 which is pretty bad.. Is this correct?

The third card claims to offer 5% cashback on travel, home, gas, restaurants, etc. and up to 1% on other purchases. Is there a 'catch' to this one as well?

Thanks!

Great thread! After reading everything, I'm definitely going for the Starwood Amex. I'm still looking for a fallback Visa or MasterCard for when Amex is not taken. Still undecided though...

biggestbopper

Yes, IMHO, Discover cards are bad. Because they are run by a bad company which a lot more often than many other companies does not follow the law, or the billing error rules.

Probably based on, among other things, its coming out of the Sears store card years ago with a base of lower income users.

I have had experience with Discover--bad experience!

On the other hand, they did give a GPS system as a sign up bonus not too long ago.

But, I would avoid them no matter what the sign up offer. Unless you are just going to take the bonus and run.

mikeef

Churning is applying for the same card over and over. There is a very long Citi churn thread in the credit card section, but most people cancel their previous cards before applying for new ones. Generally, cards wave the annual fee for the first year, so that may not be a problem, but churning will have a negative effect on your credit.

Mike

pinniped

If you're doing a lot of churning, it might actually be a rare case where it's worth it to pay for one of those credit-monitoring services that actually provides your score on a regular basis.

When I churned cards for miles and teaser dollars back in the day, I found that I could stay at a certain level of activity and my score would hardly move at all. But if I opened a card and loaded it to the max with 0% teaser money, I'd take a little hit...something about too much credit utilization (or similar).

freeflyin

My wife and I have had the original Discover card for decades and have never had a problem.The few times we needed customer service,it was handled competently and quickly.

They recently changed the terms but none appear to affect the way we utilize these cards.

We only use Discover for the 5% cashback categories,which on our cards changes quarterly.As soon as we max out each card for the promo,it returns to the drawer.ShopDiscover has some really good cashback relationships and they post seamlessly for us,unlike many of the other portals.ShopDiscover also credits if I use a code or coupon-many of the other sites do not.

I do not like the fact that they changed the cash redemption level to $50-I never saw any notification of this change.Some of the gift card options are decent also-adding extra value.

While Discover is certainly not our primary card,it does offer value to us and unless they start with an annual fee,we will keep it.

mia

I think the primary reason is that this is Flyertalk, and (to my knowledge) Discover has never issued an affinity card for any airline or hotel program. This does not mean that Discover (or Capital One) should not have a place in your wallet, only that their products do not coincide closely with the focus of Flyertalk.

Any bank can issue cards with travel rewards, but when you redeem they must purchase a seat or room at market price. Cards linked (or convertible to) the airlines' and hotel chains' own programs have access to award inventory which an airline or hotel chain projects will otherwise be unsold. This is where the greatest value is typically found. An empty seat or room is a perishable commodity worth very little to the owner, but often very valuable to the consumer.

Of course there are exceptions because some airline and hotel programs manage their award inventory poorly.

pinniped

The only problem with some of the "everyday purchase" categories is that I think the merchants are catching on. I'm guessing they have to pay more per transaction or something...

For example, there are two gas stations near me - the places I regularly fill up, swiping my card at the pump. One of the two shows up on my bill as a florist; the other shows up as a restaurant. The names are two actual nearby businesses, which makes me think the owners have a little deal worked out. (In the case of the florist, I know he does not own any gas stations.) Another gas station across town shows up as a dry cleaner.

I just use my SPG Amex or HH Amex (depending on the year) everywhere, so it doesn't matter to me. But I'm wondering if you guys who carry a variety of cards for different purposes run into this often. It seems that some gas stations want to avoid sending charges across as a gas station if they can. You'd fill up using one of those "driver's edge" type cards thinking your getting 5% back but would only end up getting 1%.

rodrigo

I don't see how HHonors yields 2-3 miles / dollar. From their points-to-miles page, you can exchange 10,000 points for 1,500 miles. That's 6.6 points per mile, so earning 6 points per dollar means you get < 1 mile / $ spent.

Since I don't stay in hotels too often, I hardly see any value in the HHonors card. I'd much rather use the SPG Amex...

Can you clarify what you meant?

pinniped

Actually, if you don't stay in hotels too often, but do stay in hotels on occasion, the HH Amex and SPG Amex are even more valuable to you than they would be for someone who is awash in hotel points and top-tier status from their stay activity.

Personally, I value an HH point at about half of what I'd value one FF mile if we're talking about "hard value" awards. Some people are probably closer to one-third... I think that's what Guava was getting at, not that he'd actually want to convert the HH points into air miles.

The only relatively decent convert-out option (IMHO) for hotel points is the Marriott Travel Package.

Keflyer

This is a great summary. Thanks gleff!

daringtofly

As an AMEX Platinum Delta cardmember I offer the following updates to the program (would be great if the OP added them to his post) from Delta.com:


How do Companion Certificates work? <T&Cs>

Delta Reserve - *Free* Domestic First Class Companion Cert
Free (plus taxes and fees) in First/Business or Coach

Platinum Delta SkyMiles - *Free* Domestic Coach Companion Cert
Free (plus taxes and fees) in Coach

Gold Delta Skymiles - *$99* Domestic Coach Companion Cert
$99 (plus taxes and fees) in Coach

And, you can now redeem online. <- SAVES $20-$35 Dir Tkt Chrg


NEW for the 2010 Medallion Program are these juicy bits:


Award Redemption Fees

All Members_________Platinum Medallion_________Delta Platinum & Delta Reserve Cardmember

Award Ticket Redemption
3 days or less prior
to departure date

$150 per ticket_________Waived_________Waived

Award Ticket Redemption
4-7 days prior
to departure date

$100 per ticket_________Waived_________Waived

Award Ticket Redemption
8-20 days prior
to departure date

$75 per ticket_________Waived_________Waived

Award Ticket Redemption
21 days or more
prior to departure

No charge_________No charge_________No charge

Partner Airline Handling Charge (per tkt if 1 or more seg is on partner)

$25 per ticket_________Waived_________Waived

For updated links to all cards see:

http://skymilesoffers.delta.com/cred...d_partners.php

Finally, all card holders can "pay with miles" which lets you trade 10,000
miles for $100 off of a ticket, not good in FT terms but normal folks might
use it on occasion when money's tight.

mia

I cannot explain why your gasoline stations are using another merchant account, but I don't think it is specifically related to the Everyday Spending feature. In my understanding merchants often pay a higher fee when a customer uses a "rewards" or high-end (e. g. VISA Signature, Mastercard World/World Elite) card, but I do not think the card issuer can pass through the cost of their specific rewards program.

The theory behind Everyday Spending seems to be that the cardholder typically must carry the card to use it at supermarkets, gas stations and pharmacies. This increases the probability that the card will be used at other merchants. (I think this model is breaking down for pharmacy purchases, because the chain stores will keep a card on file for prescriptions and other items can be added to the transaction without producing the card.)