Boogie711

Hey folks - I'm an Ontario, Canada based business traveler. I'm self employed as a consultant, and sell primarily to Americans. My apologies for a query that won't affect many of you.

Anyway - being in Canada, my primary frequent flyer program is the accursed and evil Aeroplan. I'm a United Premier Executive member (or at least, will be as soon as my recent Turkish Airways miles credit - grrrr).

As a small business owner, I probably put $40k a year through my credit card. Until now, that's been earning Aeroplan miles. But the fuel surcharges are ridiculous and almost criminal - for example, Air Canada Toronto to London Heathrow is well over $600 in fees! I'd MUCH rather be earning United miles - not for status, I collect those already, but for reward redemptions.

Does anyone have any workarounds in mind? Is there a credit card available I can transfer points to Mileage Plus?

I figure, the fall back if my business keeps going well, is to look at incorporating in the USA and seeing if I can get a corporate card that would earn miles, but that's a lot of extra hassle just to get the occasional surcharge-free reward flight.

entropy

You can get united miles with a President Plus card (with no FX) .

I agree that Aeroplan is ridiculous. The only issue with abandoning aeroplan is the lack of upgrade-ability for non obnoxiously priced fares for non-elites. And you don't get the pearson priority line as a UA*G.

I'm now hanging out in Toronto a lot, I plan on keeping my United status...

Joshua

Setting up an LLC is relatively simple to do, but you'll be stuck having to file U.S. taxes. I just set one up and took care of the appropriate tax filings, and I can attest I'd much rather pay YQ than deal with U.S. corporate taxation.

Other Canadians seem to be moving their credit cards to stuff that earns Starwood points.

CP@YOW

Dealing with U.S. taxation is even worse if you're a non-resident. Speaking as an accountant in public practice, I would never recommend that a Canadian incorporate in the U.S. for frivolous reasons. The annual compliance costs would be much more than the value of the miles earned. And would a new company with no credit rating and no assets be able to get a U.S. credit card anyway?

Starwood allows flexibility, but the problem is that the transfer ratio to UA & CO is bad -- 2 Starpoints = 1 mile. You could transfer to US Airways instead at 1:1, though I'm not sure of the status of surcharges at US.

Santander

No surcharges, decent redemption rates, worse routing rules than AC or CO but not too bad. If you have an ITIN and a US bank account it is likely you can get a US-based CC (I did it myself a few years ago) but don't hold your breath on getting a decent miles-earning card any time soon. The easiest way used to be to transfer a Canadian Amex Plat into a US Amex Plat and transfer to CO, but that obviously doesn't work anymore.

festdave

[QUOTE=entropy;17431976] And you don't get the pearson priority line as a UA*G.
QUOTE]

The last time I flew through Pearson (the Transborder part at least), I got into the priority line with UA *S. I had to have the actual card, though, not just the BP, and it may not be the same in the Canadian domestic or non-US-international concourses.

Boogie711

Thanks for the thoughts, folks. I agree incorporating in the USA is silly just for airline miles, but I'm increasingly selling to US companies and at some point I'm going to have to look at it. Ugh.

Anyway - for those of you who do a lot of flying in and out of Canada and YYZ, spend the best $10 a year you'll ever spend and get Nexus. That will get you through the Pearson priority security lines, and expedite your entry across the border.

eeprofessional

look through Chase and see if their United Mileage Plus Card can be sent to Canadian addresses....

if not, establish a US bank account with online banking and get any United Miles card sent to you.

If they refused to sent you the card, setup a US PO Box (non-Post Office Boxes) with real address across the border in the US. Then repeat the process.

Shareholder

Won't a US bank account require IRS issues too? And does one not require a US credit history to get a cc? There is a rumour that we will be getting a UA cc up here next year. Hope so, at least one that is as generous as the US one vis a vis being able to UDU and CR1 upgrade award tickets within NAmerica.

dobster1

Did anyone figure this out?
Now, a few years later maybe there's a way around this?
I thought any miles on the Star Alliance could be transferred to United? Or is there a trick?

rmadisonwi

You can't transfer miles between accounts on different airlines. You can use other airlines' miles to book UA award travel, but availability might be limited, and you couldn't use those miles to upgrade a UA flight without buying a really expensive fare to start.

WineCountryUA

• Any *A flight can be credited to UA MP (although the earning will vary based on flight operator and fare class -- warning, in some lower fare cases the earning is zero).
• Using MP UA miles, flights on other *A carrier can be booked (based on award space availability). This is true also of other *A programs.
• Once miles have been credited to a particularly *A airline's program, they can not be transferred / moved to another *A's program (a few corner case exceptions exist, typically of poor value but that is the general rule).

mahasamatman

And welcome to FT, dobster1!

transportprof

Here's three steps to earning MileagePlus miles with a Canadian credit card. I do it regularly:

1. Get an Amex Cobalt card in Canada.

2. Transfer Membership Rewards points to Bonvoy. There's even a 20% premium - i.e., 5 MR points equal 6 Bonvoy points.

3. Transfer Marriott Bonvoy points to United Mileage Plus through Rewards Plus. There's also a 10% bonus, I believe.