Credit Card Rewards and Recommendations

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Business, Finance, and Careers > Credit Card Rewards and Recommendations

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Bisty Q. posted:

Delta is pretty much the worst one. The 'pro' thing to do is to transfer them to British Airways when there's a transfer bonus in effect, then use those Avios to book trips on American. If you mostly take short-hauls (to the midwest or shorter), you'll come out way ahead this way, since Avios redemptions start at 7500 miles each way (yep, you read that right) and you book on regular American flights.

Is the British Airways 40% promo the best its going to get? Have there been any other promos?

# ¿ Jan 5, 2015 22:27

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 02:08

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Some offers are really dumb but there are occasional gems like the Amex Platinum 100k points for $3k spend that I wish they would send me

# ¿ Apr 28, 2015 15:51

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

THF13 posted:

The Capital One Quicksilver is flat 1.5% cashback on everything, no categories or redemption requirements. It is also the only credit card I know to let you setup automatic rewards redemption. Mine is set to automatically redeem my cash back as a statement credit whenever the balance reaches $25. It's probably the simplest rewards system possible.

Discover IT also has no foreign transaction fee and a simple rewards system. They are running a promotion where Cash Back is doubled for the next year at the moment. Discover isn't as widely accepted as Visa/Mastercard though.

A few people really like the BankAmericard Travel Rewards, but I don't have that card so I'm not sure how simple the redemption options are.

All three of those cards are chip and signature, not chip and pin but that should be fine. The Arrival plus is pretty unique among US cards in that it will fallback to chip and pin if chip and signature is not accepted, I don't know any recommended cards besides that one that offer this.

I recently picked up the DiscoverIT card. One nice thing with this 2x Cashback promotion is that I believe it applies to their promotional cashback offers as well. This means that for Bestbuy.com, their 5% cash back quickly turns into 10%. This is in addition to their rotating categories.

# ¿ Jun 24, 2015 22:24

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Citi Prestige (40k points - could be 50k) /Amex Platinum (100k points offer) would be good if you get access to their lounges. Everyone and their mother has a Sapphire Preferred - its a good card, especially if you can get a high signup offer.

# ¿ Oct 5, 2015 23:54

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

TastyLemonDrops posted:

I have a friend who I suggested the Chase Freedom back when the sign-up bonus was $200. I went through the whole spiel about how it was a killer deal because it was basically a free $200 and no annual fee, with no risk if you were a responsible person. The next time I saw her, she had gotten the green American Express card because her mother said it was better. As far as I'm aware, it's got an annual fee and nothing really going for it. American Express is also the only card I've had refused by vendors.

I wonder why her mother told her that. The only reason why I'd recommend an Amex over another card is for the purchase and loss protections. Its one of the only reasons why I'm keeping around my Amex Platinum - the coverage for potential loss, theft, or damage on a purchase is incredibly high, so I feel generally confident buying electronics on the card and potentially getting some money back if something happens to it during the initial use of the product (headphones breaking, getting stepped on, or generally just lost).

# ¿ Nov 6, 2015 00:22

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

The other nice thing about the platinum is the centurion lounge, especially if you're in an area where you can get regular access to it.

Speaking of Amex:

https://www.google.com/finance?cid=1033

# ¿ Jan 22, 2016 21:42

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Man, decision is pending for the CSR. Here's hoping they overlook the fact that I think I'm right at 5/24.

I do agree with the fact the Sapphire Reserve seems to obsolete the Preferred. 3x dining makes up for the off-times for the Freedom in terms of UR accumulation. I'm wondering whether the Sapphire Reserve can do the UnitedX workaround for Amazon GCs like the Amex cards can.

# ¿ Aug 22, 2016 21:20

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Geez, didn't even realize this:

Sapphire Reserve�s also applies to general travel purchases, including airfare, taxi rides, rental cars, hotels � even bridge and tunnel tolls. If you travel (even only within your own state), there�s a very good chance you�ll have no problem using up the credit.

That's pretty generous and makes up a lot for the annual fee (more than just the airfare ones for the Amex Plat.

# ¿ Aug 23, 2016 00:51

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

surrender posted:

I've only started getting into reward cards and my CSR is only my 2nd in the last 2 years, although I applied for a Freedom Unlimited in the same night Then again, I work/live in sub-Saharan Africa, so I don't have any opportunities to use a credit card besides airfare and vacations.

Are you going to be able to hit the minimum spend to get the bonus points (which makes it all worth it?)

# ¿ Aug 23, 2016 21:56

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

I really like Amex Centurion Lounges. Luckily I live next to SFO so I get to go any time I travel anywhere.

The CSR is super nice since you get the 100k points, you get the $300 travel credit, and you get UR transfer partners. Its not nice because it doesn't necessarily give you status for anything.

The best old card for status (which isn't offered) was the United MilesagePlus Presidential:

Avis President�s Club membership (ends December 2015)
Hertz President�s Circle membership (starting January 2015)
Hyatt Platinum status

It also let your purchases count towards status. Unfortunately, I don't think there's many cards that let you do this anymore.

Regarding these expensive cards though - it still costs $150 so if the lounge/point benefit is worth more to you than the annual fee, no real gotchas.

# ¿ Aug 24, 2016 16:37

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Personally for MR and Chase, it depends on whether you want a lot of use (Avios Points) or if you're just looking to blow them out on a first class ticket. Some people like the former, other people like the latter.

# ¿ Aug 31, 2016 04:16

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Mikedawson posted:

Hey, a while back I asked about a card I should get, but I never did it due to outside pressure.

Would it be safe for me to take out a Discover secured credit card when I earn roughly $770 a month, am credit invisible, and spend $331 on rent and bills? Also, are there better options available?

Are you planning on doing this to earn points back or to build credit?

Generally, you'd want to be sure you are not spending over your means before going that route.

# ¿ Aug 31, 2016 22:37

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

Humblebrag (but use your concierge services if you have access to it):

Was able to procure Hamilton tickets in SF for the presale by calling the Amex Concierge a week in advance and asking them to get it. I think I avoided the fees and taxes as well by going through them.

# ¿ Dec 6, 2016 02:25

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# ¿ Apr 29, 2024 02:08

Shadowhand00: Jan 23, 2006; Golden Bear is ever watching; day by day he prowls, and when he hears the tread of lowly Stanfurd red,from his Lair he fiercely growls.; Toilet Rascal

THF13 posted:

The normal American Express Platinum gives you access to the Delta skylounges if you have a delta flight that same day.

I think the $300 travel credit of the Chase Sapphire Reserve really puts it far ahead of the platinum. You'll absolutely use travel credit of the Reserve every calendar year but the $100 travel fee credit for the Platinum isn't nearly as good. The Reserve you don't get Delta or Centurion lounges though, just the ones included in Priority Pass.

Platinum is $200 for your selected airline. its good if you actually have a regular airline or just want to buy an airline gift card. Used to be able to do Amazon through United.

# ¿ Jan 25, 2017 07:21

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Business, Finance, and Careers > Credit Card Rewards and Recommendations