topic Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time in Credit Cards

5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 16:53:31 GMT

Chase offers one quarter on airlines. US Cash + has one category.

I have dedicated one 5% category on current US Cash + card all the time for airline.Now that US Cash + attractive categories like bill pay, Home improvement and Airlines are going away, is there any other cards which gives 5% back on airline all the time?

I have many cards which give 2% on travel or airline like Chase Sapphire Preferred but nothing to replace US Cash + category.

In absence of new card, I plan is to use all my 3 Chase cards- Freedom, Sapphire Preferred and Sapphire No annual fee Mastercard points including leveraged Freedom 5% points. Then transfer all points to Sapphire Preferred and book flight using Ultimate rewards which will give me 6.25% from 5% Freedom transferred and 2.675% from Sapphire Preferred and 1.33% from Sapphire MasterCard.

Above calculation includes 7% annual bonus on Both Sapphire cards and 25% bonus from ultimate rewards site bookings.

Re: 5% Pogints or Cash back on airlines all the time

webhopper — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 16:59:07 GMT

Discover gives 5% back on travel booked through shopdiscover. Hotels.com and expedia are both shop discover partners. Amex gives 4x MR on flights with PRG booked though amex travel online.

Re: 5% Pogints or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 17:03:22 GMT

Discover does not offer 5% cashback on airline tickets.

Re: 5% Pogints or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 17:06:19 GMT

Expedia Terms and conditions mention

Offer not valid on standalone flight purchases

Re: 5% Pogints or Cash back on airlines all the time

webhopper — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 17:13:53 GMT

If I use shopdiscover to book travel I add the hotel in. Flight only I use amex travel. Discover vacation desk is also 5% cash back on things like cruises and vacation packages with a live travel agent to help you with booking and getting discounts like AARP or military discount applied.

Re: 5% Pogints or Cash back on airlines all the time

Repo-ed — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 17:40:32 GMT

@webhopper wrote:
Discover gives 5% back on travel booked through shopdiscover. Hotels.com and expedia are both shop discover partners. Amex gives 4x MR on flights with PRG booked though amex travel online.

What is the actual site? url?

When I log into my account and click on travel, it only shows booking options for Plat holders.

When I go here https://travel.americanexpress.com/home it ask that I log in, and then I'm not able to navigate BACK to the original url.

Re: 5% Pogints or Cash back on airlines all the time

webhopper — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 17:54:02 GMT

https://travel.americanexpress.com/home?inav=menu_travel_book

There are seperate travel options depending on what amex cards you hold. I can either use the personal "book a trip" button or use the business travel button where there are savings due to pre arranged fare reductions. For reimbursed travel I would go through the PR personal travel portal. My small business does not require travel so I have never used the business travel portal.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

UFGuy2006 — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 18:51:29 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Chase offers one quarter on airlines. US Cash + has one category.

I have dedicated one 5% category on current US Cash + card all the time for airline.Now that US Cash + attractive categories like bill pay, Home improvement and Airlines are going away, is there any other cards which gives 5% back on airline all the time?

I have many cards which give 2% on travel or airline like Chase Sapphire Preferred but nothing to replace US Cash + category.

In absence of new card, I plan is to use all my 3 Chase cards- Freedom, Sapphire Preferred and Sapphire No annual fee Mastercard points including leveraged Freedom 5% points. Then transfer all points to Sapphire Preferred and book flight using Ultimate rewards which will give me 6.25% from 5% Freedom transferred and 2.675% from Sapphire Preferred and 1.33% from Sapphire MasterCard.

Above calculation includes 7% annual bonus on Both Sapphire cards and 25% bonus from ultimate rewards site bookings.

Penfed Travel Rewards Amex provides 5x points per dollar for Airline purchases.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

nickn86 — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 18:56:22 GMT

PRG is 3x MR for travel and 4x if you book through Amex Travel. Amex Travel is always a little bit more expensive than booking directly through the airline or with Orbitz, Expedia, etc... though unfortunately (tickets are like 8 bucks more for domestic travel, not sure about international).

The Travelocity Amex and Priceline Visa both give 5% if you book through their respective sites I believe.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 19:27:22 GMT

Priceline visa rewards mentions 5% on "Name your price" hotels but nowhere it mentions that it gives 5% on airline.

Can anybody confirm that priceline gives 5% points when booked air ticket from priceline.com and charged to priceline visa.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

KS13 — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 19:37:01 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Chase offers one quarter on airlines. US Cash + has one category.

I have dedicated one 5% category on current US Cash + card all the time for airline.Now that US Cash + attractive categories like bill pay, Home improvement and Airlines are going away, is there any other cards which gives 5% back on airline all the time?

I have many cards which give 2% on travel or airline like Chase Sapphire Preferred but nothing to replace US Cash + category.

In absence of new card, I plan is to use all my 3 Chase cards- Freedom, Sapphire Preferred and Sapphire No annual fee Mastercard points including leveraged Freedom 5% points. Then transfer all points to Sapphire Preferred and book flight using Ultimate rewards which will give me 6.25% from 5% Freedom transferred and 2.675% from Sapphire Preferred and 1.33% from Sapphire MasterCard.

Above calculation includes 7% annual bonus on Both Sapphire cards and 25% bonus from ultimate rewards site bookings.

i don't see what quarter Chase offers 5% on airlines? For this year

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 19:46:00 GMT

It was for Q4 2012- Last month. Freedom made changes for this year and deleted it.

Amazon 5% which was in Q1 last year is moved Q4 this year.

Luckily they continue Gas for two quarters for 5% but Discover now reduced to only one quarter a year for gas.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 19:59:07 GMT

Well, as already posted, PenFed Amex seems to do what you want:

https://www.penfed.org/PenFed-Premium-Travel-Rewards-American-Express-Card/

Earn 5 points on airfare purchases
Earn 1 point on all other purchases
20,000 bonus points when you spend $2,500 within the first 3 months of opening the Card account – that’s worth $200 toward your next round-trip airline ticket
No annual fee
No foreign transaction fees

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 19:59:19 GMT

@UFGuy2006 wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
Chase offers one quarter on airlines. US Cash + has one category.

I have dedicated one 5% category on current US Cash + card all the time for airline.Now that US Cash + attractive categories like bill pay, Home improvement and Airlines are going away, is there any other cards which gives 5% back on airline all the time?

I have many cards which give 2% on travel or airline like Chase Sapphire Preferred but nothing to replace US Cash + category.

In absence of new card, I plan is to use all my 3 Chase cards- Freedom, Sapphire Preferred and Sapphire No annual fee Mastercard points including leveraged Freedom 5% points. Then transfer all points to Sapphire Preferred and book flight using Ultimate rewards which will give me 6.25% from 5% Freedom transferred and 2.675% from Sapphire Preferred and 1.33% from Sapphire MasterCard.

Above calculation includes 7% annual bonus on Both Sapphire cards and 25% bonus from ultimate rewards site bookings.
Penfed Travel Rewards Amex provides 5x points per dollar for Airline purchases.

It also has a 20,000 point sign up bonus.

Penfed Amex

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

distantarray — Sat, 19 Jan 2013 23:25:09 GMT

US Bank Flexperks is the best for travel imo, and I'm probably the worst frequent flyer addict in this forum lol!

Flexperks is interesting. 1 flexpoint is worth upto 2 cents in tiers best for ANY flights. Why? Because it's one of the only cards that allows you to AQUIRE frequent flyer miles at the sametime.

Like I fly from Tampa FL to Vietnam few times a year. If I use my points to buy a $1,400 ticket, I'll still get about 20k miles through United for my flight. after 3 flex point award flights I can use the United miles for a free flight. So your double dipping into Flexperks + United frequent flyer program which is almost never allowed with miles credit cards.

The best thing is they have 1x 2x and 3x point categories, but the points are actually worth upto 2x 4x 6x Not to mention if your military with Platinum checking, or hold $25,000 of funds in their accounts you'll get another 50% bonus on your regular spending.

So 3x 4x 6x cents in value. Also the points to redeem domestic flights is A LOT less.

For instance an award saver flight from United from Tampa to New Jersey is 25,000 miles award saver. Or you could use 20,000 flexpoints. the flight costs $179 United points don't even come to 0.8 cents per point value in this case. Flexpoints however gets over 1.6% since 20,000 points gets you a $400 flight. Meaning instead of flying coach through United points, you can fly First class for $349, or fly two people for less points.

1.5 flex points = 3 cents with platinum checking for base spending so points adds up a lot. It's a little confusing at first but it is HANDS down the best travel card, because it has the ability to aquire miles while you redeem your flexpoint award flights + work towards your airline status. Also big spenders can get the annual fees waived, and Flexperks is THE best card if you pay a lot in taxes.

3x flexpoints (6cents value) for Charity donations. meaning if you pay Charities to get tax write offs AND gain 6% back for travel. So if you gave 50k to charity for write offs with the card, you would aquire 150k points good for $3,000 in travel + your frequent flyer miles.

If you fly international like I do, 1.5 flex points = 3 cents for base spending, but in my case the extra ff miles I would get would be worth close to 30% more value. So 3.9 cents value for everyday spending with Platinum checking, and that's just the base points!

Although if you like to fly business or first class internationally this wouldn't be the best card, but for economy flights this card is king, or 2x short domestic flights or 1 first class flight domestically.

The points are a bit strange, but if you learn how to use it correctly you'll love it.

Why I say this isn't the best card is because United miles can be worth close to 9 cents per point when redeemed for first class saver awards (140,000 round trip) when tickets can exceed $12,000. Although you could just buy the United points for under 2 penny a piece and get the first class ticket with miles purchased for the same price as a coach ticket during season.

Personally my 2 favorite cards. Flexperks (off season + international economy flights, or domestic first class) + United Club for peak season flights and instant gold status and 1.5 miles per dollar spent is the best if your looking for first class or in season flight redemption.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Cageym — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 01:20:24 GMT

I used the Amex travel site (I have a Delta Gold) to check a ticket price to go back to the states this summer, then checked other sites. Amex was about $1000 cheaper for a business class round trip ticket. I don't need %5 back if I can save that much on the ticket.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

webhopper — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 05:20:32 GMT

I like the amex travel site. The tickets are reasonably priced... and 4x rewards

Also the optional to pay with points...

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 14:44:27 GMT

My experience with Chase Sapphire Preferred is very good.

I use Kayak.com to identify which flights are most suitable and best prices and write down flight numbers. Close Kayak and go to Chase ultimate rewards.

I then transfer all Freedom points to Sapphire Preferred and then buy identical kayak flight numbers for identical prices.

That way, I get best deals as well as 25% bonus from CSP by which I get $500 worth ticket with worth $400 points.

Plus I get 2% on purchase amount for future.

Re: 5% Points or Cash back on airlines all the time

Anonymous — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 04:45:59 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
My experience with Chase Sapphire Preferred is very good.

I use Kayak.com to identify which flights are most suitable and best prices and write down flight numbers. Close Kayak and go to Chase ultimate rewards.

I then transfer all Freedom points to Sapphire Preferred and then buy identical kayak flight numbers for identical prices.

That way, I get best deals as well as 25% bonus from CSP by which I get $500 worth ticket with worth $400 points.

Plus I get 2% on purchase amount for future.

As an aside, if you're using Southwest or United, it's better to transfer your UR into those frequent flyer programs and then redeem them instead of using the UR travel portal with the 25% bonus. SW RR points are worth around 1.66-1.88 cpm, and as much as double that on United (my last redemption was close to 4 cpm).