topic Re: Best card for US-London flights? in Credit Cards

Best card for US-London flights?

smith5879 — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 04:27:19 GMT

I have a friend who is moving to London next month for school to get his doctorate. What credit card would be best for him to earn miles to fly between the US and London? Preferably with no annual fee. Would a standard card like Barclay's Arrival be best, or a co-branded card like Chase's United or British Airways cards (although those have annual fees)? Also, he'd probably want to use an airline with relatively cheap flights. I don't know if one airline generally has cheaper flights than the others. I'm not as familiar with travel cards as I'm more of a cash back card guy. I do pretty much no traveling, and if I do I drive.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

nyancat — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 04:41:17 GMT

United or Delta. Definitely NOT British Airways - they have enormous surcharges on award flights (that can come close to the cash fare).

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

Anonymous — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 04:42:08 GMT

If your friend would like top tier rewards (points) is best to pay an annual fee for a cc. For example if you compare the Chase Sapphire and the Preferred version. Its well worth paying the annual fee, since you earn points faster. same thing with the Arrival and Arrival + .

if your friend does not like annual fees.... get the annual fee and divide it by 12 (months) and see how cheap it is!

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

Anonymous — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 04:45:57 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
If your friend would like top tier rewards (points) is best to pay an annual fee for a cc. For example if you compare the Chase Sapphire and the Preferred version. Its well worth paying the annual fee, since you earn points faster. same thing with the Arrival and Arrival + .

if your friend does not like annual fees.... get the annual fee and divide it by 12 (months) and see how cheap it is!

The difference between CS and CSP has llittle to do with earning rate, much more to do with how URs can be transferred with the CSP and not with the CS.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

AvadaKedavra — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 05:09:18 GMT

How about the Virgin America Visa? I think it might actually have the highest flight rewards per dollar spent. It's Virgin America but rewards can also be redeemed with Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia. There is a $49 AF which isn't really bad at all.

EDIT - after some light research, people aren't really happy with comenity as the issuer. Perhaps still worth a look but really look into it.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

B335is — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 05:04:38 GMT

Unfortunately most airline rewards cards are going to have an AF. I would personally go for British Airways and American because American cards can be churned and the BA miles easily transfer to AAdvantage.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

smith5879 — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 06:18:40 GMT

So after doing some more research and reading your guys suggestions, I've got a small list of cards. He may be ok with an annual fee, I'll have to ask. Also since, he'll be living in London, it should probably have no FTF and an EMV chip, which eliminated a lot of possible cards.

Barclay's Arrival or Arrival+

CSP

Bank AmeriCard Travel Rewards

One more question is which of these are easier cards to obtain? I'm pretty sure he has no baddies, but probably has a pretty thin credit file. I'd guess he has maybe one or two credit card tradelines and that's it. I don't think he ever had to take out student loans and he's never had an auto loan. I think I can throw out the CSP because of the thin file, right? Any others I should cross off the list?

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

Anonymous — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 06:22:37 GMT

Is one of his existing cards an Amex? Since he'll be in the UK for quite a while, he might want a UK credit card, if he has UK income from the university for example. With an Amex, he can transfer that and get some UK history, otherwise a pain for a while.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

jsucool76 — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 06:37:36 GMT

@AvadaKedavra wrote:
How about the Virgin America Visa? I think it might actually have the highest flight rewards per dollar spent. It's Virgin America but rewards can also be redeemed with Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Australia. There is a $49 AF which isn't really bad at all.

EDIT - after some light research, people aren't really happy with comenity as the issuer. Perhaps still worth a look but really look into it.

Virgin also charges pretty hefty fuel surcharges from what I've heard

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

Skye12329 — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 06:37:55 GMT

Barclays will probably be the easiest on that list. Im not sure on how tough BOA is. I know for Chase they like a 6 - 12 mos. AAOA so since we dont know how thin or thick of a file.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

smith5879 — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 06:39:45 GMT

No he doesn't have an Amex,but he will be getting paid by the university.

Re: Best card for US-London flights?

Membersince2013 — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 12:25:41 GMT

CSP

BARCLAYCARD ARRIVAL PLUS

CAP ONE VENTURE

DELTA CARD FROM AMEX

VENTURE ONE (NO ANNUAL FEE)

PRG

Basically, the point here is that it's hard to a card with great travel benefits and no AF fee.