For all you FF users

JJShaw · Post by **JJShaw** » Sat May 31, 2008 10:37 am

We are thinking we might open a card that can earn some good miles. And close the ones we have that dont offer this. Does anyone have any suggestion as far as which card has the best deal. We'd like use it for everyday purchases and pay it off monthly and not carry a balance..anyone have any input?
Thanks

jmq · Post by **jmq** » Sat May 31, 2008 10:41 am

Considering the same. Looking real close at Capitol One right now and its any airline/anytime options, plus its one of very few cards left that do not charge foreign transaction fees on overseas charges.

alw1977 · Post by **alw1977** » Sat May 31, 2008 10:49 am

I note that you live in Eastern NC - are you willing to drive to Charlotte for flights, or do you want to go out of your "home airport"? US Air would be the most obvious choice coming out of Charlotte, but Delta could also be an option.

We use Delta Skymiles Amex. Truthfully, Delta is frustrating. It is possible to get their Skysaver rewards (30K right now for Carib travel), but you have to book very far in advance. However, Delta is our home airline and we can fly direct, so we're willing to book 330 days in advance. We rack up miles very quickly (they offer lots of double mile opportunities). If you travel mid-week and off season, it's much easier to find tickets. Delta has one or two flights to STT each day from Atlanta.

I would ordinarily say go with an AA card, but they've just cut their Carib flights and I'm not sure how it's going to be in the future.

Some people use the Capital One card (where points translate into dollars), but I don't know much about that plan. Delta works for me for now. We've gotten two free trips on Delta this year using the lowest level reward, from ATL-Costa Rica and ATL-STT. Both were booked about 300 days out, and both off-season. We leave on Thursdays and return on Saturdays.

JJShaw · Post by **JJShaw** » Sat May 31, 2008 11:16 am

We dont mind driving to Clt at all..we flew out of there on our last trip to STJ. We are also about the same distance to Myrtle beach for Spirit and currently booked on Spirit from Columbia SC to Ft Lauderdale..all those airports including Greensboro are about the same distance for us. And we too dont mind going in the off season as well. I will check into Deltas card TY.
Does anyone have any expierence with the Sprit Card?
I see they have an annual fee of 69.00 but if we got even 1 free flight every 2 yrs it would be worth it

gymnastika · Post by **gymnastika** » Sat May 31, 2008 12:13 pm

I have a capitol one card and I love it. We charge everything on there, including private school tuition. You get 2 miles for every dollar spent. You can also get credit for hotel, rental cars, etc. They have levels of reimbursement, such as: 15,000 miles for up to $150, 35,000 miles up to $350, 60,000 up to $600. The thing is if you have a $100 ticket, you have to meet their first limit of 15,000 miles, and so on. There are ways of working it where you call and get them to break down the tickets per person, per way, etc.

The best is if you have a ticket that costs more than $600, you can use it mile for mile, dollar for dollar exactly.

We average 2 to 3 tickets per year with Capitol One. It's worked great for us because you are not tied to one particular airline. I think I am going to use my miles this July for a stay at Maho or Caneel.

snorkeler525 · Post by **snorkeler525** » Sat May 31, 2008 3:16 pm

The one that gets the best ratings from the travel pros is the Starwood Amex card - lots of points earned and great flexibility on which airlines/hotels you can use. Of course, you need to pay it off each month (although now some things can be stretched across several months if you really want to pay those high interest costs!).

Puddlejumper · Post by **Puddlejumper** » Sat May 31, 2008 5:27 pm

I just applied for but have not received a card from HSBC. It should have been here over a week ago, but apparently got lost in the mail. Seems to be happening to me a lot lately. So a new one is on the way. OK, back on topic. They offer a few different cards, like cash rebates or Fly rewards. No annual fee. I had been using a US Air card with no annual fee. This HSBC seems to be a much better deal.
https://www.hsbccreditcard.com/ecare/home_nli

JJShaw · Post by **JJShaw** » Sat May 31, 2008 7:03 pm

Puddlejumper wrote:I just applied for but have not received a card from HSBC. It should have been here over a week ago, but apparently got lost in the mail. Seems to be happening to me a lot lately. So a new one is on the way. OK, back on topic. They offer a few different cards, like cash rebates or Fly rewards. No annual fee. I had been using a US Air card with no annual fee. This HSBC seems to be a much better deal.
https://www.hsbccreditcard.com/ecare/home_nli

Ohhh...becareful with HSBC bank....we have a GM card thru them...very good limit on the card..Problem was they decided for no reason to raise our interest to 31.99%

We have never been late or missed a pymt and have perfectly credit...I did a google search on this and there are over 150 reports of them doing this to others as well..We turned them over to the BBB and also threatened to report them to Office of Currency...and along with anyone else that would listen to me..Finally after a few calls and getting the BBB involved about 6 weeks later they decided to drop the interest back down...We plan on paying them off in the next cpl weeks and closing that card for good...here is a link with a few problems others are having...http://householdwatch.com/news/interactive/138...But thanks for the reply anyway...

Puddlejumper · Post by **Puddlejumper** » Sat May 31, 2008 7:33 pm

Thanks for the info! Sounds kind of like a land shark to me. That bites!

islandgirl · Post by **islandgirl** » Sat May 31, 2008 9:26 pm

ha this is the same question hubby and i talked about today. love to learn the ins and outs of FF too. any one with more ideas??? we need to get more info out so we all can afford it and feed our addiction to stj.

Sun4MySoul · Post by **Sun4MySoul** » Sat May 31, 2008 10:59 pm

JJ- I have the US Airways Visa card from Bank of America. I use it for every day purchases and monthly bills ...there is a fee for it every year. I think around $60, but I always use FF miles to fly to STJ from CLT, so its worth it for me. US Air has a daily direct flight in season and nearly daily in offseason from CLT. I just booked an off season flight for 30,000 miles. You get one mile for every dollar spent with the card and they have a great deal now where they give you several thousands miles with your first purchase.

JJShaw · Post by **JJShaw** » Sun Jun 01, 2008 8:16 am

LOL...we were just looking at US Air...and do like the bonus program they have I also read with some of their cards you can get up 149 in companion certificate once a yr....and they fly out of every airport that we would be using...sounds like a deal. I think we are leaning more toward them..

Thanks

Sun4MySoul · Post by **Sun4MySoul** » Sun Jun 01, 2008 10:27 am

Yes..US Air does give you a companion ticket every year. For some reason or another, I have never used mine, so I'm not sure how successful that is. But I should make a point to do that this year! Good idea.

We certainly have our choice of airports from Eastern NC...too bad they are all such a drive away!

Margy Z · Post by **Margy Z** » Sun Jun 01, 2008 12:50 pm

On the debit card side - we have our checking with Citibank and have a MasterCard debit card with them that is tied to AA miles when you use it as a credit card (non ATM). I now write fewer than 2 checks per month but rather use this card to pay all utilities, gas purchases, groceries, insurance, doctors, dentists, just about everything - even our real estate taxes. We try to avoid using cash even for smaller purchases and have this card connected to AA's dining rewards as there are a lot of restaurants on that plan in our area. Not that I'm plugging Citi although I worked for them for about 20 years (lol)

but, on the credit side, they also have a platinum cc that gives you 25,000 AA miles as a "signing bonus". With the combo of the two cards and the AA dining rewards and shopping (now double miles at Staples, even) you can really rack up some miles.

pipanale · Post by **pipanale** » Mon Jun 02, 2008 9:51 am

I'm a frustrated Delta person. We went with Delta back in 2000 and are more or less wedded to them at this point. We started using them out of EWR and now out of RDU. It's very hard to book travel. I could not find Sky Saver tickets for our next trip and I wa son the phone at 12:01AM on the 330'd say from our trip.

Plus, when we wanted to use some 2 months ago to go to the DR, we got "N/A" as the availability...and the damn plane was maybe 1/3 full!

If I could move my 190K miles to another card...any card, I'd be happy.

We joke about going to Home Depot and using the Amex to earn double miles that we can never seem to use

usvi-on-line

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For all you FF users

For all you FF users