Credit Cards that earn Mileage

[sunzt]

I've been looking into new credit cards and saw the Chase TravelPlus Platinum Visa Card which lets me earn 1 mile for every dollar I spend.

My question is, how many miles does it usually take to book a domestic round trip ticket? Is it like twice the actual miles between two cities?

 

[Viper GTS]

Well United as an example...

25K or more.

25K is usually the limited seats, subject to blackouts, etc.

50K for unrestricted I think.

Airline miles cards really aren't that great in terms of reward value (the possible exception being that you purchase a lot of airline tickets using the card & get bonus miles that way).

Viper GTS

 

[dullard]

A mile is supposed to be worth 2 cents (according to most airlines). Thus, a general formula is to take the price of the trip and divide it by $0.02 and you'll get the approximate number of miles. Unfortunately, in many cases a mile is really worth just 1 cent. Thus, you'll need about double the number of miles.

Essentially your CC is a 1% money back card but the money is tied up and earmarked with so many restrictions. Thus if you instead had a real 1% cash back card (cash that you could spend on anything you wanted) you probably would have been better off.

 

[RandomCoil]

If you're in an area covered by Alaska Air, take a look at the card they offer through BofA. The higher-end versions of the card include some nice features beyond just earning mileage. Also, Alaska miles transfer to British Air and Hawaiian Air, among others.

 

[Dunbar]

Without knowing this card specifically, I'd say it's better to pick an airline that covers your city well and apply for their mileage card. You can get 15-20,000 miles just for signing up plus 1 mile per dollar spent. If you cancel after 6 months and reapply you can rack up 30-40k miles a year without spending any money. The mileage requirements typically are:

Domstic Coach - 25k saver / 40-50k standard
Domestic First - 45k saver / 80-90k standard
International Coach - 50,000 saver / 80-90k standard
International Business - 90,000 saver / 150k standard
International First - 120,000 saver / 200k standard

Standard awards are much easier to come by. In my experience American has pretty good domestic saver availability.