One more note, on the personal credit card side: Chase is apparently about to release a new 'Chase Sapphire Reserve' credit card with a much higher annual fee... but so far sounds like it includes things like:
3x points on travel/restaurants (instead of 2x), 1.5 cents per point when booking through the travel portal. $300 annual travel credit - aka refund of travel expenses. Complementary Lounge access Complimentary in-flight Depending on the fine print, this seems like it might be a better deal for me than the sapphire reserve card - just because I end up traveling so much. The rumored annual fee is $450, but if you subtract the travel credit, and subtract the additional 1% of earnings on travel/restaurants, the cost of this card should actually be less for me. If you don't travel as much, then, well this card isn't for you. -forrest On Fri, Aug 5, 2016 at 10:17 PM, Forrest Christian (List Account) < li...@packetflux.com> wrote: > This gets somewhat complicated. Let me try to explain, with some > background: > > I have the following for business purposes: > > 1) Chase Ink. This earns chase miles, at a rate of 1 point per dollar > for most things, plus 5 points per dollar for office supplies, cellular, > internet, cable, and 2 points for gas stations and either restaurants (ink > plus) or hotels (ink cash). The ink plus has an annual fee (I Think $95), > and the ink cash doesn't. There's another bonus of the ink plus, I'll get > to in a minute. > > 2) AMEX Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card. This earns 1 starwood > point per dollar, plus more at starwood hotels (aka sheraton, westin, > etc). ($95 Annual fee) > > 3) AMEX Business Rewards Gold. This earns 1 membership rewards point per > dollar for everything, and 3 points per dollar on one of : Airfare from > airlines, advertising, gas stations, shipping, and certain computer-related > purchases. The remaining categories get 2 points per dollar. $175 annual > fee. > > I use the Amex gold exclusively for shipping, and for everything else I > alternate between the starwood and chase ink depending on which type of > points I need. Mostly the starwood points, since I'm swimming in chase > points right now. > > For personal I use the following cards: > > 1) Chase Sapphire Preferred. $95 annual fee. Earns *2* chase points per > dollars on travel (hotels, airfare, etc, but not gas) and restaurants. 1 > point everywhere else. This has the same bonus as the ink plus above... > again, description in a minute. > > 2) Chase Freedom (original). NO annual fee. Earns 5 points on a > different category every quarter, and 1 point everywhere else. The > categories so far this year have included grocieries, movies, and right now > costco and restaurants. These are limited by $1500 per quarter, BUT gift > cards and similar count. So during the groceries month, we stocked up on > canned goods, and then bought safeway and albertsons gift cards. Same for > the movies (we have a few hundred dollars of gift cards now from the movie > theatres). > > 3) Chase Unlimited. No annual fee. 1.5 points everywhere. > > I use the sapphire for all travel purchases, business or not. Bonus is > that it includes primary auto rental insurance, along with a few other > interesting travel benefits (no foreign transaction fee, etc). I use the > Freedom for the first $1500 of whatever category it's earning on. I use > the Unlimited for everything else. > > So here's the reason why I use the above cards: > > They all earn 'transferrable' miles. This means that you can transfer > these points to other rewards programs where they can be worth more. > > For instance, Membership rewards points are transferrable to delta for > delta miles, which is the primary reason I continue to earn membership > rewards points. Most of the other transfer partners are kinda Meh, but a > list is here: http://thetravelsisters.com/amex-membership-rewards- > airline-hotel-transfer-partners/. > > The starwood points are also transferrable to a lot of other programs. > See http://viewfromthewing.boardingarea.com/2015/08/12/ > starwood-transfer-partners-airlines/ for an example list. Personally I > use the starwood points primarily for hotel rooms with starwood itself. As > an example, I booked the westin Grand in berlin for 5 nights a total of > 40,000 starwood points. Booking this same room right now would be $937.13 > USD for the stay, which means each of those starwood points are worth over > 2.3 cents per point for this booking. If I'm earning them at 1 cent per > point, then this is a 2.3% redemption. > > The chase points are also transferrable, IF you have a premium card. This > is the sapphire preferred or the Ink plus. A recent redemption for me was > to move some chase points to hyatt, and book three nights in SLC at the > hyatt place out by the airport. Total number of points, 15,000. That > particular weekend, I couldn't find a decent hotel for less than > $120/night, which means this redemption was worth 2.4 cents per point. > This multiplication factor is why the transferrable programs are so > useful. Without either of the premium cards, you basically get to redeem > at 1 cent per point, making the points way less valuable. > > Chase also has a really nice portal for reserving rental cars, hotels, and > airfare, often with prices below what you can obtain elsewhere. You can > also use miles to pay for them, but only at 1.25 cents per point, which is > fine if you've got more miles than you know what to do with. > > So, if I was starting from scratch, I would: > > 1) Get a chase ink plus card. This is no annual fee for the first year, > and gives you 60,000 bonus miles after a $5K spend. > > 2) Get a chase sapphire preferred card. Excellent travel card. 50,000 > bonus miles after $4,000 spend. No annual fee first year, $95 after. > > 3) Get both the sapphire freedom (original) and sapphire freedom > (unlimited). Pay attention to signup bonuses. > > In a year the annual fee applied, I'd call chase and ask them to change > either sapphire preferred or the ink to a no annual fee product. (This > gets you the bonus, and a year of figuring out if you want to keep the > sapphire or ink). > > Note the above should get you at least $1100 worth of travel at 1 cent per > point, or $1375 if you use the rewards portal to book, or probably at least > $2K if you are picky about your resumptions. > > I'd only consider the amex gold card if I knew I was spending enough on > one of the categories for it to make sense to pay the annual fee. > > In relation to the starwood card: Starwood just got bought by Marriott. > There are a lot of questions regarding the future of this program. > > Two final notes: > > Chase has a rule known not-so-affectionally as the 5/24 rule. This means > that if you've opened more than 4 credit cards across ALL providers in the > past 24 months you will be denied. So, you'd need to verify the timing of > any cards you have applied for (including authorized users). Probably > safest to look at 'date opened' on your credit file to determine if you're > eligible. > > And finally, if you don't want to play the points game, I'd probably still > recommend the chase ink, and then use either the new costco card or the > citi double cash for personal items - or one of the the capital one 2% > cards if you want to use your points for travel. > > Two websites which should become part of your reading: > > http://www.thepointsguy.com/ - higher end points travel, but good to know > about what's going on in travel and earning. > http://www.frugaltravelguy.com/ - similar focus, but more about 'budget' > travel as opposed to getting high end travel for free. > > > > > On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 2:34 PM, Chuck McCown <ch...@wbmfg.com> wrote: > >> A few months ago we had a pretty good discussion about the best deals for >> credit cards. >> Today, I am looking for a better deal for company purchases. I like my >> Capital One Visa that gives good miles. I use the miles and like to store >> them up for my annual trips to England. >> >> But I figured I may as well start getting either miles or dollars or >> super low interest or something for the company credit card. >> Anyone have favorites for company use? >> > > > > -- > *Forrest Christian* *CEO**, PacketFlux Technologies, Inc.* > Tel: 406-449-3345 | Address: 3577 Countryside Road, Helena, MT 59602 > forre...@imach.com | http://www.packetflux.com > <http://www.linkedin.com/in/fwchristian> <http://facebook.com/packetflux> > <http://twitter.com/@packetflux> > > -- *Forrest Christian* *CEO**, PacketFlux Technologies, Inc.* Tel: 406-449-3345 | Address: 3577 Countryside Road, Helena, MT 59602 forre...@imach.com | http://www.packetflux.com <http://www.linkedin.com/in/fwchristian> <http://facebook.com/packetflux> <http://twitter.com/@packetflux>
