Best Credit card to accumulate Travel points

[784caroline]

We all know there are plenty of credit cards out there where you can accumulate travel miles or points using a Hilton/united /or whatever sponsored credit card. What interests me however, are the credit cards where you can accumulate points and use the points accumulated on ANY air carrier. The points convert to a specific dollar amount and when you book your travel, the credit card provider simply deducts the dollar value of the points from the total booking charge. There are no blackout dates or restricted seats.
I know of Citibank and USAA (total rewards) as having such programs. Anyone use these cards or something similar...good or bad experience??

[Mikitv]

I have used Visa Capital One's program for years and you are right about any air line and no black out dates. I have gotten free tickets this way and used my airline miles to move up to first class. A little harder to do right now. Air line credit cards will get you a free ticket too, but the miles don't count when you fly. When I use Visa CO I get a free ticket and my miles are applied to my airline account. It is like double dipping. You just have to watch for the deals the various cards offer and choose the best one for you.

[earickis]

We also have the VISA Capital One No Hassle card. No black out dates etc. You get 1 point for every dollar spent. You can book airline tickets using your Visa, and then redeem you points for credit against your balance. To determine the amount of points you need to redeem a ticket is simple. Just multiply the cost of the ticket by 80. For example if the ticket cost $200.00, the amount of points you need would be 16,000. When you redeem the points the $200.00 is credited back from your purchase. We have been using the card for several years now and have not paid for an Airline Ticket for over 3 years,.

[Barefoot]

I have a Visa Platinum Travel Card. Fireboy and I are going on the TOTV cruise in September and paying for it with travel points! And that includes airfare to/from Canada!

[nONIE]

Bare, that is wonderful! Smart move on your part.

[784caroline]

I personally use a USAA MasterCard Total Rewards and it is great. I dont know how they figureit out but For 20,000 point (I receive 1 point per Dollar charged) I get $225 in airline credit...50,000 -points = $600. This is really a no hassle way of getting discounted airline tickets AND the Credit Card is NO Fee.

[dadspet]

USAA Master Card is clearly a great card. Any airline on any date with no backout dates or money back instead. Another great feature is if you find a better flight then they give you you can actually book that flight with the airline on a 24 hr hold and USAA will pay for it. BTW I even get my Photo (hope its no surprise but its not the photo posted here) and my wifes Photo on it.

To belong to USAA last I knew you needed to be a Officer in one of the branches of service or have a family member who was one.

[deano_hoosier]

My two cents worth...

I realize the posts are focused on credit cards that are pretty unrestricted on using points for travel, but I wanted to provide input on the way we approach this. We use a Marriott Visa card with the purpose of using their Marriott Rewards "travel packages" that include rt air plus 7 nights at a Marriott property. We've used this approach on 4 trips: Australia, Argentina, and two trips to Spain.

Our last two trips to Spain each required 215,000 points. I was able to obtain open jaws and stopovers on these trips that made it convenient to add in another 7 days in other parts of Spain. By this time next year, we'll have enough points to do it again :) (assuming they don't bump up the point requirements.)

This approach works for us because we find Marriott properties that match our travel requirements and the flexibility offered by Capital One, for example (while attractive, I'll admit) isn't needed. I definitely appreciate Capital One's not charging an international transaction fee when making purchases outside the US and use it all the time in that arena. The Marriott Reward points can also be exchanged for air miles (eg. 50,000 air miles requires and exchange of 125,000 Marriott Reward points) but we've not taken this approach.

[784caroline]

deano
We also belong to the Marriott Rewards program and have taken advantage of many (free) trips to places like Hawaii, Germany, HongKong, Thailand using the "Travel packages" as you described them. WE have a Marriott Timeshare and accumulate alot of points through member referrals and have on one occasion actually traded a week in for Marriott Rerward Points.

In my opinion, the MArriott Credit card is OK if you stay at alot of Marriott Hotels. Otherwise there are drawbacks such as having to pay the $65 annual fee. The MArriott points that you accumulate are best used by far for Marriott hotel stays or the "travel packages" That typically include a 7 day consecutive hotel stay certificate (not a great feature). To redeem Marriott points for airline ticktes...well the points have to be in your airline Frequent Flyer account..not marriotts and that can take a couple of days or weeks and you can lose you seats waiting for the transfer. Using Marriott points strictly for Airline tickets is not a good use of your marriott points...neither is using marriott points for cruise tickets or general mercahndise. You definitely get most value out of marriott points using them for Marriott Hotel rooms or the Travel Packages.
After years of having and using a Marriott Master Card as my primary card, I now still have it, but use the USAA Travel Rewards Master Card which offers me much more flexibility for what I want to use it for.
BTW we intend to use our MArriott reward points to get a travel package to Australlia. USing these points take some planning and some day it would be great to comapre notes on your trip down under!

[marjean]

We have Capital One too, and I love it. We get a point for every $ of purchases, and we can use the rewards for anything, including cash or just apply the credit to our outstanding balance. That way you can use the rewards to pay for a plane ticket, or anything else you may want to buy or pay for. To me, that's the most versatile. And, it is like double dipping if you use it to pay for airfare...you still get credit for the flight. To me its the only card you need. We used to have a credit card for an airline, one for GM, etc., now we use just one and get all the same benefits.