Best credit card for travel

McCheese

McCheese

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I anticipate doing quite a bit of traveling in 2014/2015, so I'd like to get a credit card that will be useful towards that goal. Primarily, a card that will let me accumulate points that I'll be able to use on airline miles or, failing that if I don't have enough, hotels and other travel expenses. I pay almost all of my day-to-day expenses via credit card and pay the bill off each month. For the past few years I've been using the Amazon Visa card--which has been awesome--but I realized I don't buy much from Amazon nowadays so it's time for a change. I figure if I get a card soon, I can spend the bulk of the next year building up reward points. I'm also going to be making a $3,000 payment to the card in January, which is another reason I'd like to get one soon. I know some cards offer big bonuses if you spend a certain amount in the first 3 months.

I've done some Googling and searching around, and it seems like the two most popular ones are Chase Sapphire and Capital One Venture. I'm leaning towards the Capital One Venture card simply because it seems like the most flexible in terms of spending your rewards points.

Any experience with these or ideas for lesser-known cards that might work?

By the way, I swear we had a credit card rewards thread here but I couldn't seem to find it. Maybe I'm thinking of FoH.
 
Falstaff

Falstaff

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We had one on FoH for sure.

Are you planning on sticking with a single airline or picking and choosing whatever is cheapest? Chase Southwest card recently had two free round trip tickets if you spent $2k in the first 3 months, but this card also has an annual fee.

nerdwallet is a good site to checkout for comparing cards if you haven't already been there.
 
McCheese

McCheese

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I forgot to mention that all the travel will be international, and I doubt I'll be sticking with a single airline. I'm one of those people that hunts down the cheapest flights by leaving at odd hours on odd days from odd airlines out of odd airports.

I'm not too concerned with an annual fee (especially since most cards seem to waive them in the first year, anyway) because, since it will be the only card I use, I should be able to get value out of it.

I've never heard of nerdwallet, but I'll check it out. Thanks!
 
Eomer

Eomer

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Definitely some variant of Visa, anyways. They're pretty much universally accepted around the world, more so than MasterCard is and infinitely more than American Express. As far as which Visa provider and package to go with, I have no idea.
 
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Dabamf_sl

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Capital one venture. No foreign transaction fees. Visa (you need visa in some poorer countries). Great rewards that you can just use toward any travel expenses without any blackout nonsense. I love it
 
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Creslin

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Get a card with a chip and pin, there are lots of places especially in the EU that might accept visa but don't accept swipe cards anymore. US is ages behind on the tech tho and its hard to even find banks that offer chip and pin. Also make sure its chip AND pin, sometimes they offer just chip, which is pretty useless.
 
Vinen

Vinen

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Creslin_sl said:
Get a card with a chip and pin, there are lots of places especially in the EU that might accept visa but don't accept swipe cards anymore. US is ages behind on the tech tho and its hard to even find banks that offer chip and pin. Also make sure its chip AND pin, sometimes they offer just chip, which is pretty useless.
Click to expand...
What Cards offered in the US have chip and pin? Never seen it -
 
Falstaff

Falstaff

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A lot, if not all, of the American Express cards are chip and pin I think... maybe just the Gold and above.
 
Eomer

Eomer

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Eyashusa_sl said:
A lot, if not all, of the American Express cards are chip and pin I think... maybe just the Gold and above.
Click to expand...
American Express is probably the least accepted of the major credit cards internationally, though. Really if worldwide acceptance is the priority, it has to be a Visa.
 
McCheese

McCheese

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Yeah, I'm definitely not going with American Express. I still routinely see places in the States that don't accept it and I know it's worse internationally. When I was overseas before I had a Visa and an AmEx, and my AmEx was completely worthless for how often I could actually use it.
 
Nite

Nite

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Chase Sapphire no doubt... its a Visa, no foreign transaction fees, have great flexibility transferring points to a few airlines and hotels (mainly you would only transfer to United Airlines, British Airways (short haul flights) and Hyatt). The card has a Chip + Signature. Plus, the card looks really cool
I think yesterday they raised the sign up bonus on the card (50k points), check this thread on flyertalk for the best current application link:
Sapphire Preferred : 55k points after $3k spend, but $125 fee after year 1. - FlyerTalk Forums
 
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a_skeleton_03

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Yup I can swear by my Chase Sapphire and it working in every country I have been to in Europe.

The points are great. I have $1,500 in points that I can use on Amazon and a bunch of other places.
 
Izo

Izo

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Adebisi

Adebisi

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People are mentioning a lot of card names that I have never seen in my travels. Leading me to believe many of you have never traveled outside merica.

Cancun doesn't count.

Get a straight up Visa.
 
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Kedwyn

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Biggest thing about international travel is the fee banks fuck you on for using a currency other than dollars. Sometimes as high as 2% sometimes 0%. That is really what gets you. Avoid that, get some rewards and profit.
 
McCheese

McCheese

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The places I'm going I won't actually be using the credit card on location, anyway.

I went with the Capital One Venture card. Thanks for all the input! Especially Izo. He always provides the best advice. Good lookin' out, bro.
 
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a_skeleton_03

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Adebisi_sl said:
People are mentioning a lot of card names that I have never seen in my travels. Leading me to believe many of you have never traveled outside merica.

Cancun doesn't count.

Get a straight up Visa.
Click to expand...
The Chase Sapphire IS a Visa and probably the most prominent travel card on the market due to the fact that they will charge you based on local currency so that you don't have to eat it in the shorts with exchange rates by taking cash out.
 
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