Credit Card for Air Miles, Are any worth it for someone who flies 2-3 times a year?

[Sabre]

For someone who only flies 2-3 times a year, typically internationally. Are there any credit cards, plans, or clubs etc to sign up for that would be beneficial to make the experience better?

For instance, some have lounge access, some let you upgrade your seat, some cover some cost of flying (or all if you build up enough). But when I look the plans are often a bit confusing and when I dive into them I am left unsure if any of them would actually be beneficial to someone who doesn't fly constantly for work.

It isn't helped by them using their own strange inflated intercard currency (points and miles) that don't relate to real world currency.

However, if one of them is very good at building benefits from everyday spending, like if I could get 2-3%+ back on everyday spending that I could then use like cash on airline tickets, baggage fees, upgrades, etc. And maybe have a perk of lounge access or earlier boarding, I'd like to know about it.

 

[Africa1]

Citibank offers a fair deal. You pay $95.00 yearly and with those miles and day to day spending will save nicely!

 

[revturbo9967]

I fly every week, and even then, the cards aren’t worth what they give you.

 

[375Fox]

For a personal card, I’d say no. A good cash back card with no annual fee would be a better option for you. For a business card, I’d rather have the points than cash back. The additional perks are pretty minimal. You can buy club passes with each ticket for a reasonable fee. A free bag and boarding with zone 2 isn’t much of a perk.

 

[375Fox]

The one exception might be if you can find a card with a huge points bonus for signing up and hitting the required spending, but you need to have a trip in mind before any annual fee eats into the benefit of getting the card.

 

[WAC62]

Chase combo, Chase Sapphire Preferred $95 annual fee is an excellent travel card 3% points on Restaurants and Gas/EV. Chase unlimited 1.5% cash back on all other purchases and cash can be converted to points for travel.

 

[Sabre]

I fly every week, and even then, the cards aren’t worth what they give you.

For a personal card, I’d say no. A good cash back card with no annual fee would be a better option for you. For a business card, I’d rather have the points than cash back. The additional perks are pretty minimal. You can buy club passes with each ticket for a reasonable fee. A free bag and boarding with zone 2 isn’t much of a perk.

The one exception might be if you can find a card with a huge points bonus for signing up and hitting the required spending, but you need to have a trip in mind before any annual fee eats into the benefit of getting the card.

This is sort of where I kept landing as well. I have been lured in by the thought of a big sign on bonus of miles/points. But that has pretty limited value if you are doing it once just to get the equivalent of $200 in credit towards a flight.

It's hard to keep track of how much value is really there because (from what I understand as someone not very well versed in miles) the miles value seems to change depending on what you want to use them on, and from card to card.

Being sarcastic here: Some are just unnecessarily confusing and end up being useless. Like "If you pay us $600 per year you get 10 million sky miles***"
Fine print reads: ***Our sky miles can only be used from January 1st to January 2nd on a one way red eye flight to El Paso TX.

 

[coreydb]

I have a United Airlines credit card issued by Chase. I accrued enough miles by using it for all day to day purchases to fly round trips to Spain for me and my wife, and for me to go to South Africa once. Since COVID and the current conflict in the middle east though, points per purchase were greatly reduced. BTW; I use the card like a debit card and pay the balance every pay day.

 

[wesheltonj]

It depends if you want lounge access or not. For everyday spend I use the Chase BA Visa. The great things about BA is (1) they allow you to have family accounts. Each person charges and flights are pooled together (2) after 30K spend each year, you received a 2 for 1 Frequent Flyer certificate (that's two ticket using miles for the miles of one). (3) Depending on the class of service Chase reimburses you part of the fees and taxes on FF tickets.

The other thing about BA, you earn Tier Points on BA and one world partner flights, once you hit silver, that's One World lounge access everywhere when flying on a One World Airline, for example AA and Qatar.

I put my Business spend on AMEX Platinum card. That gets me AMEX lounges, Plaza Premium and Priority Pass Lounges. Lots of other fees that that are covered. $100 a quarter for Resy restaurants. I spend that at J Alexanders. US $15 Uber credit per month, Uber One membership. $200 a year Airline fees. Walmart + Membership, you get 10 cents off at Walmart, Murphy and Exxon/Mobile gas, plus Sam's Club gas. And free delivery for Walmart. Also a Hotel Credit, that for me is not very useful. I can transfer those Points to BA and Usually there are bonus points for the transfer. Also point transfers to foreign carriers do not incur Income tax liability.

Alaska Airlines before the merger with Hawaiian used to have the best FF program, but no more.