The card has a $69 annual fee which is not waived for the first year. That fee, however, is substantially offset by the 3,000 points you’ll receive on your card membership anniversary every year, good for $50 towards a Wanna Get Away fare.

In addition, you’ll earn 2 points per $1 spent directly with Southwest. That includes flight, inflight, southwestgiftcard, Jackpot Deals, and Southwest Airlines Vacations package purchases, and purchases made at participating Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Hotel and Rental Car Partners. You will earn 1 point for each $1 of all other net purchases.

Redeem your Points towards Flights, Gift Certificates or other Travel
Points can be redeemed towards any Southwest flight, but the amount of credit you’ll receive will depend upon the fare type. For example, 120 points are good for $1 towards Business Select fares, while 100 points can be redeemed for $1 towards Anytime fares. The best redemption value, however, is towards Wanna Get Away fares, where you’ll receive $1 in credit for only 60 points. This means your 50,000 point signup bonus could be applied towards $833 of Wanna Get Aware fares, $500 of Anytime fares or $416 of Business Select fares.

Alternatively, your points can be applied towards gift cards and other travel rewards at a value of roughly a penny per point. Through December 15, 2011, there is also a special promotion where you’ll receive a 20% discount when you redeem your points for gift cards. For instance, a $50 Amazon gift card can currently be had for 4000 points, or a value of 1.25 cents per point. Note, however, that redeeming your points towards Wanna Get Away fares still yields the best redemption value at 1.67 cents per point.

At this point, it’s unclear how long Chase and Southwest plan to run the 2 free flights promotion. For more info or to apply, see the link below:

Update 11/11/11: This offer has expired.
For the current Southwest credit card offer, see this link.

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Southwest Airlines Credit Card – 2 Free Flights is Back

This is the most lucrative sign up bonus offered yet for the Preferred Card, though it also has the largest spending requirement. You’ll earn 25,000 bonus points when you spend at least $5,000 within the first 6 months of opening your account; you’ll earn an additional 25,000 points when you spend another $5,000 in the following 6 months.

As is standard for the card, you’ll receive 1 point for every $1 on all purchases and also earn an anniversary bonus for every year you remain a member. There is no annual fee.

Update 12/22: This offer has now expired. Please see this link for the current Citi ThankYou Preferred Card deal.
Citi ThankYou Preferred Rewards Card application – Up to $500 in gift cards

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Citi ThankYou Preferred Rewards Card: Up to $500 in Gift Cards

Assuming your credit card account is open and in good standing, the 1,000 bonus points should post in 6 to 8 weeks. And while not everyone has reported success in getting the bonus points, it seems like the majority of cardholders are eligible, so it is definitely worth checking out.

Link (Via FW)

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Existing Southwest Credit Card Members: Free 1,000 Points YMMV

Another “undocumented feature” of this quirky rewards system is that you get an even better redemption ratio, possibly even up to 1.5 cents per point, when applying your points towards a “Name Your Own Price” Priceline.com transaction. This opacity is even referenced in the terms and conditions: “The amount of Points needed to redeem [for a credit] will vary by transaction.”

Caveats
In addition to the lack of transparency in the rewards program, there are a few less than ideal aspects to the card to be aware of:

• If you don’t use the card at least once every 6 months or keep a balance, your account may be closed and/or all your points forfeited
• Points expire after 4 years if not used
• Foreign currency transactions incur a 3% fee

Conclusion
This version of the Priceline Visa certainly isn’t as staightforward as the old Schwab card, but for the rate chasers, it offers a potentially viable alternative. There is hassle involved in the redemption process and there is a foreign transaction fee, but at its core it does offer at least a 2% rebate in a Visa product. For those who do use Priceline.com, it offers an even better value proposition.

Link

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Priceline Rewards Visa: 2% Credit Card?

Is this a temporary glitch in the system or is this the way things were designed? According to the marketing materials, one of the key benefits of the Premier card is a “15% discount on all air travel when booked through our travel benefits provider, Spirit Incentives.” It should be noted, however, that ThankYou travel redemptions are provided by a different agency, Connexions Loyalty Travel Solutions.

At any rate, that is the way the system currently works, provided you have a Premier card, so take advantage while you can.

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Get a 25% Discount on Any Flight Using Your ThankYou Premier Card

• Increased their monthly spending by an average of $68 during the first quarter of enrollment, and by $76/month over the first 9 months
• Paid off their balances more slowly, resulting in card debt increasing an average of $115 during the first quarter
• Moved spending from their other credit cards to their new rewards card

Admittedly, the study was limited in scope, as it only examined data from a single domestic bank over the period of nine months. Still, it suggests that even a modest 1% reward is enough to significantly alter consumer behavior to the bank’s benefit.

Extrapolating further, it’s possible to see how even more generous rewards could theoretically still be financially viable. As long as there are consumers falling into this “rewards trap,” by increasing spending and debt in response to a rewards program, you can count on banks continuing to put out the bait. It would be wise to remember that cashback and rewards cards are only truly “good” if you pay off your balance every month.

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Are Credit Card Rewards Programs In Danger of Going Away?

In addition, some of the card’s other benefits include:

• No foreign exchange fees
• Earn points for the miles you fly when you purchase a ticket with your Citi ThankYou Premier Card.
• Earn an anniversary bonus based on the number of points earned from purchases every year. The longer you remain a cardholder, the larger your bonus percentage will be.
• Receive a complimentary domestic companion ticket each year

The Premier Card does carry a $125 annual fee which is waived for the first year.

For more details, see the Citi ThankYou Premier Card application.

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Citi ThankYou Premier Card: $200 Bonus in Gift Cards

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New SPG Credit Card Benefit: Get 3rd Night Free at Sheraton

Personal card link
Business card link

Please note: The above offers have expired. To view what Starwood is currently offering on these cards, please see these links:

SPG Personal credit card application
SPG Business credit card application

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SPG Amex Promo is Back: 30,000 Starpoints with $1,000 in Spending

Every Tuesday, the first Cardmember to click in will be able to purchase the featured vacation package for 50% off. As an example, on May 4 at 12 noon EDT, a Maui vacation package valued at $4,700 can be purchased for $2,350.

And every single day until the end of the promotion on May 28, five “Quick Escapes” packages will be offered, allowing Cardmembers to purchase unlimited amounts of deals valued up to $3,000.

If you don’t have a PenFed Premium Travel Rewards Amex, you can apply first to participate. For more details on this promo, see penfedamazingescapes.com.

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PenFed Amazing Escapes

Big Signup Bonus
Deal hounds will immediately appreciate the card’s generous signup bonus. It offers 20,000 bonus points when you spend $650 within the first 3 months, enough for a roundtrip airfare ticket or a $200 gift card. But, digging deeper, we see that the card is not just another churning opportunity.

Huge Rebate on Airfare Purchases
The Premium Travel Rewards Amex may seem automatically good for frequent fliers since it earns 5 points for each dollar of spending on airfare purchases, but the news is even better than that. While points can be redeemed for merchandise such as gift cards at a rate of 1 cent per point (10,000 points = $100 gift card), the rewards program really shines when it comes to redeeming points for flight purchases.

The terms and conditions of the program are decidedly confusing, with two different charts listed for airline travel redemption listed on the same page. I talked to a CSR who stated that different accounts might have different terms, though she did quote me the following redemption schedule:

Ticket cost $250: 15,625 Points
Ticket cost $350: 21,875 Points
Ticket cost $500: 31,250 Points
Ticket cost $750: 46,875 Points
Ticket cost $1,000: 62,500 Points

At those rates, each point would be worth 1.6 cents when redeemed for airfare. So, since airfare purchases earn 5 points per dollar spent, for each dollar spent on airfare, you would be earning 8 cents towards an airline ticket.

Other Perks
In addition, there are many other bonuses of this credit card that frequent travelers will enjoy. Among them:

• No foreign transaction fees. PenFed remains one of very few issuers to waive fees for transactions made in foreign currencies.
• Until December 31, 2010, dining and hotel purchases will also earn 3 points per dollar spent.
• Complimentary access to airport lounges around the world with membership to Priority Pass, with 2 free passes per year when spending reaches $15,000 annually.

And while it’s far from the main attraction of the card, the Premium Travel Rewards Amex also has reasonable balance transfer fees. For instance, online balance transfers are at the promo rate of 4.99% for 24 months, with fees waived if performed by June 30, 2010. After June 30, the normal fee of 2.5% (min $10, max $100) applies.

Membership has its privileges
PenFed membership is required to apply, but basically anyone is eligible. If you are not automatically eligible through various military affiliated organizations or the Red Cross, you can always become eligible by joining the NMFA with a small, one-time fee.

The card does carry a $50 annual fee, which is waived for the first year. To read the fine print or to apply, see this link.

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PenFed Premium Travel Rewards Amex Review: Free Roundtrip Ticket + 8% Rebate on Airfare?

For more info, see this link.

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Chase Sapphire(SM): $100 Signup Bonus

To apply, visit www.fly3.citicards.com. (Via FT)

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Citi® AAdvantage® Credit Cards: 30,000 Bonus AAdvantage® Miles

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Existing SonyCard Holders: Earn Extra 5,000 SonyRewards Points After Spending $1500

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Double Membership Rewards Points on Gas and Groceries for a Year

Citi customers with a Citi mtvU Visa will also note the Citi Forward’s uncanny resemblance. Similar to the mtvU card, the Forward earns 5 ThankYou Points for every $1 spent on restaurants, books, music and movies. More importantly, the Citi Forward does not require that you be a student in order to apply.

Other noteworthy benefits of the Citi Forward include:

• 6,000 bonus ThankYou points after spending $250 in 3 months
• 2,500 bonus ThankYou points when you sign up for paperless statements within 3 months
• 0% APR on purchases afor 7 months and 0% APR on balance transfers for 12 months (though balance transfers do incur a 4% uncapped fee with a $5 min)
• No annual fee

To learn more or to apply, visit the following links:
Citi Forward Card
Citi Forward for College Students

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Citi Forward Card: 5 ThankYou Points Per $1 Spent on Books, Movies, Music, Restaurants

• Up to 40,000 Hilton HHonors® bonus points with first purchase — enough for up to five free nights
• Up to 20,000 HHonors bonus points with first eight Hilton Family stays charged to the Card during your first 18 months of Cardmembership
• HHonors Gold VIP status complimentary with your first year; to maintain thereafter, total eligible spend must reach $20,000 annually
• HHonors Diamond VIP status when your total eligible spend reaches $40,000 annually
• $75/year annual fee
• 9 HHonors bonus points for every eligible dollar spent at participating Hilton Family hotels
• 6 HHonors bonus points for every eligible dollar spent at gas stations, drugstores, and more
• 3 HHonors bonus points for virtually every dollar spent elsewhere
• 500 HHonors bonus points when you book online at any Hilton Family Hotel Website using your Card

One other noteable improvement has also been made to both the Surpass Card and the no-fee card: 6 HHonors points (as opposed to 5) will be earned for each dollar spent at grocery stores, gas stations and drugstores, and on phone, cable, satellite TV, and internet service bills.

If you already have a Hilton Amex, you can call now to have your card upgraded once it’s available. Otherwise, it appears you’ll have to wait a bit until the application becomes generally available.

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Hilton to Introduce New HHonors American Express Surpass Card

In a move that will significantly devalue Thank You Points, Citi will be removing fixed point awards for flights, effective March 1, 2009. Why is this such a big deal? For those in the know, fixed point travel redemptions offered a way to get nearly a 3% rebate per point. With many options available for earning multiple Thank You points per dollar spent, fixed point flights represented a tremendous value.

How can you get nearly 3% in value per point?
Here’s how to maximize your Thank You point redemption in a nutshell:

You’ll first need to buy a fixed-point business class ticket. The destination is not important as you will not actually be using the ticket, but the airline is. You need to pick an airline that you will want to use and ideally select a flight designed to max out your point cost. For domestic flights, this means finding a flight that costs as close to $2700, which will take 90k points. For flights to Europe, this means finding a flight that costs close to $5400, or 180k points. You should search for flight costs using Expedia.com and only selecting non-refundable business class fares.

Once you have booked your ticket, you can call your airline to change it to a flight that you really want. The airline will deduct its change fee and should issue you a residual value voucher for the rest. Each airline handles things differently, but many will allow you to spend the remainder of your voucher on multiple different flights for up to a year in the future.

Note that selecting a non-refundable fare is essential. It’s sufficient to make just one leg of your trip non-refundable, as that will achieve the desired goal of making your ticket non-refundable. If you mistakenly choose a refundable fare, when you attempt to change your flight, the airline will usually choose to refund to the original method of payment. Since Citi paid for the ticket, they will get the credit instead of you. We clearly want to avoid that.

Make sure you do your research on this method thoroughly by reading through this very informative FT thread. There are a number of very important details covered there.

With the removal of this option, the attractiveness of the Thank You network is significantly diminished. In its absence, the Starwood Preferred Guest program and 2% cash back cards clearly become superior.

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Get the Best Value for Your Thank You Points Now

Cap One miles redemption is quite flexible, as you have the complete freedom to book your travel by any means you prefer with no blackout dates or seat restrictions. Customers can charge any travel related expense–including airline, hotel, cruise line and rental car transactions–to their card, then call Cap One to reimburse the charge with their miles. Each mile is worth 1 cent and the refund is credited on the next statement. In addition, there is no limit to the number of miles you can earn and your miles do not expire.

The card is currently offering 0% APR on purchases until October 2009 and has no annual fee. Like all Cap One cards, it also does not charge for foreign currency transactions. Overall, it looks like a reasonable option for those who regularly spend more than $1,000 a month and are looking for a travel rewards card.

Link

Note: Those looking for a similar business card should consider the Business Platinum with Double No Hassle Miles.

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Cap One Launches No Hassle Reward Card with Double Miles

One drawback of the new version of the card is that your points are capped at 60,000 per year, whereas the original version has no such limitation. So if you’re a big spender at Amazon, you’ll want to keep the old card.

To upgrade your existing card, call 1-888-247-4080.
Edit 10/22/2010: This card is no longer available. For a list of currently available Chase credit cards, see this list. (Via SD)

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Upgrade to the New Amazon.com Visa

While this increased flexibility is certainly attractive, the reason that most members will not take advantage of this option is that it presents a relatively poor value compared to hotel stays. Redeeming at SPGFlights yields between 1 to 1.5 cents per Starpoint, as shown in the following chart:

It should be pointed out that SPG Flights does provide greater flexibility than transferring Starpoints to an airline to receive miles for flights. Tickets are available for some airlines that are not currently SPG airline transfer partners. In addition, since you don’t need to transfer points, you can book your tickets quicker and not be constrained by any miles redemption rules.

So while it may not always be the best deal for your points, more choice is always welcome and there are certainly situations where this new option would be useful.

For more info, see www.spgflights.com.

As a bonus, you can fill out the following survey on SPG Flights to earn an easy 250 Starpoints.

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SPG Offers More Flight Redemption Options

For more details, see this link. (Via FW)

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Sony Card Application: $150 Credit After SonyStyle.com $299 Purchase

You earn rebates of $0.15 per gallon on eligible gasoline purchases made at Exxon and Mobil stations in the United States (“Exxon and/or Mobil Gasoline Purchases”). You earn rebates of up to 2% on other eligible purchases (“Other Purchases”) you make each year as follows: 0.5% on your total annual Other Purchases up to $999; 1.0% on your total annual Other Purchases over $999 and up to $5,999; 2.0% on your total annual Other Purchases over $5,999 and up to $10,000; and 1% on your total annual Other Purchases over $10,000.

You’ll note that 15 cents per gallon is still inferior to the other gas cards offering 5%, often on any brand of gas–at least as long as gas is above $3/gallon. The tiered 2% rebate on other purchases, however, can be worthwhile, and is maximized if you can spend exactly $10,000 annually. If you have enough discipline to spend precisely $10,000, your rebate on that amount would be 1.35%.

Rebates are automatically redeemed as a credit against future Exxon or Mobil gas purchases in increments of $10. In addition, the card offers a 0% intro APR on both purchases and balance transfers, though the balance transfer fee has no limit and is 3% with a $5 minimum. There is no annual fee.

To apply, visit Citi here.

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ExxonMobil Credit Card: 15 Cents/Gallon Rebate on Gas and Up to 2% On Other Purchases

We found 17 cards that fit the bill. Not surprisingly, most of them were airline affinity credit cards, but they included general reward cards as well. In part of what seems to be a growing trend across all credit cards, most of the intro promotions require at least some level of spending in order to earn the full number of bonus miles, so as to discourage customers who only use the card for the sign up bonus. Also, as is the standard for airline-affiliated credit cards, virtually all carry an annual fee, though some of them do waive it for the first year.

You can find the full list of cards along with details here.

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17 Credit Cards with Free Plane Ticket Offers

• 3 miles per dollar spent on Virgin Atlantic purchases
• 1.5 miles per dollar spent on other purchases
• 20,000 bonus miles after your first purchase
• Up to 15,000 bonus miles every anniversary, depending upon your spending
• Up to 5,000 bonus miles when you add additional Cardmembers to your account*
• Earn credit towards Flying Club Gold elite status with one tier point for every $2,500 in purchases and additional tier points when flying Virgin Atlantic
• 10 percent off published Virgin Atlantic Premium Economy fares through December 31, 2008

Cardmembers are also eligible for for bonus redemption opportunities: When you spend at least $25,000 in a year and redeem miles for an Economy reward ticket, you can get a second reward ticket for half the miles.

In addition, through the end of January 2009, cardmembers will earn an entry into a sweepstakes for a trip into space on Virgin Galactic for every $10,000 spent.

To learn more about these cards, see these links:

• Virgin Atlantic American Express® Card – Black
• Virgin Atlantic American Express® Card – White

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Virgin Atlantic Amex: Up to 40,000 Bonus Flying Club Miles and Access to Perks that are Literally Out of this World