Last Reviewed: 10/18/2011
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Barclay’s issues two versions of the US Airways credit card: the World Mastercard and the Premier World Mastercard. One thing I’ve learned in reviewing hundreds of credit card offers is that sometimes you can find different offers (ie sign-up bonuses, rewards, etc) for the same credit card, simply by scouring the web (which is what we here at PIQ do!).
Last Reviewed: 9/9/2011
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Chase has recently launched the new United MileagePlus Explorer credit card, basically replacing the old United Milesage Plus card. Perhaps by adding the word “explorer” at the end, they hope to invoke bold images of Christopher Columbus conquering the New World.
Last Updated: 1/14/2012
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Southwest Airlines has been busy as a beaver revamping their Rapid Rewards Frequenty Flyer Loyalty Program. With this rework, it’s worth taking a fresh look at the two Southwest credit cards offered by Chase–the Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Plus Credit Card and the Rapid Rewards Premier Card.
Last Updated: 5/16/2011
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If Chase Sapphire and Chase Sapphire Preferred were two sisters, PlasticIQ would definitely want to date Sapphire Preferred. With Sapphire Preferred, you get a rather super-sized initial spend bonus (50K points instead of 10K), and you get a 25% bump in the value of your points when you redeem for airfare or hotel (making the initial 50K spend bonus worth a cool $625!).
Last Reviewed: 3/23/2011
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While the HSBC Premier World Card has some moderately attractive features to its rewards program, ironically its probably the insanely high deposit/investment balance requirement that will keep most readers from ever applying for this card (yours truly included).
2/14/2011
Right now I’m in the air, about 8 hours into my 10 hour flight to London Heathrow. Flying Virgin Atlantic Premium Economy (courtesy of my full-time employer). Just a couple of days ago I returned home from Aruba (personal trip!) on United and was upgraded for a 4-hour leg of that flight to their Economy Plus.
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Last Reviewed: 2/15/2011
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The USBank FlexPerks travel card is quite a strong credit card if you are fine with redeeming your points for airline tickets (due to the very favorable redemption rates for airline tickets provided by this card, discussed below). Other forms of redemption, such as gift cards, cash back, and merchandise, offer far more “ordinary” value for your hard-earned points, and the FlexPerks Travel Card won’t make much sense in these redemption scenarios.
Last Reviewed: 1/31/2011
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The Pentagon Federal Premium Travel Rewards card is the cat’s meow (I wonder if that’s the first time ‘cat’s meow’ and ‘Pentagon’ have been used in the same sentence?). With a whopping 5 points per dollar spent on airfare, and airfare redemptions yielding $0.016 cents per point, this card is a must-have for anyone who does even a moderate level of travel. And if you don’t travel at least a bit, you should. It’s fun. And you might find international romance.
Last Reviewed: 1/1/2011
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Well this is my first post of 2011–and I’m leading off with a review of a very solid US Air credit card, the Premier World Mastercard. This USAirways Mastercard, issued by Barclay’s, has a fairly basic rewards structure, but derives significant incremental value from two sources: the relatively favorable value of USAir Dividend Miles; and, more impactfully, the value of the 2 reduced-price companion tickets provided each year. If you don’t plan on using these companion certificates, the value of this USAir Card drops quite dramatically.
Last Reviewed: 12/26/2010
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Virgin Atlantic actually offers two flavors of credit cards, the Virgin Atlantic Black and White cards. We’ll review both in detail here, but the main difference between them is that the Black Virgin Atlantic Card has a higher annual fee but offsets this fee with a higher rewards payout and more bonuses. Both cards are on the American Express network, and are issued by Bank of America.
