Best Frequent Flyer Credit Card

[cove]

Hello Amberlower,I checked a May $US payment of $6060 and the fee was $221 on Westpac Kris.
Now I would rather keep most of the $221 in my pocket so I have opened a fee free US cheque account that I can wire funds to for about $50 in fees a time total from both ends.
Paying 3% for a Frequent Flyer point is beyond my pain barrier.

[Amberlower]

Amberlower do you have a recent actual transaction because I really bitched about it around 8 months ago and they may have fixed it. They could not undo the BS charges but they refunded the annual fee for the Kris card.
I have used the Kris card heavily but only for $AUS and mainly the Visa to pay lots of taxes at 0.65 cents a point uncapped.

Not sure what your beef was with the card. I use it regularly overseas incuding just this month - it is as I said 3.5% + 3%. Confirmed it twith Westpac as well.

[Amberlower]

Hello Amberlower,I checked a May $US payment of $6060 and the fee was $221 on Westpac Kris.
Now I would rather keep most of the $221 in my pocket so I have opened a fee free US cheque account that I can wire funds to for about $50 in fees a time total from both ends.
Paying 3% for a Frequent Flyer point is beyond my pain barrier.

Frequent Flyers average at 5c/point making it around $400 for that transaction. If you collect a lot of points it is well worth it - particularly since most points cost you no more than what you spend. NOT collecting points is ignoring free money, I think.

[cove]

What happened was I paid a Hilton hotel account at about $100 US a night in advance to lock in a special price in around May 2009 and when combined with a lousy exchange rate the cost of using the Westpac Kris Platinum Visa worked out at over 6 %.They have now fixed it so I am happier.
My pain threshold for earning a point remains at around 1% because I do not need to buy points at expensive rates seeing I am loaded with millions of points already.
I do understand that you may feel the point can be worth about 5 cents retail but the real game in the land of plenty is to try to fly in the best available at the lowest cost including no cost points.
For travel this is the best game in town.

[PineappleSkip]

Actually 3% Visa overseas - 3.5% Amex o/seas. Stick to Visa o/seas - no downside

The other variables I take into account when choosing among cards are the exchange rates and (obviously) the points earn rates.

When comparing I use the net cost of a transaction in AUD to give an effective exchange rate net of charges. This allows for the exchange rate differences between cards to factor in as well as charges differences.

The variations also appear to differ across currencies. A couple of examples, the cards involved are a NAB Qantas Gold Visa (.667 points per $1), and An AMEX Qantas Ultimate (1.5 points per $1).

14/6/10 processing date, two transactions in EUR - AMEX 0.6782, Visa 0.6797 - marginal difference at best

22/6/10 processing date, two transactions in PGK - AMEX 2.2070, Visa 2.3703-
rather more substantial

Even with the bigger cost difference when buying PGK on AMEX, its still my card of choice because it seems a small price to pay for upgrading to those comfy seats up the front!!

Cheers skip

[Amberlower]

What happened was I paid a Hilton hotel account at about $100 US a night in advance to lock in a special price in around May 2009 and when combined with a lousy exchange rate the cost of using the Westpac Kris Platinum Visa worked out at over 6 %.They have now fixed it so I am happier.
My pain threshold for earning a point remains at around 1% because I do not need to buy points at expensive rates seeing I am loaded with millions of points already.
I do understand that you may feel the point can be worth about 5 cents retail but the real game in the land of plenty is to try to fly in the best available at the lowest cost including no cost points.
For travel this is the best game in town.

Interesting to see you mention Hilton. My preferred choice of hotel loyalty- programs.

[cove]

Hilton US is saying that they will price match any offer from the likes of Expedia,Travelocity and Hotels.com and you can get a refund plus loyalty and frequent flyer points. Now that is pretty good as we use Hilton Orange for the Angels baseball seeing you can walk over to the arena.
They take all credit cards but I use Amex as their exchange rates are good or my US debit card.
This year we will put several million dollars on Westpac Kris and Amex Ultimate so they are the best so far in uncapped rewards rates.
We are back in Oz this week but we stay in touch by playing ABC radio on our computer in USA.