Not every credit card churn has to be for 5-6 cards and generate an enormous number of miles and points. It's important to consider the miles and points that are most valuable to your travel plans, and there's no need to just signup for a bunch of cards whose points you don't value much. The other factor for me is that I've applied for most of the credit cards I consider most valuable in terms of their miles or points bonuses, so I now need to consider which cards I can conceivably apply for again.
For my own travel, and as I wrote in my Beginner's Guide to Miles and Points, I recommend building up significant balances of United MileagePlus miles/Ultimate Rewards points, American AAdvantage miles, AMEX Membership Rewards points, Starwood Preferred Guest points and British Airways Avios.
Having just recently redeemed several hundred thousand AAdvantage miles and AMEX Membership Rewards points for 2014 travel, I'm looking to replenish our accounts, so my latest small churn included these cards. I already have the CitiBusiness Card from earlier this year, with its 50,000 bonus points, so that wasn't part of this churn. I've included the details on the bonus and tips for applying, where relevant:
Citi Platinum Select AAdvantage Visa: 50,000 AAdvantage Miles
- 50,000 AAdvantage miles after $2500 spend within the first 4 months
- $85 annual fee waived the first year
- Application strategy: Make sure to read Citi AAdvantage Credit Cards: New Rules to Earn 130K AA Miles. The Citi AAdvantage Two Browser “Trick” is dead, so you cannot apply for more than one Citi card per day, and you can't get approved for more than 2 cards in a 65 day period. If you already have a Citi Platinum Select AAdvantage Visa you *can* can another of the same card without closing the first one, if it's been long enough since the date of your original application. In my case, it had been 19 months since I'd been originally approved for the Citi Platinum Seelct AAdvantage Visa, and most folks can get approved 18-20 months after their first card's approval.
Citi Gold AAdvantage World MasterCard: 30,000 AAdvantage Miles
- 30,000 AAdvantage miles after $750 spend within the first 4 months
- $50 annual fee waived the first year
- Application strategy: If you've chosen the Platinum Select AAdvantage Visa and the Gold AAdvantage World MasterCard as the two Citi cards you want within a 65 day period, I recommend first applying for the Platinum Select Visa above, then waiting a couple days and applying for the Gold card. You may not receive instant approval, but the nice thing about Citi is that it provides chat funcationality, so you can chat with the representative and often get approved that way. My chat took a couple minutes for the rep to confirm info on my application, and then I was approved. This 30,000 mile bonus may not seem like much, but keep in mind it's gotten much harder to rack up a lot of AAdvantage miles with the new limits on applications.
American Express Business Gold Rewards Card: 75,000 Membership Rewards Points (Expired Offer)
The 75K Bonus Points AMEX Business Gold Rewards Card with $5000 spend is no longer available (it was only for a period of <24 hours) but there is a 50,000 bonus points offer for the same $5000 spend, or you can wait for AMEX to run a 75,000 bonus points offer, although typically the minimum spend is $10,000.
Application strategy: If you see a great AMEX offer, don't wait–apply for it. For example, earlier this year there was a 100K AMEX Platinum Signup Bonus offer, which also only lasted a short time. If you haven't already, signup to follow TravelSort on Twitter, or like TravelSort on Facebook so you won't miss time-sensitive deals, plus all our other travel tips.
Takeaway: Only you can decide the best churn for you, with the miles and points that will benefit you most and minimum spend that you can realistically meet on time. This small churn will, after I complete the minimum spend, just give me 80,000 AA miles and 75,000 AMEX Membership Rewards points for 155,000 miles/points total. With similar applications for my husband, that's just over 300,000 miles/points. Nevertheless, as part of a strategy to gradually replenish our recent redemptions and as just one of several churns in a year, it fits our needs.
Which credit cards are part of your next churn?
Related Posts
Citi AAdvantage Credit Cards: New Rules to Earn 130K AA Miles
Citi AAdvantage 10 Percent Award Rebate
Top 10 Best Ways to Use AMEX Membership Rewards Points
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