First rewards credit card & need help deciding on provider - High spending

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  TheMindsetTraveller on 10/07/2018 - 14:23

  +2

  ANZ Rewards is a fairly decent card (the annual free flight offsets the annual fee), the reward points are pretty OK (but at least you can transfer them to say Virgin Australia, then to Singapore Airlines for example) but if you are spending 25% of your monthly expenditure of >$40K , the benefit here is that the Rewards card will save you a tonne of forex conversion fees.

  Now, if you get the ANZ Black Qantas Card as well as the Rewards Card - there is a promotion where you get 75,000 points, plus no annual fee for the first year. Now if you put the balance of your monthly expenditure through this card, say $30,000 each month, then in 12 months you will rack up 360,000 plus the 75,000 for signing up. That's 435,000 Qantas points in 12 months.

  Ok what does 435,000 points get you? For example, you could fly around the world in First Class for 420,000 points. 280,000 is in business, 140,000 for economy. Obviously these are dependent on flight award availability.

  If this was me, I'd choose both cards for the reasons I have suggested. If you dont want to pay the Rewards annual fee, then I guess the 28degrees would work given they also have no annual fee / no forex conversion fees.

  • 

    Saul Goodman on 10/07/2018 - 18:16

    Mate, thank you so much for all that. I had not considered getting both those cards. Makes a lot of sense to me.

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    Saul Goodman on 10/07/2018 - 19:23

    Just checking everything. ANZ QANTAS BLACK looks to be:
    1 Qantas Point per $1 spent on eligible purchases up to and including $7,500 per statement period
    0.5 Qantas Points per $1 spent on eligible purchases above $7,500 per statement period

    So I think if I have done it right it's $360000 year = 225,000 points.

    Or is there another card which I'm missing?

    • 

      squarepants on 11/07/2018 - 08:12

      That is correct. The ANZ FF Black caps out for 1 QFF point per $ at 7,500 a month and then drops to 0.5 for any spend above that. So your calculations for $360,000 a year resulting in 225,000 points is right.

      You might want to look at AMEX cards if your suppliers or payees accept them as that is where you have the opportunity to earn a large volume of points based on the spending that you’re putting through.

      For e.g. if you get the Amex Explorer or Business Explorer, there’s the opportunity to earn 2 Gateway Membership (MR) points per $ (equates to 1.5 miles per $ with a bunch of airlines) uncapped.

      So if you’re able to put all your local spend through your Amex, you get 720,000 MR points or 480,000 FF miles with a number of airlines a year (best of which I think is SQ for international flights, and probably virgin for domestic flights).

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  Gaz1 on 10/07/2018 - 14:27

  +2

  Here is a good summary of cards with no international transaction fees:
  www.ozbargain.com.au/wiki/cards_with_no_overseas_transaction…

  Note that most of the cards don't offer any any rewards / frequent flyer points.
  The best no int fee I have found for frequent flyer points is the Coles Rewards.
  Low fee & they regularly have 15% bonus transfer to Velocity so the end result is about 1 velocity point per dollar (which isn't bad for a Mastercard).

  You can actually achieve a higher point earn for Australian spend on other cards, especially on Amex cards.

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  starburstyellow on 11/07/2018 - 10:45

  An alternative to DrunkOnTheGoodLife guide, as that is more QF sentric.

  If you are interested in the Singapore airlines (SQ) route, I would suggest:

  St George Amplify Signature card which I've posted here. If you opt in (like I have) to the Amplify, each $1 you spend would net you 0.825 Kris Flyer points. I dont believe (tried looking) there is a cap like the ANZ card so your $360000 would net you 297000 Krisflyer points (KFF), not including the 45000 KFF you get from the bonus of signing up. I'm not sure where you are based as your profile doesnt say, but for me thats equivalent of Perth to Hong kong/Taiwan on Singapore Airlines Business, 4.5 times. An around the world business fare on Star alliance would also only require 240000 points.

  Btw is American Express on your radar as well? You could also apply for the Amex Business Charge card, which gets you 120000 KFF but the annual fee is a bit steep. Earn rate is good to @ 1:1.

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  lilkid28 on 14/07/2018 - 11:40

  Definitely get an Amex Explorer Card down the road, but wait till they offer an increased bonus of 100k points, currently its only 50k.

  You can get another card such as an ANZ as mentioned above first.

  With your high turnover definitely worth it to get an Amex as I imagine a reasonable amount can be paid via Amex.