Airline Credit Cards That Don't Fly

[jeffrey]

The appeal of a credit card that earns even the infrequent flier a free trip on any of a dozen or so carriers is unmistakable, but some travel experts warn that such rewards can turn into fool's gold.

Credit cards that aren't affiliated with any airline's frequent-flier program — but which promise users the ability to earn free trips on a variety of carriers — have been around since the mid-1990s. Known as "fake" cards to the frequent-flier cognoscenti, they're marketed primarily to infrequent travelers who aren't loyal to any single carrier but who would like to earn a free flight every couple of years.

They offer lower annual fees than most cards affiliated with the airlines' frequent-flier programs, or, in some cases, no annual fees. They also typically charge lower-than-average interest rates on balances.

But Randy Petersen, a leading expert on frequent-flier programs, says unaffiliated travel-reward cards are a bad deal for most consumers. They lack the mileage earning power of airline-affiliated cards. And airfares now are so low that unaffiliated cards offer poor value relative to the rewards offered by other kinds of affinity credit cards... [read more at usatoday.com]

to read mor about the advantages credit cards offer to people who pay off their balance each month, read the SavingAdvice.com article Credit Card Advantages