The Best Airline Mile Credit Card Gets You Free Bag Check And Beyond!

The Best Airline Mile Credit Card Offers more Than Just a Sign-up Bonus

A lot of airline cards like to market their huge sign-up bonus offers when attracting new customers. They go something like this: “Sign up with our brand new card and you’ll get 50,000 points or enough points for two round trip flights!” That sounds great but what if you’re a busy traveler and you quickly use up those two free flights?

Now you’re stuck paying for your ticket plus all of the little extras. But that’s where the best airline mile credit cardcan come in handy. See, airline cards offer more than just enticing sign-up bonus offers. They offer a wide variety of ancillary benefits that can save you a bunch of money. So, what’s the best credit card for a traveler? One that offers all these benefits:

• Free Checked Baggage: This is probably one of my favorite benefits since I hate having to carry on large suitcases. Weekend bags aren’t a problem, but when you have to lug a giant suitcase around the airport and try to jam it in an overhead bin, that can be pretty stressful. It’s nice checking in your bag for free and not having to worry about it until you land.
• Priority Boarding: Have you ever noticed how many people start to line up at the gate before boarding starts? Well if you have an airline card that offers priority boarding you won’t be one of them since you’ll get to board right after the business class passengers.
• Companion Passes: I think companion passes are one of the most under-rated benefits of airline credit cards since you can really take advantage of that free ticket. Most companion passes can only be used domestically but they are also great for last minute travel since you’ll effectively pay half price for two tickets.
• Lounge Access: Flying during peak travel times can be a real headache and often times there isn’t even a place to sit down or charge your phone at airport gates. In order to remedy this, a lot of airline cards are starting to offer two free lounge passes every year that you’re a cardmember. Some cards like the Citi Executive card will even offer you Admirals Club Access for an entire year (but that privilege does come with a hefty annual fee).
• No Foreign Transaction Fees: If you’ve ever tried to use your credit card in a foreign country you already know that most banks will levy high fees on international purchases and have credit card fees overseas. But a lot of the top travel cards have no foreign transaction fees since they know their customers are travelling all over the world and this benefit can save them a lot of money.
• Reduced Award Travel: Several airline cards are starting to offer this benefit since it allows you to buy an award ticket at a discount. Most of the time you can get a saver award for a 5,000-10,000 point discount based upon availability.

Are the Perks Worth it?

When you consider the fact that most airline cards waive the first year’s annual fee, give you up to 50,000 sign-up bonus points and adorn you with all of these perks, signing up for a new airline card should be a no-brainer! Some people like to cancel these cards once they have to start paying for them but if you fly just once or twice on that airline it might be worth it to keep that card.