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With such a large variety of credit cards now aimed at the travel market, it can be confusing trying to decide which card to use for particular circumstances. One of the scenarios we get asked about on a regular basis about redeeming rewards:
Which credit card should I use to pay award ticket taxes and fees?
Not only do these cards offer some of the best travel insurance benefits of any credit card available today, but they will also earn bonus rewards points on travel spend, and you only need to book a portion of the travel using either card (or its reward points) for the insurances and benefits to apply.
Paying Award Fees and Taxes with the Sapphire Preferred & Sapphire Reserve
Equal parts art, voodoo, and science, searching for award bookings with low fees and taxes is one of the most time-consuming activities when redeeming points and miles. It can require hours of searching different routing over multiple carriers, figuring out how to get points from program A to program B, and occasionally on to program C without losing any value; value that is often measured down to the 100th of a cent.
Chase allows you to book award travel using frequent flyer miles or rewards points from any program. And, as long as you use your Sapphire Preferred or Sapphire Reserve to pay a portion of the ticket (in this case, the fees and taxes), you’re covered under the travel insurance and benefits of the card.
As an example, we’ve clipped the exact wording from the terms and conditions of some of the cards that qualify for Trip Delay Insurance and included them below.
“You must charge the full amount of a Covered Trip to your Eligible Card or in combination with your Eligible Card and accumulated points on your Eligible Card or redeemable certificates, vouchers, coupons, or discounts awarded from a frequent flyer program or similar program.”
Barclaycard Arrival Plus® World Elite Mastercard®
“You must purchase the trip entirely with Your covered card for You, or Your family member, and Your traveling companions. If redeemable certificates, vouchers, coupons, or discounts awarded from frequent flier programs are used to purchase the trip, any remaining charge for the trip must be purchased entirely with Your covered card.”
Final Thoughts
As the saying goes, the devil's in the details, and when you start examining the wording of each policy, the cards from Chase, Amex, and Barclaycard offer a way of covering your trip just by paying the fees and taxes on an award ticket, or by using any portion of points from their respective program!
One more thing worth adding is the $300 travel credit you receive as a Sapphire Reserve cardholder, as it takes this convenience to a whole new level.
In the case of the Sapphire Reserve, the fees and taxes on award bookings will credit as travel spend, automatically qualifying for a statement credit using the $300 Travel Credit that is one of the highlights of the card, and another reason the Sapphire Reserve has become such a sensation amongst the points and miles crowd.
How does this work in practice?
Book an award ticket using points or miles from any loyalty program, pay the award fees and taxes with your Sapphire Reserve, have the charges credited back to your account using the $300 travel credit, and you have genuinely free travel covered with the best trip protection available.
Did you know that you can track loyalty accounts and travel plans for your entire family with one AwardWallet account? Simply add your family members and then add their programs to AwardWallet. Show me how
The comments on this page are not provided, reviewed, or otherwise approved by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
Just a note on the Chase cards. They aren’t as good as people say and you need to read the fine print very carefully. They have two types of claims – delay and cancellation/interruption. They don’t cover mechanical delays and only one cover children over 21. AND you better have all your receipts for your expenditures. I don’t mean the CC charge I mean the itemized receipt like what you ate for lunch.
I encourage people to read the actual brochure for their CC carefully if you are counting on this benefit.
I learned from a 17 hour flight delay on Hawaiian (BTW #1 worst customer service in my entire life) which was due to a mechanical.
I also forgot to mention on my previous comment. Chase does not cover prepaid expenses on Trip Delay – so no matter the cause – weather, strike, or mechanical for a Delay you don’t get a lost hotel or AirBnB. Trip Cancellation would cover it but only if weather or strike, not due to change by a common carrier. So as you can see it’s complicated.
Chase Sapphire Reserve for anything remotely related to travel, since you never know how it might code. 3x URs, which I value at more than 2 cents each, is like getting $0.06 per dollar back on travel.
Thanks, although I understand that as of April 2016, the Citi Prestige’s travel protections also apply if only a portion of the fare was paid for on the card or via Thankyou points:
Just a note on the Chase cards. They aren’t as good as people say and you need to read the fine print very carefully. They have two types of claims – delay and cancellation/interruption. They don’t cover mechanical delays and only one cover children over 21. AND you better have all your receipts for your expenditures. I don’t mean the CC charge I mean the itemized receipt like what you ate for lunch.
I encourage people to read the actual brochure for their CC carefully if you are counting on this benefit.
I learned from a 17 hour flight delay on Hawaiian (BTW #1 worst customer service in my entire life) which was due to a mechanical.
So just read and be prepared.
I also forgot to mention on my previous comment. Chase does not cover prepaid expenses on Trip Delay – so no matter the cause – weather, strike, or mechanical for a Delay you don’t get a lost hotel or AirBnB. Trip Cancellation would cover it but only if weather or strike, not due to change by a common carrier. So as you can see it’s complicated.
Chase Sapphire Reserve for anything remotely related to travel, since you never know how it might code. 3x URs, which I value at more than 2 cents each, is like getting $0.06 per dollar back on travel.
Thanks, although I understand that as of April 2016, the Citi Prestige’s travel protections also apply if only a portion of the fare was paid for on the card or via Thankyou points:
http://i.info4.citi.com/wpm/100164/PDF/Guide11.pdf
That is indeed correct.