Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is happening now! Follow us as Greg, Nick, and Stephen compete to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines before November 23rd. Who will complete the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
I currently have 32 active credit cards in my name. Many are no-fee cards, so I’ll keep them indefinitely. With the others, I’ll make a decision when the annual fee comes due: keep, cancel, or downgrade. Since I’ve been thinking about this, I figured it was worth sharing my thoughts on a wide array of cards. Of the cards I have which have annual fees, which ones are worth keeping?
Keepers
- Amex Delta Reserve $450: Keep for SkyClub access, annual companion pass, and ability to earn Delta elite status through spend. Note: If you are not chasing Delta elite status, but want the airport lounge benefit, you might be better off with a regular (non-Delta) Amex Platinum card.
- Amex Delta Platinum $150: Keep for annual companion pass, and ability to earn Delta elite status through spend.
- Barclaycard US Airways MasterCard $89: I have two of these cards and plan to keep them both. Barclaycard regularly offers great deals for bonus points (e.g. “spend over $750 per month for 3 months and get 15,000 bonus points”) and gives a 10,000 mile annual anniversary bonus which alone is worth the annual fee. It will be interesting to see how long these cards survive after the AA / US Air merger.
- Chase Sapphire Preferred $95: This is actually my wife’s account, but I am an authorized user with my own card. Keep for spend bonuses (2X travel and dining) and 7% annual dividend. Also, my wife doesn’t like to juggle many cards, so I think this is a great one for her to defer to for virtually all spend.
- Chase Ink Plus $95: I don’t really need to keep an Ink Plus (or Ink Bold) since I could do just as well with a free version (Ink Cash or Ink Classic) combined with my wife’s Sapphire Preferred (see above). However, Chase has been so good to me with the Ink Bold and Ink Plus cards that I feel like I owe them something. This is more of a gut decision than a rational one.
- Chase Priority Club $49: Keep for annual free night at any IHG property worldwide (e.g. Intercontinental London Park Lane!), Platinum status, and 10% rebate on awards.
- US Bank Club Carlson Premier Rewards $75: Keep for annual 40K bonus points, 5X everywhere spend, and Bonus Award Nights that make points almost twice as valuable. (Note: The Bonus Award Night feature was discontinued as of 6/1/2015.)
- US Bank Club Carlson Business Rewards $60: Keep for annual 40K bonus points. Other features are great but redundant with the personal card (above).(Note: The Bonus Award Night feature was discontinued as of 6/1/2015.)
Undecided
- Chase Marriott Rewards $85: This card offers an annual free night at category 1 through 5 properties, so it ought to be a no-brainer to keep, but with recent Marriott devaluations I simply don’t know if I’ll really use it for a high-value stay.
- Citi AAdvantage Visa $95: I’m tempted to keep at least one of my AAdvantage cards for the 10% rebate on awards (up to 10K rebate per year). Depending on how many AA miles I use each year for awards, the rebates could easily be worth the annual fee. I don’t otherwise fly often on American Airlines and when I do it is usually because I’ve redeemed British Airways Avios for short-haul flights.
- Citi ThankYou Premier $125: I never use this card, but I might keep it anyway because it gives me the ability to use ThankYou points for 1.33 cents per point value towards flights. Since I rack up lots of ThankYou points with my Citi Forward and Preferred cards, this is a valuable benefit. I’m not sure it’s worth $125 per year though! I’ll probably cancel, but hope for a good retention offer.
Cancel or downgrade
- Amex Platinum Mercedes-Benz $475: Great perks, but not worth the steep fee to me (others may find it well worthwhile, though).
- Amex Premier Rewards Gold $175: This is the best card for earning Membership Rewards through spend (3X flights; 2X gas and groceries), but I don’t pay for many flights, and I do as well or better with other cards for gas and groceries.
- Chase Ink Plus $95: I have two of these so I might as well cancel or downgrade one of them.
- Chase Ink Bold $95: I’ll probably cancel my two Ink Bold cards, as long as I keep an Ink Plus. Since the Ink Bold is a charge card it can’t be downgraded to the Ink Cash or Ink Classic (both of which are credit cards).
- Chase British Airways Visa $95: If I could come up with a good use for the Travel Together ticket (which requires $30K spend) I would probably keep this card, but I don’t see that happening in the near term. I love this card’s signup bonus and its 1.25 Avios per dollar rewards, but I just have too many other cards vying for my wallet.
- Chase United MileagePlus Explorer $95: This is a very good card for United travelers who do not have elite status, but I rarely fly United so it is unlikely that I would get $95 value per year from this card.
- Citi AAdvantage American Express $95: I have three AA cards which have mostly redundant benefits. No reason to keep more than one.
- CitiBusiness AAdvantage Visa $95: See above.
Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
[…] Frequent Miler had an article about which annual fee cards he is planning on keeping. It got me thinking about my […]
@FM
Chase Priority Club $49: Keep for annual free night at any IHG property worldwide (e.g. Intercontinental London Park Lane!),
My wife and I both have that card , does that mean we each get a free night and is this a use it or loose it or can i keep on accumulating free nights ?
Doug: the Priority Club free night is good for one year from issue. Yes, if you each have your own card (each as a separate account), you will each get a free night.
[…] Frequent Miler had an article about which annual fee cards he is planning on keeping. It got me thinking about my […]
Whoops, I take that back, my fave hotel is a cat 6, and not eligible. In that case, get rid of the Mariott card. 🙂
I’d personally keep the Mariott card (though I don’t have it yet), because we live near Chicago and often have a weekend in the city. We recently stayed at the renaissance blackstone and Loved it! The restaurant is also great (Mercat a la plancha). So, I’d view it as getting a night at my new favorite hotel for $85. But that’s the kind of personal decision that will be different for everyone.
Quick reply to a number of comments here: believe it or not, I personally don’t like churning the same cards over and over. I feel good about getting a new card signup bonus and in-exchange I’ll try out the card and see if I like it. Are its benefits worth the annual fee? If yes, I’ll keep the card. If no, I’ll happily cancel before the annual fee comes due. Many cards offer the equivalent of mini-signup bonuses every year simply by renewing (and with no hard-pull to my credit). Those are the keepers.
FM or anyone can confirm whether the Citi AA Business also has the 10% back bonus for the annual redeemed AA miles?
Thank You gives a free companion ticket….Which of course, I not only forgot about, but booked four tickets to Europe and didn’t use the 15% discount either. I’m due for the $125 as soon as this statement closes. maybe I’ll call for retention because I don’t want to lose my 58,000 pts,free ticket or pay the $125.
One card that I keep and use occasionally is the United card. Why? It has primary collision coverage when renting a car. Have I found it worth the annual fee? Oh yes! Just recently on a rental in Australia I had damage to the tune of $1100 (us). It took about six weeks but the claim was paid in full. Just to make sure the coverage is understood, it covers only the rental and not anything you might hit…..
Re: ThankYou Premier. Received a $75 statement credit + 5k TY points from a Citi Premier account manager and 10k TY points after $3000 spend from the Citi retention department (I spent about $5k on the card and use TY points for travel). I think Citi agrees that the $125 is a ridiculous number.
As a non-churner 3 of the 4 cards I keep are listed in FMs list. The one not listed is the Chase Hyatt simply for the free night annually. It’s only up to a cat 4 but it’s still worth it for me. Plus I have managed to get an offer or two I was able to gain extra points from.
re: Barclays US Airways MasterCard – I have two of them as well… can I apply for a third? Has anyone tried that? Thanks.
@TheDapperDon, FM is indeed correct. I tried to downgrade my Ink Bold to an Ink Classic, but was unable to even though I applied for the Ink Classic before calling to downgrade. There was noting I could do.
Interesting tidbit about downgrading the Ink Bold, ore the lack of ability to do so. Was this in the posts regarding the signup bonus offers?
@FM, Disagree with your comment on CSP, “this is a great one for her to defer to for virtually all spend.” For general spending, I think Freedom’s 10% annual bonus beats the 7% of CSP. Between CSP and Ink Plus/Bold, the latter is obvious superior as its 5X office supply bonus category, far better than 2X in travel/dinning. So I would suggest to keep one of your Ink Bold/plus card and close the CSP.