When I signed up for the card, it was just a Visa. How did I now get two different cards?

The enclosure explained:

We have enhanced your Citi/AAdvantage credit card account. You now have two Citi/AAdvantage cards, including a Citi/AAdvantage American Express card, to access your existing account and credit line. These two new cards – which are enclosed and carry no additional fee — replace the Citi/AAdvantage card you are currently carrying, and provide you with more places to earn American Airlines AAdvantage miles.

Perhaps there’s precedent for this, but I’ve never had a bank issue me a second, different card before.

I suppose it’s a no-cost addition, and since it’s considered part of the same credit line, it doesn’t hit my credit report as a new, separate account. (Their enclosed FAQ’s stress this point.)

But no thanks. My wallet’s credit card space is already fully occupied, and frankly, I don’t need this Amex. (“Waste of plastic” comes to mind.) If I’m using an Amex, it’ll be my Starwood-linked card.

Anyone have a different take?

FareCompare wants you to go on a mileage run
The folks at FareCompare are running a sweepstakes of sorts, offering the lucky winner the opportunity to go on a mileage run for up to 15,000 miles of travel on the airline of their choice. If you’re just shy of elite status (re)qualification and have time to kill, it can’t hurt to enter.

OpenSkies knocks $200 off fares to Paris
All-premium carrier (and British Airways subsidiary) OpenSkies has a promo code for $200 off flights from New York to Paris if you book and fly by November 30, 2010. Promo code is PAR200DO.

Citibank brings back the 75,000-mile American AAdvantage bonus
Well, that didn’t take long… While the mega-bonuses on new Citibank/American Airlines credit cards ended on October 31, a new offer is already up. 75,000 miles after $4000 spend within 6 months, with no annual fee. Not quite as easy to attain as the last round of offers, but still a fine, fine way to collect some major mileage balances. (via Gary Leff)

Now, back to the polls…

I opted for a personal Visa card that offered up 75,000 bonus miles after just $1500 in spending. I quickly reached the threshold, and the bonus appears on my current statement (screenshot above). The miles were reflected in my AA account the next day.

Echoing Gary Leff’s comments on this subject, these bonuses are among the best credit card mileage offers that have ever been made available. If you’re feeling particularly frisky, sign up for one personal card and one business card. If you’ve got a partner, have the partner do the same. This is an easy way to rack up a boatload of miles in one of the best programs out there, a program that actually has solid award availability.

The mega-offers run out on October 31, 2010, so act fast.

Here are the links again.

75,000 miles after $1500 in purchases within 6 months, no fee the first year:

• 75,000 mile bonus: Visa
• 75,000 mile bonus: Visa Business
• 75,000 mile bonus: American Express (issued by Citi, not Amex)

100,000 miles: 50,000 miles after $750 in purchases within 4 months, and another 50,000 miles after $10,000 in purchases within 12 months, no fee the first year

• 100,000 mile bonus: Visa
• 100,000 mile bonus: Visa Business
• 100,000 mile bonus: American Express (issued by Citi, not Amex)

The 75K bonus (with $1,500 in purchases within 6 months) and a 100K bonus (with $10,000 in purchases within a year) first hit the inter-tubes about a month ago. I thought I had posted about it, but looking back, I didn’t. (Gary Leff was on the scene.)

This sort of deal usually doesn’t last long, but the fact that they’re sending it out to folks via snail mail (with an application deadline of October 31, 2010) and not just electronically suggests that it has some legs.

Some caveats/warnings: 1) If you can’t manage your credit, stay away from these cards. It’s not worth messing up your finances for a chunk of miles. 2) The cards have an annual fee, but it’s waived the first year. You can collect the bonus and cancel the card before the fee kicks in, but you’ll need to likely need to hold the card for 8 to 10 months after qualifying for the bonus in order to receive the miles. And 3) choose the right card. If you’re not going to spend $10,000 on a card in 12 months, don’t sign up for the 100K mile cards.

But, caveats aside, and in the interest of beefing up your mileage accounts, here are the links, via Gary.

75,000 miles after $1500 in purchases within 6 months, no fee the first year:

• 75,000 mile bonus: Visa
• 75,000 mile bonus: Visa Business
• 75,000 mile bonus: American Express (issued by Citi, not Amex)

100,000 miles: 50,000 miles after $750 in purchases within 4 months, and another 50,000 miles after $10,000 in purchases within 12 months, no fee the first year

• 100,000 mile bonus: Visa
• 100,000 mile bonus: Visa Business
• 100,000 mile bonus: American Express (issued by Citi, not Amex)

The sales pitch argues that the card now comes with new benefits:

• Buy-two-nights-get-one-free option on Starwood-family hotel stays
  Okay, fine, but there are plenty of strings attached to that. Prepayment. Limited dates. Participating hotels only. And a lack of clarity on whether the rates are actually the lowest available. Big whoop.
• Five nights credit toward elite status
  That means 20 nights to gold instead of 25, 45 to platinum instead of 50. It’s nights, not stays. No bone being thrown to those who reach elite level with stays rather than nights? Pfft.

Color me unimpressed by the new benefits or the new price. These “benefits” don’t warrant a 44% price hike. This sure looks like a downgrade. It looks, swims, and quacks like a downgrade. It’s a downgrade.

I still like the Starwood program because of its flexibility. Not only do you earn points that can be redeemed for hotel stays, but you can convert your points 1:1 — at no cost — into a laundry list of airline programs. They even give you a 5000-point bonus if you transfer a threshold of 20,000 Starwood points — making those worth 25,000 airline miles.

So the next question is whether or not to hold onto the card, now that the price tag is higher.

For the time being (especially with nearly half a year left before I need to renew), I’m staying put. I’m still getting a good return by putting points into SPG and leveraging those for high-value awards worth more than 2 or 3% cash rebates.

But take away redemption opportunities or make it harder to cash in, and it may be time to look more closely at the Costco Amex’s 3% cashback on gasoline and restaurants, and 2% back on airlines, car rentals, travel agents, and hotels is tempting. Especially since the Costco card has no annual fee if you’re already a member there.

(For those who were considering becoming Starwood Amex cardholders before this news — and I get a number of e-mails asking me about the card — you still get the first year free; the second year is when they sock it to you.)

Current cardholders, does this change the value proposition for you? Are you sticking with the Starwood Amex or bailing out?

It’s probably no surprise that the credit union in question is one with a highly mobile and international user base: the United Nations Federal Credit Union, whose membership is limited to employees of the UN, a limited set of affiliated organizations, and family members of existing members.

However, despite being rolled out by a niche provider, this is still a big step for the American credit card industry. It opens the door for what could potentially be a huge upgrade for American residents traveling internationally, especially to Europe.

Adding the chip-and-PIN option doesn’t remove the functionality of the magnetic stripe. It just adds a feature that wasn’t there before, much like the RFID-based “tap-and-go” chips that some large issuers have added to their cards in recent years.

For banks with large numbers of international transactions, the addition of the chip sounds like a winning proposition:

The chip and PIN system has lowered the incidence of card fraud at the point of sale in the countries where it has been implemented, but critics have pointed out it has led to an increase in Internet or other “card not present” fraud.

Merrill Halpern, the card services manager for UNFCU, explained that the credit union had been contemplating starting to issue the cards for a while, both to better serve its international membership and to limit the CU’s exposure to card fraud. Halpern would not share specific numbers to illustrate the credit union’s card fraud but noted that it was significantly higher than for other financial institutions, including banks.

Part of the reason for the higher than average fraud incidence is that other credit unions with primarily U.S.-based memberships can, for example, automatically decline card transactions from some overseas countries perceived to have a high risk of card fraud to protect themselves from losses. But with its 88,000 members spread across 205 countries, Halpern pointed out that option is less feasible for UNFCU. Further, its members had started to complain about the lack of the chip and PIN cards, particularly when traveling on U.N. or other business.

This doesn’t mean that the chip-and-PIN system will be in use at any American terminals yet. That’s a sizable infrastructure investment that seems unlikely to occur anytime soon.

And while the addition of Chip-and-PIN would speed in-person transactions for American banking customers abroad, and allow Americans to use automated gasoline pumps, ticket vending machines, and parking fee machines in Europe, the system still has its flaws. Security isn’t guaranteed (much as it isn’t with a swipe-and-sign setup), with some semi-comical results.

Still, I’m still hopeful that this credit union’s experience is positive, and that more banks and credit unions follow through as well. It would be a big boon to frequent international travelers.

In Europe, a credit card fee is more of a norm. But Ryanair, which has been charging a fee for years, was just slapped down by the German courts for charging the fee:

Germany’s federal court of justice found yesterday that Ryanair placed consumers at a “disproportionate disadvantage” by offering no way to pay for flights without incurring a fee.

“By charging the fee is shifting in a one-sided manner on to customers the costs of fulfilling its own legal obligations … without bringing any service in return,” said the court, a practice at odds with German law.

The case against Ryanair was brought by Germany’s leading consumer organisation. It complained about the fee, which ranges from €1.50 to €4 per flight and passenger.

By not accepting cash payments, it argued, Ryanair offered customers no opportunity to pay for flights without paying extra.

I can understand the motivation behind this fee: Merchants accepting credit cards give up a piece of each transaction to the credit card processing bank. (The percentage varies according to card brand and total transaction size.) But there are rules to which merchants are required to adhere. I couldn’t find a European merchant agreement. But in the US, for example: “Visa merchants are not permitted to establish minimum transaction amounts, even on sale items. They also are not permitted to charge a surcharge fee when you use your Visa card.”

It will be interesting to see if other European countries see similar cases. Credit card fees aren’t limited to Germany, after all.

Starting June 1st, Cardmembers with a Gold, Platinum, or Reserve Delta SkyMiles Credit Card from American Express—and up to eight travel companions within their reservation—will automatically receive a first checked bag fee waiver upon check-in for all Delta and Delta Connection® flights.

This only applies to general members of the SkyMiles program, of course, since elite-level members are already waived out of paying the baggage fees — for two bags.

Assuming a single checked bag, checked both ways on a roundtrip, Delta Amex holders would save $50 per person on the itinerary. (Up to eight travel companions?! Big crowd. But that could work out to quite a savings.)

The cards charge annual fees — the gold, platinum, and reserve cards charge an $95, $150, or $450 (!) annual fee, respectively — but if you’re not an elite member of SkyMiles and you’re going to be traveling with Delta (and checking bags) anyway, it may be worth signing up for a card.

One argument I’ve made on several occasions (such as here), is that international travel is a time to choose your credit card on the basis of fees, rather than rewards. (Ideally, you can get both, but most rewards cards slap hefty foreign transaction charges on your account.)

Another consideration is rental car coverage. Because of Visa’s more generous loss-of-use coverage in the case of damage to the car, I always use a Visa when renting.

But another rationale became clearer to me this past week: For expensive items, it can make sense to choose a card on the basis of its purchase protection.

Last week, our home was broken into and burglarized. The thieves took one item: a nearly-new high-end netbook, purchased just a few months ago.

After the police left the house (and after we cleaned up the CSI staff’s fingerprinting dust from our bedroom…) I filed a homeowner’s insurance claim. But I remembered that our credit card might be able to cover a part of it, and that the credit card might have been our only coverage had the computer been lost outside the home.

In the process, I was reminded of the variations between cards:

American Express Purchase Protection will cover the expenses of a lost, stolen, or damaged item if the incident happens within 90 days of purchase, up to $1000 per incident and $50,000 annually.

Visa Signature has a similar product, dubbed Purchase Security, but incidents are limited to $500 of coverage. The $50,000 annual cap still applies.

MasterCard’s Purchase Assurance is also limited to 90 days, but it’s not clear what the dollar limits are. You need to check with your card-issuing bank to see how large the benefit is. (In my own case, Citibank offers $1000 coverage per incident, with a $25,000 annual cap.)

I would rank those 1) Amex, 2) MasterCard, and 3) Visa.

(I remember when these programs lasted an entire year, instead of just 90 days. But times change, and benefits get shaved back.)

The computer that was stolen from me was bought with a Visa, and it isn’t covered, as it was stolen just over 100 days from the time of purchase (the credit card coverage had run out on day 91). Our normal go-to card, our Starwood Amex, or our Citibank MasterCard, wouldn’t have been any more help, given the 90-day limit. But if the crime had occurred a few weeks ago, the Amex or MC would have been the better cards to have used.

But for big purchases, the Visa just went down a notch in my estimation, and the Amex moved up.

More importantly, in my view, the rules include a provision that airlines can’t retroactively change the contract governing your ticket. This has always struck me as patently unfair: You buy your ticket in January for a March flight, and the airline changes its rules in February; until now, you’ve been stuck with the February contract. Now, the federal government has ruled that you’re covered by the original contract in effect when you made your purchase. Good.

Chris Elliott has pulled the highlights from the actual rules, if you want to review.

Downgraded: Globespan Airlines
Potentially Downgraded: Credit card processors
Scotland’s Globespan Airlines shut down abruptly over the weekend, stranding 4500 travelers mid-trip. For the time being, guidance from the company on rebookings, is available on the former airline’s website. But questions now turn to whether or not the airline’s credit card processor was to blame for the immediate death knell. The processor, E-clear, apparently held back between £30m and £35m due to Globespan. You may recall that Frontier Airlines blamed their credit card processor when they declared bankruptcy in 2008 (though they didn’t halt all operations at that point).

Upgraded, after days of being Downgraded: Eurostar
English Channel rail firm Eurostar had a miserable (and well-publicized) weekend, with a complete shutdown of all their trains, midway through the Channel crossing. And the company handled things rather poorly. For example:

When worried passengers [aboard the trains] challenged Eurostar officials they received a cursory shrug. Some became so desperate for information that they banged on the train driver’s door but could only hear him sobbing inside.

Awesome. That’s the kind of leadership in a crisis I look for… But the company is resuming service and has promised to make it up to the thousands of passengers it stranded, not just in the tunnels, but on both sides of the channel. They’ve vowed that “the company would reimburse them for expenses incurred while they were stranded.”

Upgraded: The number of stars in the Parisian hotel sky
Four stars? Not enough. Bring on the fifth star. At least they haven’t gone the way of the absurdist 6 and 7 star hotel…

Upgraded: Biofuels
A Seattle company has put in motion plans to create a large-scale biofuels operation aimed specifically at airlines. AltAir Fuels has signed up 14 airlines to be launch customers for jet fuel and diesel made from camelina, a mustard-like weed whose seeds can be refined.