Using a "travel reward" credit card for free dive trips, resorts, liveaboards, etc...

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

RJP

Contributor
Scuba Instructor
Divemaster
Messages
13,460
Reaction score
5,930
Location
New Jersey
# of dives
1000 - 2499
Not sure if this has been covered, but I've found a way to earn frequent traveller points that can be used to pay for ANY travel related* expense.The Barclay Bank Arrival MasterCard earns 2points for every dollar charged to the card. These points are redeemable as a direct statement credit to offset travel-related expenses, defined by the card as follows:

A travel purchase and redemption is defined as: Airlines, Travel Agencies & Tour Operators, Hotels, Motels & Resorts, Cruise Lines, Passenger Railways and Car Rental Agencies. Purchases made at merchants that do not process transactions under these terms or that use incorrect MasterCard merchant category codes will not qualify. Barclaycard is not responsible for incorrectly coded purchases.

This is great for divers who don't necessarily want to stay at a chain hotel with points (eg Hilton, Marriott, etc) preferring to stay at a dive resort (eg Sunset House, Buddy Dive, etc) or even possibly want to take a liveaboard trip.

Points are earned at 2x per dollar spent, and redeemed at $10 per 1000pts. This is on the good/generous end of a frequent flier program in terms of point "earn rate" as well as "redemtion value." Plus there's a significant sign-up bonus of 40,000pts, so you could easily have 46,000 points within a day of signing up; 40,000 sign up bonus plus 2x $3,000 spend w/in first three months to earn bonus. (There are easy ways to "manufacture" spending to hit bonus levels. if you don't ordinarily spend $1,000 a month on a credit card.) This means that for less than 10min of your time you would have at LEAST $460 to spend on travel.

I signed up for a Barclay Arrival MasterCard that I recieved on March 1st and quickly manufactured spending to hit/exceed bonus on the first day I had the card. My plan was (and still is) to earn enough points to pay for a liveaboard trip. However, I was surprised to find that my daughter's Sweet 16 celebration - a NYC dinner cruise for her and some friends - actually showed up on my statement as "a cruise" and therefore travel-related. With two clicks of a mouse I was able to apply 55,000 points as a $550 credit on my account... which immediately reduced my credit card bill for March by $550:

Barclay.png


As mentioned above, I'm not sure if this has been covered before... but this opens up a whole world of possibilities for absolutely free dive trips. Free airfare, free dive resorts, free liveaboards, etc. And even if you want to stay at a chain hotel on those points, if they have a dive-op on site that can be charged to your room... and then can be "paid for" by billing those incidental charges to the Barclay card.

For instance, if I went to Curacao to dive I could...
Get a free plane ticket using United FF miles
Get a free week at the Marriott using Marriott points
Get a free week of diving from Caribbean Sea Sports by billing that package to my room and paying that bill with my Barclay MasterCard.

Barclaycard Arrival - Travel Rewards Credit Card With Double Miles

The only caveat I will throw out there is there is the potential unknown of how any individual business (hotel, liveaboard, etc) lists themselves in the MasterCard merchant category code. (The way credit card companies track charges, and travel rewards programs determine reimbursement.) If you are interested in this approach I would ask. They should know.

When I was at "Beneath The Sea" last week I spoke with all the various livaboard companies, and found that only ONE boat - the M/V Spree - bills out to a credit card category that would qualify for this approach. None of the usual suspect "liveaboard fleet" companies bills to an appropriate code. One boat even told me that the purposely bill to "Clothing, retail" in order to eek a few extra pennies out of the credit card fees.

Perhaps Frank will come along and confirm what he told me... that the Spree bills out to "4411 - Steamships/Cruise Lines" which does fall under the general "Travel Services" category in the MasterCard system, and would qualify. Accordingly, if someone wanted to get a $450 (or more) discount on an M/V Spree trip, all they'd need to do is open a Barclay Arrival MasterCard, hit the $3000 threashold to get the 45,000 bonus points, book a Spree trip billed to the card, and when the bill comes, apply the 45,000 points to delete $450 from the bill. Personally, I'm shooting to put enough spend on the card to get a whole trip on the Spree for free... but a $450 discount right off the bat is a nice start!

I book most of my dive travel through my LDS, who uses Caradonna for most resorts/trips. Their merchant code is "Travel Agency" so any hotel, liveaboard, dive op package I book through them will hit my bill as "Travel" and qualify. I have, in the past, had some travel to small/boutique hotels show up on my credit card as "XXXXXXX Property Holdings, Inc" or similar. These might not qualify.

I would think that this could be a boon all-the-way around.
Ray
 
In fact, booking with us you win 2 ways. Some rewards cards earn double and triple rewards points for travel related expenses, so booking a trip on the Spree will earn you points faster, and some cards (like your Barclaycard) allow redemption of points greater than 1 percent for travel related redemptions. I haven't found a card that allows both, yet, but I'm still looking.

So, for instance, the Barclaycard gets you 2x travel miles on all purchases, so anything you buy gets you 2 for one points if you redeem for travel. The Blue Sky from American Express allows you to redeem 7500 points for $100 against your statement for travel related expenses. Yes, we are a travel company as far as the credit card companies are concerned.
 
In fact, booking with us you win 2 ways. Some rewards cards earn double and triple rewards points for travel related expenses, so booking a trip on the Spree will earn you points faster, and some cards (like your Barclaycard) allow redemption of points greater than 1 percent for travel related redemptions. I haven't found a card that allows both, yet, but I'm still looking.

Barclay does earn 2x points per dollar in the first place - for all charges - so it effectively "does both."

They also give a "10% dividend" on redeemed points, so if I were to cash in 50,000 points for $500 off a Spree trip, Barclay would give me 5,000 points back. So $500 would only cost me 45,000 points. So effectively they are giving 2.2% for travel.

Now I just need to pick my Spree trip for next year! Where are we going, Frank?

:d
 
Barclay does earn 2x points per dollar in the first place - for all charges - so it effectively "does both."

They also give a "10% dividend" on redeemed points, so if I were to cash in 50,000 points for $500 off a Spree trip, Barclay would give me 5,000 points back. So $500 would only cost me 45,000 points. So effectively they are giving 2.2% for travel.

Now I just need to pick my Spree trip for next year! Where are we going, Frank?

:d

Looks like I'll be in Long Island Sound the 3rd week in June 2015. You pick.
 
Looks like I'll be in Long Island Sound the 3rd week in June 2015. You pick.

Geeze Frank, planning on taking a wrong turn somewhere in the Florida Straits?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Geeze Frank, planning on taking a wrong turn somewhere in the Florida Straits?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Spending 6 weeks going up the East Coast looking for beach sand in deep water, so the ACE can dredge it up and put it on the beaches. That's right, tax dollars to put san on beaches, then remove it from the inlets and dump it offshore.
 
Spending 6 weeks going up the East Coast looking for beach sand in deep water, so the ACE can dredge it up and put it on the beaches. That's right, tax dollars to put san on beaches, then remove it from the inlets and dump it offshore.

Sounds about right for the ACE...


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Does anyone happen to know what LiveAboard.com comes through as on a credit card statement? E.g. is it a cruise or other travel? If so it qualifies for extra cash back for me.
 
I prefer the Chase Sapphire/Reserve combo. 3-5% cash back on a whole bunch of things and then travel booked through Chase is at a 1.5x multiplier. Means up to 7.5% cash back towards travel in some categories.
 

Back
Top Bottom