Travel rewards - and flexibility, too

Bon voyage, Air Miles. Sayonara, Aeroplan.

There's a new breed of credit card out there that allows you to book flights and other kinds of travel without the hassle of dealing with the country's two pre-eminent travel reward programs.

With the new TD First Class Travel Visa Infinite card and American Express Blue Sky cards, you can make any travel arrangements you like and then apply your reward points to offset the cost. "Customers are now free of what I like to call the tyranny of the redemption grid," said Jim Sallas, senior vice-president of personal lending and Visa at Toronto-Dominion Bank's TD Canada Trust division.

The new TD and Amex cards offer much more flexibility than the old guard of travel reward credit cards, which are tied either to the Aeroplan program run by Aeroplan Income Fund or Air Miles. Unfortunately, this extra utility comes at a cost. The rewards-generating power for every dollar you spend on the TD and Amex cards doesn't match up to the best scenarios with Aeroplan and Air Miles.

But if you've had trouble getting the reward flights you want on terms you can live with, then you may not mind.

TD has long had a Visa gold card that lets you earn generic travel points redeemable toward all kinds of travel.

The hitch was that you had to book through TD's in-house travel service, which limited your ability to take advantage of the best deals out there.

You can book a trip any way you want using points generated with a First Class Travel Visa Infinite - through a travel agent, through a travel website like Expedia.ca or directly through an airline or other service provider. Just charge the expense to your card and then call the TD service centre to redeem your points. TD then applies your redemption as a credit on your card statement.

Amex Blue Sky works in much the same way, but it's only nominally a competitor because it's a standard credit card and not a gold card like TD's Travel Visa Infinite. Blue Sky has no annual fee, and the only insurance coverage it provides is travel accident.

The annual fee for the TD card is $120 (extra cards are $50 each), which gets you several kinds of insurance coverage, including limited travel medical, trip cancellation and interruption, lost baggage and collision/damage for rental cars.

With Blue Sky you have to spend $8,000 on the card to accumulate $100 in travel rewards. By contrast, TD's Travel Visa Infinite requires you to spend about $6,666 to generate $100 in rewards.

Neither of these cards gets you flying as quickly as one tied to either Air Miles or Aeroplan. Spend roughly $12,500 to $15,000 on a credit card tied to these programs and you might be able to get a short-haul reward flight, say Toronto to New York.

Spend similar amounts on the new TD and Amex cards and it's doubtful you'd have enough points to cover a similar flight.

But let's say you found a seat sale. With the TD and Amex cards, you could book that cheap seat and use points to pay for it. This is where the flexibility of these new cards comes into play.

"The idea is to make your best travel deal even better," said Rob McClean, vice-president of new product development at American Express Canada.

"Take advantage of a great seat sale or a special offer, then you redeem your Blue Sky points towards an account credit."

Amex requires you to redeem $100 worth of travel credits and the $50 increments after that, while TD allows $50 increments. With the Amex card you can wait as long as a year after booking a trip to redeem points, which gives you lots of extra time to build your point total. TD card holders have 90 days from the date they book their travel to redeem points.

TD and Amex make a virtue out of the fact that they're not tied to programs like Air Miles and Aeroplan, but both Aeroplan and Air Miles are quite efficient at generating reward flights in certain circumstances. If you're nodding your head at this, then Blue Sky and Travel Visa Infinite aren't for you. If you're guffawing in disbelief, then these new cards deserve a look.

Flexible travel reward cards at a glance

What are they?

An alternative to cards linked to Aeroplan and Air Miles that allow you to redeem points for all kinds of travel, no matter where you book it.

Who offers them?

American Express and Toronto-Dominion Bank.

What are the fees?

Amex's card has no annual fee, while TD charges $120.

What kinds of travel

are eligible?

Flights, hotels, car rentals, cruises, trains, spas and resorts, holiday packages.

How much do you

have to spend?

With the Amex card, you get $100 in travel credits by spending $8,000; the TD card gives you $100 in rewards for every $6,666 you spend.