Consumers favor bank travel reward cards over airline cards

If you want a rewards credit card to accumulate points and redeem them for flights, which are best: airline-branded cards or bank-issued travel reward cards?That's the question addressed in a report released this week by IdeaWorksCompany, which conceded that comparing the two types of cards was difficult, leaving researchers "dazed and often confused by asterisks and small print."The short answer is that airline co-branded cards, such as the United MileagePlus Explorer Visa Signature or American Airlines Citi Platinum Select AAdvantage Visa Signature, offer advantages for consumers who want longer-haul, premium-class rewards. However, domestic travel represents the bulk of reward activity, and bank travel reward cards, such as American Express Blue Sky Preferred and Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard, tend to be favored because of their simple and effective promise to consumers of "travel anytime on any airline."
American Airlines, Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and US Airways co-branded cards essentially deliver two round-trip tickets after annual spending of $18,000 when a generous sign-up bonus is considered.Among the four bank travel reward cards reviewed, the average return per dollar spent is about 2 cents. The Barclaycard Arrival card topped the list with a 2.2 percent reward return.The Chase Sapphire Preferred card delivers "an amazing" travel reward value of nearly $800 within the first year after spending $18,000, including a sign-up bonus of 40,000 points.For travelers who usually buy $200 round-trip tickets, a bank travel reward card or the Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Premier card probably provides the best value.
Counter to conventional wisdom that Tuesdays and Wednesdays are the best days to purchase airline tickets, a new study found that weekends are better for booking. Airlines are more likely to discount fares on Saturday and Sunday, say Steven Puller, associate professor of economics at Texas A&M, and co-author Lisa Taylor, a former Texas A&M graduate student. In the study "Price Discrimination By Day-Of-Week Of Purchase: Evidence From The U.S. Airline Industry," published in the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, the researchers found that tickets purchased on the weekend were, on average, 5 percent cheaper than similar tickets purchased on weekdays. The study finds the weekend purchase discount is greatest on routes with a mix of business and leisure customers.