December 8 Update: Aeroplan to award less miles for most Canadian North flights, get priority boarding for wearing an ugly sweater, buy miles bonus summary

Aeroplan accumulation for Canadian North flights has changed. Most fare classes will be earning less miles now. At least you can still double dip and earn Aurora Rewards points and Aeroplan miles on those flights. (Source Aeroplan)

- Earn 75% of the miles in booking class C, H . For travel until November 30, 2017 earn 100%
- Earn 50% of the miles in booking class M. For travel until November 30, 2017 earn 75%.
- Earn 50% of the miles in booking class O For travel until November 30, 2017 earn 100%.
- Earn 25% of the miles in booking class T. For travel until November 30, 2017 earn 50%
- Earn 0% of the miles in booking class R. For travel until November 30, 2017 earn 25%
- Earn 25% of the miles you fly in booking class B. For travel until November 30, 2017 earn 75%
- Y, V, P, & A fare classes remain the same 

Are you going to be flying on Alaska Airlines on December 15th? Be sure you wear an ugly Christmas sweater to get yourself Priority Boarding! (Source Alaska Airlines)

In celebration of National Ugly Holiday Sweater Day, Alaska Airlines guests who wear their festive holiday sweaters to the airport are able to board early. The one-day promotion will be celebrated by flyers and employees alike across Alaska's 115-city network and includes all Alaska, Virgin America and Horizon Air flights. Festive holiday-themed boarding music will play all month long to help get guests into the holiday spirit.

If you are in the market for buying miles or points and want to know what bonuses are available we summarized them all over on the FFB blog. Find those offers here.

We're going to keep this reminder going in each update until Christmas:
Check out the Give A Mile Flight Hero campaign! The charity can really use donations of miles to help provide flights to those who otherwise would be unable to travel to visit terminally ill or critically sick family and friends. Rewards Canada has pledged to raise 100,000 miles and we are half way there! We are putting the call out to all of our fans, readers and even new visitors, if you can give please do so. It can be as little as 1,000 miles! You can find out more and donate here.


Posts since our last update:

• Hilton Winter Sale - Save up to 25% on weekend stays in the UK, Europe, Middle East and Africa
  Save up to 25% on weekend breaks, now and throughout 2018. With over 400 hotels across Europe, The Middle…

Travel Deals
Fairmont President's Club latest Great Rates, Great Dates offers are out. Book by Dec 14 for stays until Jan 31, 18. Find out more here
Remember to visit Rewards Canada's Travel Booking site to book travel directly with many of your favourite airlines, hotels and more!

Canadian Bonus Offers
N/A

Other Bonus Offers
Aegean Miles+Bonus
- Earn up to 40% bonus Miles+Bonus Miles when you buy miles online. More... Until Dec 27, 17

Carlson Hotels Club Carlson
- 1,500 Bonus Gold Points and up to 30% off stays at any participating Radisson Blu®, Radisson®, Park Plaza®, Park Inn by Radisson® and Country Inns & Suite By CarlsonSM hotels across Asia Pacific. More... Book by Jan 31 for stays Jan 4 - Feb 28, 18

Hilton Honors
- Earn up to 80% bonus Honors Points when you buy points online. More... Until Dec 29, 17

Hyatt World of Hyatt
- 3,000 Bonus World of Hyatt Points for stays at the Grand Hyatt Manila. More... Jan 15 - Mar 31, 18

Iberia Plus
- Triple Avios for stays at all Melia Hotels Worldwide. More... Book by Jan 30 for stays until Mar 15, 18

Marriott Rewards
- 2,500 Bonus Rewards Points when you stay 5+ nights at the Residence Inn Santa Barbara Goleta. More... Until Jan 21, 18
- 3,000 Bonus Rewards Points for stays at The Alexandrian, an Autograph Collection hotel. More... Until Feb 28, 18

Qatar Airways Privilege Club
- Double QMiles for all Qatar Airways flights that are booked on the Qatar Airways website or the Qatar Airways mobile app More... Book by Dec 30 for flights until Mar 31, 18

United MileagePlus
- Earn up to 100% Bonus MileagePlus Miles when you buy miles online. More... Until Dec 31, 17

Follow Rewards Canada:

Hilton Winter Sale - Save up to 25% on weekend stays in the UK, Europe, Middle East and Africa

Save up to 25% on weekend breaks, now and throughout 2018. With over 400 hotels across Europe, The Middle East and Africa. Book today and save - and access the best savings as a Hilton Honors member, simply join for free when you book. Stays must be booked by January 30, 2018 and completed on weekends between November 2017 and December 31, 2018. Remember that you should also be earning Double Points on these stays with the current winter Hilton Honors promotion. Find that and all other Honors bonuses here.


Click here to take advantage of the Hilton Winter sale 

For purposes of this offer, "weekend" is defined as Friday, Saturday and/or Sunday nights and in Middle East (excluding Turkey, Lebanon, Morocco, Africa) as Thursday, Friday and/or Saturday nights. Must book a minimum 3 days before arrival.

December 7 Update: Amex Cobalt Confirmed Multiplier Locations (help us build the list), Alaska Airlines & Air France KLM part ways, IHG Accelerate Returns

Alright Cobalters! We need your help! Rewards Canada reader Hossam M. asked if there is a published list of merchants where you can earn the 5x (10x for this month) multiplier with the American Express Cobalt card. We know that Amex doesn't publish one so based on Hossam's question we created a page to track the locations where you can earn the 5x, 2x and 1x points. We need your help to populate the charts! Simply comment and let us know who the merchant was, where the merchant was located and what the multiplier was and we'll add it to the charts and keep it going as a master list! You can access the article and chart here.

Thought of the day - on our global site we have saying that asks "Are you bonusing?" - well I think here in Canada we should be asking "Are you Cobalting?" especially with this 10x multiplier!

Bad news from Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan, their partnership with Air France KLM is coming to an end on April 30, 2018. Seeing that AF KLM have a pretty big presence in Canada this is definitely a blow to Mileage Plan members here. Although availability was sparce on AF KLM from Mileage Plan it was an optoin I know some of you used or were planning on using. Overall though there are lots of other great options to use Mileage Plan miles on especially airlines like Cathay Pacific, Qantas, LAN and more. If you want to redeem on AF KLM you can use Flying Blue, Delta SkyMiles (or virtually any other SkyTeam airline) and of course the newest option WestJet Rewards. (Source Alaska Airlines)

We're going to keep this reminder going in each update until Christmas:
Check out the Give A Mile Flight Hero campaign! The charity can really use donations of miles to help provide flights to those who otherwise would be unable to travel to visit terminally ill or critically sick family and friends. Rewards Canada has pledged to raise 100,000 miles and we are half way there! We are putting the call out to all of our fans, readers and even new visitors, if you can give please do so. It can be as little as 1,000 miles! You can find out more and donate here.



Posts since our last update:

• IHG Rewards Club Accelerate returns for Winter 2018 - Earn lots of bonus points for your IHG stays!
  The Fall Accelerate bonus isn't over yet as it goes until the end of December but if you don't…
• Visa Infinite Privilege cards to lose Fairmont President's Club Elevated Status benefit
  Rewards Canada reader and Meet the Collector Charles T. forwarded to us a letter from TD letting him know that…
• Earn 5x Aeroplan Miles for Radisson and Country Inn & Suites stays in Canada and the U.S.
  A nice holiday bonus if your travels are taking you to a Radisson or Country Inns & Suites location this…
• Miles & More Award Ticket Sale - Economy class & Business Class award tickets on sale from Toronto & Vancouver
  As we do each month we bring you the latest set Miles & More "Meilenschnaeppchen" discounted mileage awards!  This…

Travel Deals
Fairmont President's Club latest Great Rates, Great Dates offers are out. Book by Dec 14 for stays until Jan 31, 18. Find out more here

Remember to visit Rewards Canada's Travel Booking site to book travel directly with many of your favourite airlines, hotels and more!

Canadian Bonus Offers
Air Canada / Aeroplan
- 5x Aeroplan Miles for stays at Radisson hotels and Country Inns & Suites By Carlson in the U.S. and Canada. More... Until Dec 31, 17

Other Bonus Offers
Alitalia MilleMiglia
- Double MilleMiglia Miles on your next hotel stay booked via Rocketmiles. More... Book by Mar 31, 18

Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
- Triple Asia Miles for stays at Minyoun Hotels. More... Until Feb 28, 18
- Triple Asia Miles for stays at Sino Hotels in Hong Kong and Singapore. More... Until Jan 14, 18
- Earn up to Quadruple Asia Miles for Hertz rentals of 3 or more days in Asia, USA, Canada, Europe, Australia and New Zealand. More... Book by Dec 31 for rentals until Jan 31, 18

Emirates Skywards
- 2,000 Bonus Skywards Miles when you complete your first hotel stay booked via Rocketmiles. More... Book by Jan 10 for stays until Feb 28, 18
- 9,500 Bonus Skywards Miles for Avis rentals of 3 or more days Worldwide. More...Book by Jan 10 for rentals until Feb 28, 18

MEA Middle East Airlines Cedar Miles
- Double Elite Qualifying Cedar Miles when flying between Beirut and Saudi Arabia or Kuwait in Economy. More... Until Dec 18, 17 and Jan 10 - Mar 31, 18

Follow Rewards Canada:

IHG Rewards Club Accelerate returns for Winter 2018 - Earn lots of bonus points for your IHG stays!

The Fall Accelerate bonus isn't over yet as it goes until the end of December but if you don't have any IHG stays planned until the New Year don't fret as the latest Accelerate offer for the start of 2018 has been released! As we have seen each Accelerate promotion they come out with new personalized offers for each member. The total bonus available per member ranges from a minimum of 30,000 points to well past 100,000. You can register for Accelerate here.

My offer dropped from the 45,000 possible points this fall to 41,000 points for the Winter:

Once again based on what I believe our travels will be during the promotional period I am not going to go out of my way to achieve the whole amount. Even staying 5 nights in total for 5,000 points would be tough. In all likelihood I'll maybe the achieve the stay once bonus of 1,000 points and maybe the weekend bonus.

Let us know what offer you get in the comments below!

Offer details
IHG Rewards Club Accelerate: Earn 500 to 30,000 or more Bonus IHG Rewards Club Points when you complete stays at IHG Hotels Worldwide. Bonus varies by member  Full details, online registration and booking (Registration is required) Jan 1 - Apr 30, 18

Find many more IHG Rewards Club offers here!

Visa Infinite Privilege cards to lose Fairmont President's Club Elevated Status benefit

Rewards Canada reader and Meet the Collector Charles T. forwarded to us a letter from TD letting him know that the Fairmont President's Club Elevated Status benefit that comes with his TD Aeroplan Visa Infinite Privilege card will be discontinued.

 
We decided to check the Visa Infinite Privilege website to see if this is the case for all Infinite Privilege cards and we found out that yes it is:

This means cards issued by TD, CIBC and RBC are all affected by this change.

Unfortunate to see another benefit being taken away from what are the highest end Visa cards in the Canadian market but there may other factors in play here. As you may or may not be aware of, Fairmont Hotels was bought out by French based Accor Hotels. Accor has their own loyalty program called Le Club AccorHotels and recently the moves on their part seem to be indicating the near end of Fairmont's President's Club program. If this is really the case it could explain why this benefit is being removed from the Visa Infinite Privilege program. A further confirmation of this would be if the benefit is pulled from The Platinum Card from American Express - which it hasn't been, yet.

Earn 5x Aeroplan Miles for Radisson and Country Inn & Suites stays in Canada and the U.S.

A nice holiday bonus if your travels are taking you to a Radisson or Country Inns & Suites location this month. You can earn 5x Aeroplan miles for stays at either brand in Canada or the U.S.

Offer details
5x Aeroplan Miles for stays at Radisson hotels and Country Inns & Suites By Carlson in the U.S. and Canada. Simply present your Aeroplan card at check in. Full details and online booking or book direct at Radisson or Country Inns & Suites  Until Dec 31, 17

Find many more Aeroplan bonus offers here

Miles & More Award Ticket Sale - Economy class & Business Class award tickets on sale from Toronto & Vancouver

As we do each month we bring you the latest set Miles & More "Meilenschnaeppchen" discounted mileage awards!  This month we see the return of the business class options in addition to some economy class deals! The offers are for Austrian Airlines' Economy Class out of Toronto or Lufthansa's Business Class from Vancouver.

These are good for travel on Austrian until Jan 31 while Lufthansa is between Apr 1 and May 15 and must be booked by Jan 1.

You can redeem Miles & More miles for round trip economy class tickets on Austrian from  Toronto to Austria for only 30,000 miles. This is a 50% discount off the normal Economy Class award ticket price of 60,000 miles.  

All of the economy class offers:

For business class between Vancouver and Europe, the discount is a bit below 50% as you need to redeem 55,000 miles for round trip flights that normally cost 105,000 miles.

Some of the business class options:

As we mention every time they have the 50% off economy offer is that you could in theory get close to amount required to redeem for the  tickets with grabbing a single credit card that has a $120 annual fee! How so? As we usually mention in this post you can boost your Miles & More account with the Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express. Currently the card comes with a 20,000 Starpoints sign up bonus and when you convert those 20,000 Starpoints to Miles & More SPG will award you an additional 5,000 miles. Which gives you 25,000 miles. Of course if you spend $5,000 on the card that will boost you to the 30,000 miles required. That's enough miles to redeem for one of the economy class tickets in this offer. Of course timing of getting the card now, spending and getting the points will likely not happen for this month but the 50% off economy class tickets at 30,000 miles is offered frequently throughout the year so you can grab the card now and use the points for the next time the offer comes up. Need to grab two tickets? You could choose to get one SPG card for yourself and you for your partner or spouse. If that's not your situation and want two tickets for yourself you could also grab The Starwood Preferred Guest Business Credit Card from American Express as it also has 20,000 point sign up bonus and then you would ultimately be able to have 50,000 Miles & More miles not including spending.

Simply book the offers seen here by January 1, 2018

Full details on this offer can be found here

December 6 Update: Best Western promo update, 50% off British Airways award tickets out of Canada, double Club Premier points between Calgary & Mexico City

As a follow up to our post on Best Western's new systemwide promotion that provides a $10 Gift Card for each stay where we mentioned that we were unsure of the value of the card for currencies outside of the U.S.. We reached out to BW and they told us it would be the equivalent of US$10, so for Canadian BW Rewards members you will get a gift card of roughly C$13 for each stay.

British Airways launched a 50% discount offer for redeeming for select award flights to/from London Heathrow or Gatwick and their Canadian destinations are included. The 50% even works on their off-peak award rates that are see cities like Toronto and Montreal which are normally 26,000 Avios off-peak drop to 13,000 Avios round trip.

 While it may seem like a steal in most cases it isn't. We looked at some options and while it is only 13,000 Avios Round Trip between YYZ and LHR you also have to pay just over $600 in taxes and fees. To buy the same tickets out right ranged from $680 to $780 so the points are only saving you ~$50 to $150. Not a great value. Where it might come handy however is for one way flights - these are notoriously more expensive to buy with just cash and utilizing Avios plus some cash for taxes and fees can save you some money. Of course we just had the 25% transfer bonus from Amex to BA earlier this fall and right now you can transfer RBC Rewards Points to BA with a 30% bonus so these can definitely help bring out more value during this 50% off sale.

Here are the one way amounts for off-peak flights out of Toronto, Montreal, Calgary and Vancouver

Toronto-London

Calgary-London

Montreal-London

Vancouver-London

Look at this way, a one-way flight in Economy from Toronto to London is only 6,500 Avios. That equates to as little as $2,600 ($3,250 without the transfer bonus) in spending on a card like the American Express Gold Rewards card or $5,000 ($6,500 without the transfer bonus) on the RBC Visa Infinite Avion card. It is almost unheard of to get a one way flight to the U.K. for that little amount of spending or points!


We're going to keep this reminder going in each update until Christmas:
Check out the Give A Mile Flight Hero campaign! The charity can really use donations of miles to help provide flights to those who otherwise would be unable to travel to visit terminally ill or critically sick family and friends. Rewards Canada has pledged to raise 100,000 miles and we are half way there! We are putting the call out to all of our fans, readers and even new visitors, if you can give please do so. It can be as little as 1,000 miles! You can find out more and donate here.




Posts since our last update:

• Delta and WestJet agree to form joint venture - to include reciprocal elite member benefits!
  WestJet and Delta have announced a plan to further enhance their partnership by forming a joint venture for trans-border…
• Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for December
  Here are the Rewards Canada Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for the month of December! This is not…

Travel Deals

Remember to visit Rewards Canada's Travel Booking site to book travel directly with many of your favourite airlines, hotels and more!

Canadian Bonus Offers
AeroMexico Club Premier
- Double Club Premier Points when you fly between Mexico City and Calgary More... Until Jan 31, 18

American AAdvantage
- 20% Bonus AAdvantage Miles when you convert Diners Club Club Rewards points to American AAdvantage More... Canadian Residents only Until Dec 31, 17

British Airways Executive Club
- 50% Avios Discount when you redeem for select award flights from Canada to London Heathrow or London Gatwick. More... Book by Dec 17 for travel Jan 4 - Jun 30, 18


Other Bonus Offers
Aegean Miles&Bonus
- 30% Miles&Bonus Discount on select award tickets within Greece and between Greece and Europe, the Middle East or Africa. More... Until Feb 28, 18

AeroMexico Club Premier
- Double Club Premier Points when you fly between Mexico City and Nuevo Laredo, San Luis Potosi, Reynosa, Calgary, Portland, Seattle, Seoul, Shanghai or Tokyo; Monterrey and Chihuahua, Puebla, Queretaro or San Luis Potosi; Atlanta and Queretaro, Guadalajara, Merida or Monterrey More... Until Jan 31, 18
- Double Club Premier Points for stays at Best Western hotels in Mexico. More... Until Dec 31, 17
- Triple Club Premier Points for stays at participating NH hotels in Mexico. More... Until Dec 31, 17

American AAdvantage
- Earn up to 120,000 Bonus AAdvantage Miles when you buy or gift 10,000 or more miles. More... Until Jan 4, 17

Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
- Triple KrisFlyer Miles for stays at Accor Hotels Worldwide. More... Book by Jan 31 for stays until Feb 15, 18

Follow Rewards Canada:

Delta and WestJet agree to form joint venture - to include reciprocal elite member benefits!

WestJet and Delta have announced a plan to further enhance their partnership by forming a joint venture for trans-border flights. This is similar to what Air Canada has had in place with United for many years. The key aspects of the joint venture (subject to approval) will be as follows:

• Coordinated flight schedules for new nonstop flights to new destinations, expanded codesharing and seamless and convenient connections on the airlines' extensive networks in the U.S. and Canada.
• Enhanced frequent flyer benefits including reciprocal benefits for top tier members of both airlines.

The latter one is awesome news! This is yet another step in the growth of WestJet Rewards and its evolution into a full fledged frequent flyer program. Right now WestJet Elite members have no benefits outside of WestJet but it appears that Gold (and perhaps Silver) members will soon get some benefits when flying on Delta! Seeing that reciprocal benefits for elite members is not subject to government approval we should see this happen regardless of whether the joint venture is approved or not.

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Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for December

Here are the Rewards Canada Top 5 Credit Card Sign Up offers for the month of December! This is not a 'best' credit card list like our Top Travel Rewards Credit Card rankings but instead a look at cards that have very good acquisition (sign up) offers. As always when choosing a card you should always take other factors into account other than the sign up bonus, but when most or all of these cards are first year free, they can and do pay off even when you grab them strictly for sign up rewards. In fact all of the cards on this list for September are first year free so you can try them out at no cost and decide later on if the card is right for you. All the while earning the sign up bonus which can be used to subsidize your travels!

Same list of cards we saw in October and November. You may ask with the upcoming devaluation of the two BMO cards why are they still on the list? For the BMO Rewards World Elite, you're getting $200 in travel and the Priority Pass benefits for no cost, when January 15th rolls around that 20,000 points should be boosted to 28,000 in your account as BMO says your points will retain their value so no matter you get the $200 value. After you use it up and use up your Priority Pass then you can reconsider keeping the card. Same with the AIR MILES card - the devaluation is the 25% discount for flights in North America dropping to 15% as of January 15th but no matter what 3,000 miles for $0 is an awesome deal.

 

Here are our top 5 credit card sign up offers for November (in alphabetical order)

BMO AIR MILES World Elite Mastercard - 3,000 Miles  (Apply here)
The best ever sign up bonus for an AIR MILES co-branded card makes it into our Top 5 sign up list thanks to its 3,000 miles sign up bonus (worth ~$300 or more) and no annual fee in the first year! Even if you aren't a fan of AIR MILES the fact you can get 3,000 miles and them use them as cash rewards for no cost to you should be enough to go out and get this card.

BMO Rewards World Elite Mastercard- 20,000 Points  (Apply here)

It's been awhile since this card has graced the top 5 credit card sign up offers! 20,000 points is your sign up bonus that is worth $200 in travel and since the card is first year free right now (they bill you $150 and then rebate after several months) that means your $200 in travel is free and yes you even get the Priority Pass access and 4 lounge passes included in that first year free. 

CIBC Aventura Visa Infinite (Apply Here)
Back into the list the CIBC Aventura Visa Infinite card offers a 15,000 Aventura Points sign up bonus worth anywhere from $150 to $300 depending on what type of flight you redeem for and since the annual fee of $120 (and supplementary cards are waived as well) those 15,000 points come at no cost to you.

Scotiabank Gold American Express Card - 25,000 Points  (Apply here)

A very strong card in the earn category for Gas, Grocery and Dining/Entertainment purchases, the current sign up bonus for the Scotiabank Gold American Express Card is 25,000 points when you reach $1,000 in spending in the first three months. That 25,000 points is equal to a $250 travel credit and since this card is a book anywhere card you can book the travel how you want when you want and when the charge shows up on your account you can redeem the points against the charge. The card normally has a $99 annual fee but of course that is waived in the first year during this promotion.

TD First Class Visa Infinite Card - 50,000 Points (Apply here)
Its been awhile since this card has had a good sign up offer and now it has what we can recall as one of its highest bonuses of 50,000 points but that's not all it also has the first year fee waived! You get the standard sign up bonus of 20,000 upon approval and another 30,000 when you spend $1,000 in the first 90 days of having the card. Those 50,000 points translate to $200 worth of travel credits for any travel booking or $250 worth of travel for bookings made via Expedia For TD

If you went for all these cards you ultimately could end up with $1,300 or so in travel credits but even if you only take on one or two you are helping your travel budget significantly at no cost other than regular credit card spend