February 17 Update: Double Points for stays at the Yorkville Royal Sonesta Hotel Toronto, new Centurion Lounge to open at Washington's DCA airport & this week's PC Optimum offer is 50,000 points

Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your daily dose (or near daily dose) of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more. This update is brought to you by the HSBC +Rewards Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 30,000 bonus points, no annual fee in the first year and a low 11.9% interest rate! 

 
Late last year the InterContinental Hotel Yorkville Toronto converted over to Sonesta Hotels and was rebranded the Yorkville Royal Sonesta Hotel Toronto. The celebrate they had a bonus points offer that ran until the end of January and now once again the hotel chain's loyalty program called Travel Pass is offering bonus points for stays at this location. The offer this time is for Double Travel Pass Points on all stays. The end date of the promotion has not been published but in my experience of covering Sonesta's promotions for years on end the offer should be available for quite some time. Learn more here.

Earn double Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles for stays at Coast Hotels in March & April

 
Here is a nice little offer if you are looking at getting away from home for a little staycation in Western Canada and at the same time want to boost your Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan balance. For the months of March and April you will be able to earn double Mileage Plan Miles for stays at any Coast Hotel in Canada or the U.S.. In Canada they have locations in B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and the Yukon with many being in ski towns like Canmore, Sun Peaks Resort and Revelstoke, so it is a prime offer for some spring skiing! 

Three days only - Earn 10x AIR MILES Reward Miles for online purchases with Apple

 

For three days only you can earn 10x AIR MILES Reward Miles when you shop online with Apple via AIR MILES Shops. The offer runs from today to February 18 and with the standard earn rate being 1 mile for every $20 spent you'll end up earning 10 miles for every $20. 

Summary of global hotel systemwide bonus points promotions – February Edition

Here is your monthly update of all the global hotel bonus points promotions that are available. One of the easiest ways to rack up lots of hotel points is to take advantage of these systemwide bonuses that come from many of the big chain programs and also from the lesser known programs. In fact, right now it should be rare for you NOT to earn a bonus. Unless you are staying at a boutique hotel or perhaps an independent hotel most other hotels out there have a bonus. So take advantage of it! These systemwide bonuses simply require you to register beforehand and they do not affect hotel pricing as long as you book a point eligible rate which are most rates out there. Of course booking through a third party site like Expedia or Rocketmiles does not count as most chains only award points on bookings that are made directly with them.  Here are all the current promotions that are available to everyone this month:

Best Western is offering a $25 Gift Card for every night you stay + double points if you stay 5 or more nights

 

Best Western Rewards' Spring promotion kicked off yesterday and it's a two parter this time. After you register for this offer you will receive a $25 Best Western Gift Card for each night you stay up to four nights. That's right, you are getting $25 back not per stay but per night. The nights do not have to be consecutive either, they can be spread out across multiple stays. 

February 12 Update: Canada's new entry requirements to start on February 22 and the Government of Canada approves Air Canada's takeover of Air Transat

Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your daily dose (or near daily dose) of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more. This update is brought to you by the HSBC +Rewards Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 30,000 bonus points, no annual fee in the first year and a low 11.9% interest rate! 

Canada's new travel restrictions that require a mandatory hotel stay and quarantine upon returning to Canada will take effect February 22. This is the requirement where you may have to spend $2,000 to stay at specified hotel and to get your COVID-19 tests done. (Source Global News)

Neo Financial expands credit card reward options and goes nationwide

 
Back in October we provided you with details about Neo Financial and their rewards credit card offering. At that time they were only a few months past their beta stage and now less than half a year later they changing things up. When Neo first launched they wanted to be a different type of credit card and reward program but the approach they were taking at the time limited their market to select cities namely Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg with more cities coming down the line. That's very limiting when you want to grow your company and clientele base, so what does Neo do? They go down the traditional line of offerings that we see from most other card issuers by expanding their credit card portfolio to have cards that have a traditional cash back rewards component. And now that they have that all encompassing cash back reward option they have opened up applications to all Canadians including Quebec.

Top 5 Small Business Credit Card Sign Up offers for February - These cards provide the best value out of their welcome bonuses

 

Here are the Rewards Canada Top 5 Small Business Credit Card Sign Up offers for this month! This is not a 'best' credit card list like our Top Travel Rewards Credit Card rankings but instead a look at cards for small businesses that have very good acquisition (welcome/sign up) offers. As always when choosing a card you should always take other factors into account other than the just sign up bonus, but when some of these cards are first year free, they can and do pay off even when you grab them strictly for the sign up rewards. This month we see four first year free cards on the list! And remember this list is based on minimum value towards travel which we calculate as the minimum value of the welcome bonus less the annual fee. It is entirely possible to receive more value out of the welcome bonuses on some the cards below namely those like Aeroplan and Marriott. 

February 11 Update: Earn 8x miles sitewide on AIR MILES Shops, Flair Airlines announces major route expansion and more

 Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your daily dose (or near daily dose) of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more. This update is brought to you by the HSBC +Rewards Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 30,000 bonus points, no annual fee in the first year and a low 11.9% interest rate!
 

To celebrate the Lunar New Years AIR MILES Shops are offering 8x miles sitewide on all purchases made via any of their online retailers. This offer is available until February 15 and don't forget to also earn points/miles/etc. in the retailer's loyalty program if they have one! Find out more here.

Clash of the Credit Cards! HSBC World Elite Mastercard vs. Scotiabank Passport Visa Infinite Card

 

Welcome to another Rewards Canada Clash!

If you listened to our podcast from June 2020 entitled Clash of the Credit Cards - you'll know that we've changed our Showdown features to Clashes. The reason why is that lots of sites and blogs are using Showdown now, some are using battle so we wanted to continue to be unique so our comparisons are now Clashes! 

This time we have another Clash of the Credit Cards that pits two of the best No Foreign Transaction fee cards in Canada against each other! Those cards are the HSBC World Elite® Mastercard®  and the Scotiabank Passport™ Visa Infinite* Card 

Continue on to the main Rewards Canada site to read the Clash in its entirety!