August 26 Update: Aeroplan extends generous refund & rebooking policy, save 15% on AeroMexico award tickets out of Canada & a reminder to complete your Best Western stay surveys

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.

 
Air Canada Aeroplan has once again updated their refund and re-booking policy by extending it to September 30:

Aeroplan flight rewards booked through September 30, 2021, can be changed or cancelled free of charge, at any time.  Members can cancel free of charge and receive all of their points back in their account, plus a full refund of any associated taxes, fees and charges on the unused value of travel. For changes, members will pay only the difference in points, or receive a partial refund if their new itinerary requires fewer points. In addition, a difference in taxes, fees and charges may apply when changing an itinerary.

Want to leverage your airline or hotel elite status into other programs? Check out this new service!

Did you know that once you have earned elite status with an airline or hotel you can typically leverage it to obtain status with other airlines and hotels? This topic of elite status matching is one we cover with some regular frequency here on Rewards Canada - whether its reporting on new status match offers or showing you how some of them work. Some elite status matches are easier than others, in particular hotel program matches, these are usually easier to come by than airline matches with the easiest being Best Western's famous Status Match No Catch offer. It is the airline side that can prove to be more difficult and that's where statusmatch.com comes in. This new company co-founded by a former frequent flyer program head, a frequent flyer program director and the creator and operator of frequent flyer program will represent you and your status to other airlines in your quest to obtain additional elite membership.

Air Canada Buddy Pass to Aeroplan points conversion will end on November 30 plus they will extend annual worldwide companion passes

 

 Air Canada reached out to us this morning to let us know they have now put in place an end date for being able to convert Buddy Passes earned from there co-brand cards to Aeroplan points. Instituted earlier, this conversion was an unpublished benefit that Air Canada put in place due to the uncertainty in travel. The benefit allowed members who felt they could not utilize their buddy pass to call up Aeroplan and ask to have it converted to 30,000 Aeroplan points. With Aeroplan members starting to travel more and the previously announced extension of Buddy Pass expiry to the end of 2022 Air Canada felt it is right time to bring the conversion option to a close.

Here are the latest RBC Offers including a 10% statement credit for Microsoft purchases, 50% off two DoorDash orders & more!

 

RBC is really giving it a go with their RBC Offers program as they have a whole bunch of new offers added and some extended since we last provided an update at the start of this month!

Be sure to login to your RBC account right away to load these offers (if required) or get the promo codes if required. Personally I received these offers on the WestJet RBC World Elite Mastercard but I know most if not all should also available for RBC's most popular card the RBC Avion Visa Infinite Card and most other RBC cards.

Mogo card to replace its 2% Bitcoin cashback with a good for the planet tree planting reward

Today Mogo announced a major change and shift in the rewards being offered on their MogoCard. Currently the card earns 2% Bitcoin cashback as the reward for your everyday spending but that will come to a close on October 1st. From August 25th onward, on Mogo will instead plant one tree for every transaction made on the card. 

August 25 Update: Awesome gas gift card redemption offer from CIBC, 5,000 bonus Be Well points for linking your RBC card & earn up to $350 with a new Scotiabank account

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.

 
Right now CIBC Aventura cardholders are able to redeem their points for select gas gift cards at up to 50% off (ie only 7,000 points for a $100 gift card). This puts the per point redemption rate for these cards at 1.42 cents each. That's an awesome redemption rate for gift cards as it is higher then the 1 cent per point you would get for their any travel redemption and is very competitive with the average redemption rate when using the Aventure airline rewards chart. This offer is available until September 15. Learn more here.  (Thanks to Raffaele F. who sent this offer to us via our Facebook page!) 

CIBC AC Conversion Visa Review - Load up to 10 currencies and earn 1% cash back until April 30, 2022

 
Earlier in the year we brought quick details of the limited time cash back offer for CIBC's AC Conversion Visa and now wanted to delve deeper into what this card is and what it offers.  The CIBC AC Conversion Visa is a prepaid Visa credit card option offered by CIBC and Air Canada that has been around now for quite a few years and is somewhat unique in that you can load multiple currencies onto to card at once to use when traveling to various parts of the world.

FREE MILES! Receive 2,020 miles when you join Emirates Skywards

Delayed by a year, Expo 2020 in Dubai is slated to start on October 1 and one of the big sponsors is the hometown airline, Emirates. To celebrate the exposition, Emirates is starting to release numerous promotions and this one here is for new members to their Skywards program. Using the invitation code EXPO2020 anyone who joins the program will automatically receive 2,020 Skywards miles and the airline is offering these new members the opportunity to redeem right away with a special Cash+Miles rate of 2,000 mile = US$20 (but you don't have to redeem they right away if you don't want to.) The new member welcome bonus doesn't have a printed end date however the other promotion on the same landing page mentions bookings must be made by September 15 and seeing how this bonus is being tied into the special Cash+Miles rate I would speculate that's the last day to join and get the miles.

New Hilton Honors promo: Double points on all stays from Sep 7 to Dec 31

 

Hilton provided us with details of the next systemwide promotion for the Hilton Honors program. This new offer launches the day after the current promo ends so there is no gap at all where you won’t be able to earn extra points on your Hilton stays. This promotion is called Power Up and it rewards 2x points on all stays for those members who have registered for the promotion. If you hold an eligible Hilton Honors credit card* you will earn 3x points on all those stays instead of double and you’ll still earn all the points that your card awards for that spend. For most Canadians we'll be stuck with the 2x points since we don't have a Hilton Honors co-brand card here but if you are playing the U.S. credit card game and happen to have one of their Hilton co-brand Amex cards you'll earn the 3x points. You can register and book now for stays from September 7 to December 31, 21

Podcast Episode 82 - How the best credit card in Canada was made even better

In this episode we take a deep dive into the best credit card in Canada - that is best travel rewards credit card which also happens to be the best cash back card in Canada and how the most recent changes to it made it even better. It is none other than the American Express Cobalt Card and this podcast episode covers those changes but can also be considered an audio review of the card. We discuss earn rates, redemption options, how it provides huge value and even tackle the downsides of the card. Give it a listen right away to find out why we think this card should be in every Canadian's wallet.