October 28 Update: New increased welcome bonus offers for CIBC cards, Qatar Airways Montreal seat sale & Flair Airlines adds Manitoba to Saskatchewan routes

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 World Elite Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 100,000 bonus points worth $500, has no foreign transaction fees and no annual fee in the first year! 

CIBC revealed new offers on their Aventura and Dividend Cards today! We have them all listed on our CIBC page and will have further coverage coming shortly. Here's a quick run down of the new offers:

CIBC Aventura® Visa Infinite* Card & CIBC Aventura® Gold Visa* Card: Get a total of up to 40,000 Aventura Points (up to $850 in travel value†) including a first year annual fee rebate!†

CIBC Dividend® Visa Infinite* Card & CIBC Dividend Platinum® Visa* Card Get a first-year annual fee rebate for you and up to three Authorized Users† and 10% cash back for the first 4 statements on net purchases of up to $2500.†

CIBC Aventura® Visa* Card & CIBC Aventura® Visa* Card for Students Get up to 12,000 Aventura points when you make your first purchase (up to $120 in travel value†)

CIBC Dividend® Visa* Card: Get 5% cash back for the first 4 statements on net purchases of up to $2,000 (up to $100 cash back).†

CIBC Dividend® Visa* Card for Students: Welcome Offer: Get $60 cash back after you make your first purchase within the first 4 months!†

Last few days to get the first year free & 3,500 points with the Signature RBC Rewards Visa

 

RBC's entry level rewards card, the Signature RBC Rewards Visa currently offers a first year annual fee waiver as part of its welcome bonus. That will change as of November 2nd as the bank will start charging the $39 annual fee in the first year on new applications. CORRECTION: The 3,500 welcome bonus points will also not be carried over as we initially reported. So if you have been considering this card you'll definitely want to apply for it by November 1. Click here to learn more.

October 27 Update: Radisson Rewards extending elite status to 2023 and your weekly PC Optimum & Be Well shopping bonuses!

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 World Elite Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 100,000 bonus points worth $500, has no foreign transaction fees and no annual fee in the first year! 

Radisson Rewards is the latest hotel program to provide a further extension on Elite benefits. They announced that all Radisson Rewards Americas Silver, Gold and Platinum members whose status is set to expire in February 2022 will have it extended to February 2023. They will also rollover all 2021 elite nights that you have earned to 2022 thereby making it easier to achieve status for 2023. They have not however extended the expiration on points - those are still set to start expiring on December 31, 2021. I actually just received an email from them about a week ago telling me my points will expire at that time. I'm going to have to look at either buying a small amount of points current or convert a small amount to one of my airline programs to keep them going. Learn more here

A closer look at the credit card that Canada voted as the number one No Foreign Transaction Fee card

 
The results of Canada's Choice 2021 were revealed earlier this month covering 10 categories of credit cards and loyalty with some surprising and not so surprising results. The third of which we look is the card that took the top spot in the No Foreign Transaction Fee Credit Card category and that's the
HSBC World Elite® Mastercard®

Receive up to a 15% bonus when you convert HSBC Rewards (Canada) points to Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer

 
Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer has brought back their bonus for transferring bank rewards points (ie credit card) to their program. For us here in Canada this means HSBC Rewards and the bonus ranges from 12% to 15% depending on how many points you transfer to KrisFlyer. So this is a little different than when they ran it at the end of last year/beginning of this year as that time it was a flat 15% instead of a tiered bonus. The transfer window is also smaller this time as you only have until November 22 to make a transfer, though SQ did extend it last year so it is possible it will be extended this time as well.

October 26 Update: Air Transat adding more U.S. and Europe flights for summer 2022 and a new RBC Offer for Boston Pizza purchases

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 World Elite Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 100,000 bonus points worth $500, has no foreign transaction fees and no annual fee in the first year! 

 
Air Transat has announced some new U.S. and European routes for Summer 2022. For U.S. flights the airline will offer twice weekly service between Montreal and San Francisco, three times weekly service between Toronto and Los Angeles and they will make Montreal to Miami and Quebec City to Ft. Lauderdale flights year round instead of just over the winter. For Europe the airline is adding Montreal to Amsterdam and Quebec City to London flights. Both of the Europe flights will operate once per week. (Source Air Transat)

American AAdvantage simplifies and changes how elite status is earned

 
Big changes from American Airlines today in regards to their AAdvantage frequent flyer program. The changes revolve around earning elite status and AA has gone away from the model most airlines have adopted over the past decade or so. Gone are elite qualifying miles, elite qualifying segments and elite qualifying dollars, to be replaced by Loyalty Points. One simple elite qualifier, Loyalty Points are earned on a one to one basis for most AAdvantage miles earned by a member through flying, credit card spend and earning with partners.

Up to a 100% bonus when you buy Air France KLM Flying Blue Miles and how there can be value in buying them

Flying Blue's buy miles bonus has returned not too long after we last saw it. The offer provides up to a 100% bonus when you buy Flying Blue miles and this time that 100% level starts at 20,000 miles instead of 30,000 miles. If you are short some miles for a redemption or want to speculatively buy for if and when we see a 50% off business class promo reward you'll want to check out this offer.

Big changes coming to the Marriott Bonvoy program including dynamic pricing (award charts to be done away with)

 

We all woke up to big news this fine Tuesday morning and that news affects a lot of Canadians including ourselves. Some of it is good but the major part of it isn't so good. The news comes to us from Marriott International and their Bonvoy frequent guest program. This is Canada's favourite (as voted on by you) and most popular hotel loyalty program that we have all loved to use and also get mad at for past changes - just like we have done with so many other programs like Aeroplan and AIR MILES. Today's news will definitely continue that love hate relationship.

AIR MILES Shops Halloween special: 7x miles sitewide for your online shopping

 

Time for another bonus for your online shopping! AIR MILES shops is back with a Halloween special 7x site wide bonus offer. This offer is good for purchases made by October 31, 21