Mandatory vaccination will no longer be required for domestic travel, 2x points + Free Night Award for private home stays & Neo boosts interest rate to 1.6%

Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your near daily dose of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more.

One more step was taken by the Federal Government yesterday to returning travel to normal. The feds announced an end to the vaccine requirement for domestic air and rail travel. As of June 20th travellers flying or riding the rails within Canada will no longer have to show proof of vaccination. The rule also holds true for passengers departing from Canada on international flights or rail journeys however there may be separate rules in place for the foreign airlines and/or the country you are travelling to so be sure to know those beforehand. All other requirements still remain in place such as masking on planes and trains and the return to Canada requirements such as vaccination and testing. Click here to learn more about this news

Limited time offer: Earn up to 3 Aeroplan Points per dollar spent on Air Canada Gift Cards

Air Canada has brought back a limited time offer where you can earn extra Aeroplan points for buying Air Canada gift cards. The offer is available until June 19th and will award 1 point/$ spent on gift cards up to $750 and 3 points/$ if you spend over $750. Do note these don't code as Air Canada purchases on your credit card as they are processed by Buyatab so you won't earn extra points on the Aeroplan suite of co-brand credit cards or any credit card that has a travel accelerator. 

The BMO AIR MILES Mastercards are due for another revamp

In light of the recent news of Sobeys et al. moving from AIR MILES to Scene+ and my updating of the Rewards Canada review of the BMO AIR MILES World Elite Mastercard it became very apparent to me that BMO is going to have to revamp their portfolio of AIR MILES co-brand credit cards. In this post we'll look at why I think these cards need to be updated and how the bank should update them.

New American Express Cobalt Card Confirmed Multipliers for Edmonton, Chicago, Minneapolis and more!

Our American Express Cobalt Card Confirmed Multiplier Locations feature received a nice big update today thanks to a couple of our rewards. The page saw a trio of Edmonton restaurants added thanks to CedricT and over 20 restaurants in Minneapolis, Chicago and Decorah were added thanks to Aaron B.! Aaron also confirmed that Lime Scooters in the U.S. code as 2x points as they do here in Canada.

Flash Sale: Save up to $200 on Aer Lingus flights from Toronto to Ireland, the UK and Europe (Book by June 17)

Aer Lingus has once again brought back their offer that provides an additional discount off of their flights. This time it is once again up to $100 on Economy Class flights but this time for Business Class they have doubled the amount to up to $200! The discount is available fares booked by June 17 for travel between Toronto and Ireland, the UK and Europe between July 1 - September 30, 2022.

Choice Hotels to acquire Radisson Hotels Americas

 

I can't even count now the number of time that ownership of Radisson Hotels or its subsidiaries has changed hands over the past few decades and it continues this week with Choice Hotels announcing the acquisition of Radisson Hotels Americas. The Americas portion of Radisson only emerged about a year ago after the parent company had to split their Radisson family of brands in two due to Chinese ownership and U.S. privacy rules. Thus they created Radisson Hotels Worldwide and Radisson Hotel Americas, the latter to appease to the U.S. government. It is the latter as well that is subject of this purchase.

Receive up to a 50% bonus when you buy Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles

 

Alaska Airlines has launched a new buy miles offer that runs until December 23rd. This time the bonus once again ranges from 30% to 50% depending on how many miles you buy. Ideally you want to buy so you get that 50% bonus which means you’d have to buy 30,000 or more miles. We see the 50% bonus quite frequently now but we also see 60% quite often now as well so unless you really need the miles right now you may want to wait to buy.

The best flight, hotel, and car rental bonus offers for June

 
Here are our Top Travel Bonus Mile/Point Offers for this month. This post covers the best travel related bonuses for Canadian travellers. Whether it is for flying, hotel stays or car rentals you'll find our top picks here to earn more miles more points and more rewards. Many of these offers go beyond this month so don’t count them out if you need to book and/or travel beyond this month. 

CIBC Dividend® Visa Infinite* Card - 10% cash back on all purchases up to $2,500 and a first year annual fee rebate

 
The highest welcome bonus for non-American Express Cash Back cards in our market has typically been 10% cash back on up to $2,000 of spending ($200 cash back). That changed when CIBC bumped up the spend limit for their offer to $2,500 over the first four statement periods. This means that 10% welcome bonus can earn you up to $250 cash back!

Best ever bonus for buying Air France KLM Flying Blue Miles - up to 120% extra miles!

Flying Blue's buy miles bonus has returned and it's bigger and better than ever! The offer provides up to a 120% bonus when you buy Flying Blue miles which is 20% higher than we have ever seen. 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 definitely want to check out this offer.