Cardless has launched two new Avianca cards:
- Cardless Avianca
- $99 annual fee
- 40,000 miles after $3,000 in spend.
- Silver status
- 10% discount on some cash bookings
- Earn 3x on Avianca purchases
- $0 foreign transaction fees
- Card earns on the following rates:
- 2x On all avianca airlines and lifemiles purchases
- 2x On groceries and restaurants
- 1x Everything else
- Cardless Avianca Elite
- $249 annual fee
- 60,000 points after $4,500 in spend within the first three months
- Earn 40,000 Miles After You Spend $25,000 On Eligible Purchases In The First 365 Days From Account Opening
- Silver status
- Card earns at the following rates (double miles, up to 1,000 miles per month):
- 3x On all avianca airlines and lifemiles purchases
- 2x On travel and restaurants
- 1x Everything els
- Complimentary lifemiles+ membership
- Get 10% miles back on Star Alliance flight redemptions
- Up to 25% redemption discount on avianca airlines flights
- Up to 40% more miles on lifemiles hotels and lifemiles cars
- Up to 10% discount on lifemiles cars
Our Verdict
If you joined the waitlist you’ll get an extra 5,000/10,000 miles on sign up. Cardless only lets you have one Cardless card currently, don’t think either offer is particularly attractive given the high annual fee on the $249 card and the smaller bonus on the $99 card. Might be a use case for some people if you can take advantage of the lifemiles+ subscription.
Possibly denials are due to following the link from DOC? Suggest trying going to lifemiles direct using a incognito window. Not certain…. just a guess.
received email offer:
up to 120,000 bonus miles: 80,000 after $4,500 purchase in first 90 days and an additional 40,000 after $25,000 in first 365 days. Valid for accounts opened from 11/1/24 to 1/21/25.
Interesting offer. I would probably pull the trigger on this targeted offer if I had space in 5/24.
The double miles up to 1000 miles per statement aren’t posting for me. Are they posting for anyone else?
Another added perk for both cards: 15% discount on multiplying earned mileage. When you go to multiply your mileage (2, 3, 6, 8x) there’s a footnote that says you’ll get a 15% discount if you used an Avianca co-branded card. This makes the cost per mile 6% less (when doing 6 or 8x) than buying them with the current 160% bonus promo that is going on until August 15. Of course you are limited to multiplying only earned miles, which limits your purchase amount.
Never had a Cardless card before. Score is 810. I’m right at 5/24. Just denied for an Avianca card – Reason:
we are unable to provide credit to you on this occasion for one or several of the below reasons:
Would have been nice since I’m relocating to Panama and will be flying there a few times in the near future, but both wife and I got denied for odd reasons and can’t seem to get in touch to find out if we can remedy it. Screw it…
800+ score, denied, but no number to call for “Excessive obligations in relation to income”, even if my mortgage payment is <20% of income, and total line of credit is also <20% of income… And there is no number to call
DENIED WTF?
My application was denied for “potential fraud” and there is no phone number to call them to clear up what they state their reason for denying my application was. No phone number or email to contact and I took a hit against my credit and I fly avianca routes very often (currently fly United instead of avianca). Any ideas on how to contact Cardless (Careless) to clear what they say is “potential fraud”?
Hey D, Are you redeeming LM for United flights? How good is availability on United and what routes are you redeeming LM for United flights?
Not yet, I fly United and also redeem United miles on avianca. Frequenting IAH, SAL, GUA, SJO, CUN. However, this card offer would allow you seat preferences due to the status provided by the card (possibly front seats) which I usually pay for using my ritz card and then having them reimbursed to me. I’ve also read of finding sweet deals using LM on United, Singapore and ewa. But now I’ll never know.
For Colombia, United is pretty weak, not that I’d fly United anyway. Being in the Northeast, it is just not prudent to fly west to Houston to fly south as it adds almost 2 hours of travel time. Now, a couple years ago I did see a hybrid United/Avianca option on LifeMiles through MIA, which got me excited. But never again have I seen this route, this route being Avianca to Miami, then United to the Northeast airports all in one booking (e.g. EWR, IAD). You can book it directly this route through United but the cost is exorbitant ($1850 at a minimum…compared to usual one-airline routes, including United, that are under $500 one way).
Frankly, the power of LifeMiles is for flying to Colombia. I literally get $0.018-$0.036 per mile on flights. With Club Lifemiles it worked out to be more! They say “up to 25% discount”. In reality almost all discounts are 10%.
Without-With Club lifemiles
Flight1: US to Colombia
Miles: 16380 – 14740 (10.012% savings)
Value: $0.0245 – $0.0272/mi
Flight 2: Colombia to US
Miles: 12780 – 11500 (10.015% savings)
Value: $0.0253 – $0.0282
Flight 3: DR to Colombia
Miles 10870 – 9780 (10.028% savings)
Value: $0.0330 – $0.0367
Hi TDD, Thanks for providing this information! This is helpful for flyers to and from the NE airports. Personally I do not fly from the NE. I have done many Lifemile searches and Lifemile availability from IAH and other airports in US to South America is getting more challenging. Thanks for contributing to Doctorofcredit !!!
The issue that no one really considers with miles is that you really aren’t getting the $/mi that people think they are getting. I showed you the amounts I got above, and in all my cases the value is exactly as stated since I’m flying during peak times and other airlines are similarly priced. For most cases though, assuming you don’t have allegiance to one airline and don’t mind paying for other brands, if Avianca was $400 out of pocket if you bought the flight outright and you got $0.025/mi on the value you paid deducting taxes (e.g. taxes were $100 and 12,000 miles covered the remaining $300 value), was it really $0.025/mi if the American Airlines with similar travel times was only $300 out of pocket? No. You’d have probably bought the $300 AA ticket and therefore 12,000 miles was really more like $0.016/mi ({$300-$100}/12000). I always check that before buying tickets with miles.
If you book with LifeMiles more than 2 months out you can get some crazy discounted miles prices. The Punta Cana flight was only 9800 or so miles on a flight priced $500 or something. Crazy.
What people aren’t considering with the Elite card is that you get 500 miles per month with the on top of the 10% Avianca discount and the 10% Star Alliance discount. The 10% discount on Avianca for one year at the lowest Club LifeMiles level is $12/mo for 6 months or $72. For one year that’s $144. So right there is $144 in value. Club Lifemiles gives you 600 mi/mo whereas LifeMiles+ gives you 500/mo. Still, 500/mo is 6000 mi in a year, that’s $60 value at a bare minimum (more like $90-$150). Sadly, I just signed up for Club LifeMiles on April 1. I’m with it until September 30 (6 months required). I guess I would get 500+600/month until club LifeMiles expires. But like I mentioned before, club LifeMiles doesn’t give you 10% discount on Star alliance, only Avianca, so LifeMiles+ is much more valuable.
Thanks for the info. For United, I usually fly out of IAH for trips to Central and South America. Partner availability with United using Lifemiles has become much more reduced in the last 1-2 years, so I probably will use my accumulated Lifemiles for Avianca within Central and South America unless redemption availability improves.
I am way over 1/24 so I guess I better pass.