Barclaycard Arrival World Mastercard

*If you choose to apply for this card and are approved, I do receive a commission for this card. Should you do so, please know that I greatly appreciate it!*

Here is a card that I have not previously written about because the previous bonus was one that I personally would not have applied for. They have recently doubled the bonus, however, so now this card is definitely on my list – it is the Barclaycard Arrival World Mastercard.

Barclaycard Arrival World Mastercard

This is not a typical points or miles card that we are accustomed to. This card earns miles, but not miles that can be redeemed for award travel like an airline branded card. Airline mile cards are very helpful because (with the majority of them) if you have 25,000 miles with an airline, you can get to any city in America (theoretically!) from a US city. This is very helpful for tickets that may cost over $400. In addition, you can also redeem an average of 60,000 miles for tickets from the US to Europe. These tickets often cost over $1,000, so you are getting a deal for 60,000 miles!

Bonus Miles

With the Barclaycard Arrival card, you earn 40,000 bonus miles after you meet the spending threshold. These miles are worth $400 towards any travel. This is very helpful for people that want to travel to someplace that costs less than $250 for airfare (since an award ticket would cost 25,000 miles) so a $110 from Rochester – NYC would cost 11,000 “miles” per ticket. Thanks to the 10% Travel Redemption Bonus, you will receive 10% of your miles back from your redemptions. So, if you redeem all 40,000 miles for a trip, you will shortly receive 4,000 miles back.

2.2% Miles for Every Purchase

In addition the great bonus and redemption bonus (worth $440), this card also earns 2 miles on every dollar you spend.That means you are receiving a 2.2% return for all of your spending. For people that are traveling mainly domestically, or want flexibility to choose different airlines and hotels for different destinations, or for people wanting to earn elite miles flying (because tickets purchased using this bonus earn elite miles since it is like cash purchases).

Card Comparison

White it is true there are other cards that have category bonuses that work out better than this card, this card makes a strong statement for being a good second card in the wallet. If you were to spend $30,000 on this card in a year, you would earn 60,000 miles redeemable for $600 in travel purchases plus the redemption bonus of 6,000 miles that are refunded after your redemption. If you put $30,000 on your Chase Sapphire Preferred card for everyday 1 point per dollar purchases, you would earn 32,100 points (because of the 7% bonus on points earned). If transfered to United, this would get you a one-way ticket to Europe from the US. This would make the cards about equal in value with a possible edge to the Barclaycard Arrival (depending on the departure and destination cities).

So, let’s look at the details of this card:

• Earn 40,000 bonus miles when you spend $3,000 or more on purchases in the first 90 days from account opening. 40,000 bonus miles equates to $400 off your next travel redemption!
• 0% intro APR on purchases and balance transfers for the first 12 months after account opening. After that, variable APR, currently 14.99% or 18.99%, based upon your creditworthiness
• Earn 2X miles on all purchases
• No mileage caps or foreign transaction fees
• Get 10% miles back when you redeem for travel statement credits (i.e. redeem 25,000 miles for travel and get 2,500 miles back)
• Use your card to book through any airline, hotel or discount travel engine with no blackout dates or seat restrictions
• Easily redeem your miles for statement credits towards all or a portion of your travel purchases within the last 90 days
• Complimentary online FICO® Score access for Arrival cardmembers

To sum up, this a great deal. Again, the 20,000 offer had been around for a little while, but now that there is a limited-time offer of 40,000 this card is a lot higher on my value list. My wife and I will both be adding this card to our little card collection and hope you consider doing so as well!