Orbitz Rewards® Visa® Card might help you maximize your rewards if you are an Orbitz devotee and participant in the company's loyalty program. For everyone else, however, the rewards system on this card is likely to be excessively complicated, requiring excessive work, which will result in frustration.
As is the case with a select number of other co-branded travel credit cards, the difficulty arises from the uncomfortable combination of benefits earned through the credit card and awards accrued via an existing loyalty program. There are ten distinct reward rates associated with the card, and they vary depending on what you buy with it and, in certain cases, whether you make your purchases using the Orbitz app or directly through the Orbitz website using a web browser. And those prizes, even though they may be rather rich, come with some restrictions:
- One of the greatest rates for rewards is for hotel bookings, but the catch is that they must be paid for in advance.
- Rewards are only valid for a short period—just one year—unless you use the card to reset the clock.
- Orbitz only allows rewards to be redeemed for one specific travel expense category: hotel reservations.
The card does not have an annual fee, which is a plus. The rewards it offers for spending in non-bonus areas, known as the "everything else" category, are comparable to a respectable 2% cash back on purchases.
Basics and Benefits
- Type of Card: Travel.
- Cost per year: $0.
- Sign-up bonus: Spend $1,500 with your Orbitz Rewards® Visa® card during the first 90 days of creating your account, and you'll get a credit of $100 applied to your statement.
- Interest rate: The continuing APR ranges from 17.49% to 26.49% and is variable.
- Foreign transaction fees: None.
- Balance transfer fee: $10 or 5% of the balance transfer amount, whichever is higher; the fee may not exceed the greater amount.
The Mechanics Behind The Rewards Program
Your rewards rate comprises the Orbitz loyalty program and the Orbitz credit card. Regarding bonus categories, both components contribute to your overall reward. On top of what you would normally earn via the rewards program, the card awards you an additional five percentage points worth of Orbucks in each of the following four bonus categories:
- Prepaid hotel bookings.
- Flight bookings.
- Package bookings.
- Activities such as going on city tours and purchasing tickets to museums.
In addition, you'll get 2% back in Orbucks on "anything else" when you use this card. When you book travel via Orbitz with your Orbitz Points® Visa® Card, you will earn rewards depending on whether you book using Orbitz mobile app or web. This will add a layer of complexity to the process.
Reasons Why You Should Consider Applying For The Orbitz Rewards® Visa® Card
High rewards rates
Using this card to prepay hotel rooms using the Orbitz mobile app, you will get an incredible 9% rewards rate. This includes 5% in Orbucks from the card itself and another 4% from Orbitz's loyalty program. Because of this, the card might be useful to you if you make reservations in this manner regularly.
Even if you do not use the card for qualified Orbitz transactions, you will still get 2% back in Orbucks on all other purchases. This is especially notable, considering that most travel credit cards with bonus categories only provide the equivalent of 1% cash back on transactions made with the card that do not fall inside the bonus areas.
Just make sure you don't get too excited by remembering that you can only use Orbucks on Orbitz to pay for hotel reservations there. Credit cards provide a fixed cash-back rate, and some yield 2% cash-back, a much more valuable currency.
No foreign transaction or annual fee fees
Since no annual fee is associated with the Orbitz Rewards® Visa® Card, you may still come out ahead on rewards even if you don't use the card very often. Because it does not impose a fee for fees made in a foreign country, this card is convenient to carry with you while traveling outside the country.
Drawbacks
Complexity and restrictions
It takes work to reach the maximum level of rewards, consisting of 9% in Orbucks and 4% from loyalty program, and 5% from card. Not only do you have to make sure that you don't forget that math, but you also have to make sure that you book your hotel stay using the mobile app that Orbitz provides and that you prepay for your stay by using the Orbitz Rewards® Visa® Card.
