My Alaska Visa annual fee hit this past billing cycle – my first under their new, higher annual fee – so I thought it’d be a good idea to revisit the card and its parks with an Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review. After all, the last time I did anything remotely similar was in 2022.
For longtime readers, my love of Alaska Air’s co-brand credit card is no secret. In an increasingly dower points and miles landscape, this card remains one of the best values around. Mostly. The card went through some significant changes last year, and depending on when you got it and/or how you use it, your value proposition may differ greatly. So, let’s dig into the card’s current value proposition with an Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review post.
Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 Review Basics
To kick off my Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review, let’s go over the basics of this credit card. Issued by Bank of America, the Alaska Air Visa Signature carries a $95 annual fee. That’s $20 more than the fee used to be before it increased last March. Anyway, with that $95 annual fee, cardholders enjoy:
- 3x miles for every $1 spent with Alaska Airlines.
- 2x miles for every $1 spent with the following merchant categories:
- Gas – including service stations, automated fuel dispensers, marinas, marine service, marine supplies, and fuel dealers (fuel oil, wood, coal, LNG)
- Local transit – includes rideshare, taxicabs, limousines, passenger railways, bus lines, tolls/bridge fees, and local and suburban commuter passenger transportation, including ferries.
- Cable – including satellite service providers and other pay television/radio/streaming services
- Select Streaming Services – includes digital goods media such as books, movies, digital artwork, and music.
- 1x miles for every $1 spent on the card not covered with the above bonuses.
- Free checked bag for the primary cardholder and up to 6 travel companions on the same itinerary when you use your card to pay for your airfare.
- Priority boarding for you and up to six others on the same reservation will receive priority boarding on flights marketed by Alaska Airlines and operated by Alaska Airlines, Horizon Air, or SkyWest when you use your card to pay for your flight. You’ll board before general boarding but after Alaska Mileage Plan elite and Oneworld elite members, First Class or Premium Class passengers, and other pre-boarding groups, which means you’ll be in Group C.
- In-flight statement credit: receive 20% back for all in-flight purchases, including meals (even pre-ordered), media players, etc.
- $100 Alaska Lounge+ Discount when you use your card to purchase/renew your membership.
- 10% mileage bonus on all miles earned if you have a qualified Bank of America account (not available to Hawaii residents)
- No foreign transaction fee
As you’ll recall, of the above benefits, the ones appearing for the first time in my Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review are the bonus on fuel, the priority boarding, the lounge membership discount, and the 10% bonus. Most of these were added in March 2023. However, last year also added the requirement to use your Alaska Air Visa Signature when booking your flight to receive the complimentary bag benefit.
Annual Companion Certificate
The best feature of this card is the one I haven’t mentioned thus far in my Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review, and with good reason—the famous companion certificate underwent massive changes last year, though said changes didn’t apply to everyone. But before I review that, let’s discuss what hasn’t changed.
As it always has, the Alaska Air companion certificate allows you to book a companion’s ticket for $99 plus applicable taxes and fees. Those taxes and fees start at $23, depending on your itinerary, as Alaska does pass on airport-imposed fees (at least, that’s my understanding), so your companion fare will really start at $122 for a roundtrip ticket. Still, back in 2016, I paid less than $200 for Mrs. Island Miler’s ticket from HNL to JFK and back, whereas my ticket was somewhere between $600 and $800 – I can’t remember. That’s a significant savings!
Of course, the certificate only covers Main Cabin fares. You can both pay to upgrade to Premium Class, but you’ll have to pay the usual upgrade fee for both of you. Further, the certificate must be used within 12 months of being issued.
Now, what changed last year is who gets the certificate. If you were already a cardholder or applied for the card before January 18, 2023, you’ll continue to receive the companion certificate annually without having to meet any criteria. However, if you applied for the card on or after January 18, 2023, you now need to spend $6,000 or more per year to qualify for the certificate. Moreover, the spending requirement is based on your card opening/anniversary date – not on a calendar year. That’s a very material change to the card, which can drastically change its value proposition for newer cardholders. However, at least for this year, some of the sting is subdued.
Earn Elite Qualify Miles for Card Spend
One benefit that may appear only in my Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review and not in subsequent ones is the ability to earn Elite Qualifying Miles (EQMs) when using your Alaska Air Visa to make purchases. Why? Because Bank of America and Alaska Air are advertising this benefit as a 2024 exclusive. Whether it will remain that way is anyone’s best guess.
Anyway, under the current promotion, all cardholders will earn 4,000 EQMs for every $10,000 in purchases they make on their card between January 1 and December 31, 2024. A maximum accrual of 20,000 miles applies for the offer period, which is the number of miles needed to achieve MVP status. However, to spend your way to MVP status would require you to spend $50,000 in a single year on your Alaska card, which isn’t something I’d recommend doing.
As a reminder, MVP Gold requires 40,000 EQMs, while Gold 75k and Gold 100k require 75,000 EQMs and 100,000 EQMs, respectively.
My Value Proposition
As I like to try to do for all cards I carry with an annual fee, I attempt to justify the card’s value proposition. But I’m going to be honest with you all – I really only use this card to pay for Alaska flights, which I haven’t done since 2022, and to make gas station purchases. So, the value of the miles I earn with the card annually is, honestly, negligible. Since I haven’t flown with Alaska since 2022, I can’t count the in-flight benefits I receive, either.
As such, I should theoretically be stating in my Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review that the card isn’t worth keeping and that I’ll be canceling it. However, that’s not what I’m doing.
I’ve had my Alaska Air Visa Signature since 2016. That means I’m grandfathered into the old companion certificate program and, thus, don’t have an annual spending requirement. As such, I’ve decided that I will be keeping this card as long as this benefit remains the same. Sure, I haven’t used the certificate last year and won’t this year, but my inability to travel is (I hope, anyway) temporary. And when I do take to the skies again, I’ll make good use of these certificates.
Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 Review, Final Thoughts
There you have it – my Alaska Air Visa Signature 2024 review. Despite my poor value proposition, this is one of the cards I’m willing to ignore that with and continue to keep in my wallet. Can this change in the future? Sure. After all, it’ll be interesting to see how Alaska Air handles its co-brand cards when it closes on its acquisition of Hawaiian Air and merges the loyalty programs. However, that’s a discussion for another day. For now, if you travel once a year (or, maybe even just once every other year), the Alaska Air Visa Signature is worth having in your wallet, especially if you’ve had it since before 2023.