"Robert M. Gary" wrote:

A friend of mine just sent me an email that he got a notice from MBNA
that the AOPA 5% rebate would be discountinued after this year and
instead he would get "2 points" for every dollar spent. I haven't
checked my mail yet today but I didn't see anything about this on
AOPA's web site.

I too received the death letter, from AOPA. Curiously it doesn't
mention Bank of America (or even MBNA) but I'm sure the takeover is
what's behind this. MBNA WorldPoints cards haven't been that great in a
while. Sure you earn one "point" for every dollar charged. (AOPA says
you'll get double for certain (undefind) aviation purchases for their
card.) However the current, reduced redemption value makes the rebate
yield far below one point=$0.01, unless you redeem in huge quanitites.
The AOPA letter says "Many members have told me they want something
different." AOPA likes to tout their "we represent 400,000 members"
around, so I wonder how many members is "many members." I smell a rat.
They could have just said BoA is cancelling on us.

I'm going to miss the 5% card a lot, especially with costs rising. I had
problems once back when you had to fax, and last year they suddenly
started rejecting my valid rebate purchases. After calling MBNA and the
CSR was having trouble figuring out what the deal with this car is, I
called AOPA instead. They contacted MBNA, resolved the problem and let
me know that everything was straightened out. Never had a problem after
that.

AOPA has also had a money market account and CD program with MBNA for
years. That apparently is continuing with BoA, but the mm competitve
rates set to the IBC index is going away next week. (boo!!) Oh well,
high yield savings accounts are easy to find elsewhere. For nearly 10
years, I have used that account to fund ACH transactions and the only
thing I didn't like about it was they never offered online access, which
BoA now promises to do.

I suspect the MBNA credit card bill pay system will go next. Now that
I'll really miss. Where else can you combine all of your bills into one
convenient credit card account?

Curiously my AOPA credit card is about 10 years old and I have a much
more recent separate Worldpoints card. The Worldpoints has a longer
grace period, and the foreign transaction fee stayed at 1% for a year
after the AOPA went to 3%. But I never really spent that much on my
MBNA card, and it now has a credit limit of $30,000(!) To the banks, I
am a "deadbeat," I always pay my bill in full. Credit card rebates seem
to be declining a lot this year, the Citi Dividend Plus card is about to
end its 5% rebate on gas, groceries, and drugstores.