BarclayCard Arrival Plus vs Capital One Venture

Similarities

These two cards are direct competitors and hence are essentially similar in the way the reward system works (with a couple of exceptions). Firstly, the are what the industry calls double miles card (2X). That means that you could earn 2 miles for every dollar that you spend on the card. This is in contrast to many reward cards that lets you earn 2X or 3X on 'certain types of expenses'. With either of these cards, you get 2X on everything. The attractiveness of this is that you could earn you miles very quickly.

The second similarity is that both cards are meant to be redeemed for travel rewards (though you could redeem your miles for other things like gift cards or merchandise - which is less valuable). The way the redemption system works is pretty similar. You could book your travel with anyone you wish, be it an offline travel agent or a travel aggregator like Expedia on the web. You will have 90 days to submit this spending to the issuers and a statement credit will be given against that expense.

Another aspect that this card has in common is that they both waive the foreign transaction fees for card holders. Most cards charge anywhere from 2.7% (typical Amex FX fee) and 3% (typical of most Visa and MasterCard). The absence of these fees make both cards ideal for travel abroad.

Differences

The differences between the two cards are small, but probably significant enough to affect your choice when we are caring them.

Firstly, though there are similar in the way the miles and points are redeemed, Barclaycard has added a sweetener to their card. When you redeem points on the Arrival, you will get credited with 10% bonus (based on how many points you redeem) back into your account. For example, if you redeem 10,000 points (which is worth $100 in statement credits for your travel expense), you will be credited with 1000 points back into your account. So essentially, you have only used 9000 points. Because of this, the rewards are really worth 2.2% rather than 2% for the Capital One. Barclays comes out on top of this.

The Arrival card also has comes with an annual subscription to Trip-It Pro, which is a travel planner app. The pro version requires an annual subscription of $49 if you were to get it yourself from their site. But Barclaycard Arrival Plus members get this for free. This is a $49 value alone every year.

Another significant difference between the two cards is that Barclays offers card members access to their TransUnion FICO scores for free (which is updated monthly). Yes, that right. You get your free credit scores. And they are FICOs, and not Fakos.

There are differences in the annual fee. The Arrival has an $89 annual fee (waived for the first year) while the Venture has a $59 annual fee (also waived for the first year). Though it appears that Capital One has lower fees, one has to bear in mind that Barclays provides the free annual subscription to TripIt Pro (which is a $49 value). So net of that, it appears that the Arrival card is providing more value.

The Arrival card also has the Chip and Pin technology embedded in their cards. That makes traveling to (for example) Europe a little easier because you can use the card at places like the Paris and London Metro. Capital One is supposed to be slowly converting their existing cardholders to the Chip technology by 2015 (not sure if it is Chip and Pin or Chip and Signature).

And The Winner Is.....

Based on the differences, I would say that at this moment, the BarclayCard Arrival Plus Elite World MasterCard comes out ahead of the Capital One Venture. Though there both earn double points (2X) and have no foreign transaction fees, I feel that Barclays edges out Capital One because they give back 10% of your points when you use them for travel, give you your TransUnion FICO score for free and also give you a complimentary subscription to TripIt Pro.

Though Barclays Bank has the edge on Chip and Pin technology for now, I believe that sooner or later, Capital One (and indeed all issuers) will have that as a standard feature.