Dreps - Marcie and Tom pointed out the wisdom to us of using the Starwood Amex card for points accumulation. It allows you to transfer points into your mileage account, has no annual fee and is very flexible. It's been a home run in our opinion, as the points required for free hotel stays are extremely reasonable on Starwood.

If you don't travel much, then a slightly higher exchange rate may well be worth the flexibility you get with racking up Starwood Amex points for all your purchases. I'll use it again next week & let you know for sure if there's any difficulty getting the points credited on overseas purchases to our Starwood account.

Capital One does offer its "No Hassles" rewards card, but I believe that simply buys you a ticket, rather than give you points towards business class upgrades. If that's correct, then this reward card from Capital One would not achieve your purposes.

Cheers, Anne