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Delta offers several co-brand credit cards through its partnership with American Express. The Gold Delta cards are the mid-level entry point of the portfolio. These cards have an annual fee and provide excellent benefits if you’re an occasional Delta flyer.

What benefits does this card provide upon signing up, and does keeping it in the long run make sense?

Delta SkyMiles® Gold Business American Express Card

Annual Fee

$150 per year (fee waived for the first year)

Sign Up Benefits

Currently, you can earn 90,000 bonus miles after spending $6,000 in purchases on your new card in your first 6 months of card membership.

If you decide to sign up for any Delta credit cards (or any AMEX card, for that matter), we’d appreciate it if you use our link. We receive a bonus for each referral, which helps us keep Your Mileage May Vary HQ going strong.

This card is subject to AMEX’s one sign-up bonus per lifetime rule. To read more about that, check out this article from Doctor of Credit. AMEX also has added this stipulation to their cards:

You may not be eligible to receive a welcome offer if you have or have had this Card or previous versions of this Card. You also may not be eligible to receive a welcome offer based on various factors, such as your history with credit card balance transfers, your history as an American Express Card Member, the number of credit cards that you have opened and closed and other factors. If you are not eligible for a welcome offer, we will notify you prior to processing your application so you have the option to withdraw your application.

I’d suggest keeping any card you get from American Express for at least 2 years (or more if you think the benefits outweigh the annual fee). There’s too much risk with American Express increasingly cracking down on those they feel are abusing the system by canceling a card shortly after the signup bonus is awarded.

To that end, AMEX has added this wording to the Offer Terms.

If you have a history of cancelling or downgrading American Express Card accounts within your first year and you cancel or downgrade your new Card account within your first year, we may not credit, we may freeze, or we may take away bonus miles from your account. If we determine that you have engaged in abuse, misuse, or gaming in connection with this offer in any way or that you intend to do so, including if you return purchases you made to meet the Threshold Amount, we may not credit, we may freeze, or we may take away bonus miles from your account. We may also cancel any accounts you have with us.

Fortunately, AMEX has not started applying the “Little Brother” rule to business cards, so you’re free to apply if you have the Delta SkyMiles Platinum or Reserve Business cards.

Spending Bonus Categories

The Gold Delta SkyMiles Business card earns 2X points on the following purchases:

• On every dollar spent on eligible purchases made directly with Delta
• On every dollar spent on U.S. purchases for advertising in select media ($50,000 per calendar year)
• On every dollar spent on eligible U.S. Shipping purchases ($50,000 per calendar year)
• On every dollar spent on dining at restaurants worldwide.

The card earns one point per dollar for all other types of spending.

$200 Delta Flight Credit

If you spend $10,000 on the Delta SkyMiles Gold Card in a calendar year, you’ll receive a $200 Delta Flight Credit.

$150 Delta Stays Credit

You can receive a $150 credit when you prepay for a hotel or vacation rental booking at delta.com/stays. On a quick look, it’s a travel portal site powered by Expedia. According to the landing page, SkyMiles members earn 2 miles per dollar spent on stays booked through Delta. (excluding taxes and fees).

No Foreign Transaction Fees

As you would hope a card you can use on Delta flights worldwide would, the Gold Delta SkyMiles Business card does not charge any foreign transaction fees.

Priority Boarding

The primary cardmember and nine companions on the same reservation will be invited to board Delta-operated flights before general boarding. This boarding is with Zone 5 that includes the following:

• Silver Medallion Members
• Delta Corporate Travelers
• Gold, Platinum and Reserve Delta SkyMiles credit card members
• Flying Blue Silver members
• Virgin Atlantic Flying Club Silver members
• SkyTeam Elite
• LATAM Pass Gold+ Elite
• WestJet Rewards Silver Elite

This advanced boarding sounds great, but at least twelve groups of people, including Delta Platinum and Gold Medallion members, Delta Comfort+  passengers, and SkyTeam Elite Plus members, will get to board before you. If you book a basic economy ticket on Delta (which I did once—never again!), having the credit card will allow you to board at the same time as if booking a Delta Main Cabin ticket.

Free First Checked Bag

Delta provides a free checked bag for the cardholder and up to nine others traveling on the same reservation. You don’t have to pay for the ticket with your Gold Delta SkyMiles Business card, but the cardholder does have to have their SkyMiles number on the reservation.

This means you’d get the free checked bag benefit while still paying for the ticket with a card like the Sapphire Reserve to take advantage of the better trip delay and lost baggage insurance this card offers.

Now that your first checked bag on Delta costs $35, this benefit alone can almost save more than the cost of the annual fee on a single round trip for 2 people.

TakeOff 15

This quickly became one of my favorite perks of having a Delta co-brand AMEX card. Delta SkyMiles Gold, Gold Business, Platinum, Platinum Business, Reserve and Reserve Business American Express Card Members save 15% on the mileage portion of an Award Ticket booked with Delta SkyMiles. There are no lockout dates and it works on all Delta award tickets.

20% In-Flight Savings

You’ll receive a 20% savings in the form of a statement credit on eligible pre-purchased meals and in-flight purchases of food and alcoholic beverages on Delta-operated flights.

Pay With Miles

This little-known benefit allows you to pay for part (of all) of your ticket with your SkyMiles. In essence, this will enable you to use your miles at a penny per point to pay for a cash ticket on Delta. You redeem miles in increments of 5,000 miles for $50. While not the best value for your points, this may be helpful if you find a cheap cash ticket and don’t want to spend money. To find out more about this benefit, check out the Delta website.

Use of Miles on Partner Airlines

While you can use your miles to book flights on Delta, you can also use miles to book award travel on SkyTeam and other partner airlines. I booked us on Virgin Atlantic premium economy from New York to London for 55,000 miles each. Pre-departure prosecco? Don’t mind if we do!

Final Thoughts

The Gold Delta SkyMiles Business card offers many perks we like from a co-branded card, such as priority boarding and free checked bags. I don’t even need to use the card for the tickets to get the benefits, which comes in handy if I’m booking an award ticket.

Delta gets grief for its award pricing and the lack of an award chart. I’ve found prices on routes I wanted to book to be fair, and they’re still competitive when flying from Orlando. Don’t forget that Delta offers lower award prices for inexpensive tickets, like 6,500 miles for a NY-Florida one-way trip.

Keeping at least one Delta co-branded American Express card makes sense because of the benefits we get when flying on Delta. We can save $140 on one trip where we would both be checking a bag. However, it’s not a great card to spend money on. Earning at least 1.5 to 2 Membership Rewards per dollar on all your expenditures with the Everyday Preferred or the Blue Business Plus is easy. Since Delta is a Membership Rewards partner, using a card that earns flexible points makes sense. If you need Delta SkyMiles, you can transfer the points when required. It will cost you since AMEX charges a fee to transfer points to U.S. airlines, but that’s a price I’ll gladly pay for the ability to move points to Flying Blue or Virgin Atlantic if they have a Delta flight available at a much lower cost than Delta is offering.

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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary