> It's generally a time-vs-money thing though in that to maximize airline/hotel programs

Credit card hotel booking portals are often much worse than what's available too.

For example, you might end up paying 30-100% more for a hotel booked through Chase Travel. At the very least you'll have way less selection. Even if price matching exists, you could still end up paying more.

I am traveling to Mexico next month and I do have a Chase Sapphire Preferred card (the one with the $95 annual fee). You get $100 in hotel credits per year if you book through Chase Travel.

In one of the spots I'll be at, there was (1) selection. It was $92 for 2 nights in a pretty low populated town that I'll be passing through. That hotel was rated 3.2 stars on Google.

If I use Google search or any hotel aggregator site, there were over 10 hotels available for half the price with much better ratings.

In this case it cost me about $50 extra to use the card's benefits.

Many people don't understand how rewards work when it's marketed towards your annual fee. The $100 credit doesn't offset the $95 annual fee. You pay $95 out of pocket for the fee. As soon as you book that hotel for $100 you've now paid $195 total out of pocket of which $100 gets credited back, so you're still out $95. If you instead didn't have the card and got the hotel at the cheaper rate, you'd only be out $45 or whatever you paid.

I mainly got the card because it had a really good sign up bonus, 0% international exchange fees and reasonable rental car coverage. Other cards can cover these benefits without an annual fee.