Points & Miles 101

Points and miles in the travel space has become a major buzzword…but how do you actually earn and use them to score deals on travel? Check out the post below for some starter tips!

We don’t claim to be a points and miles experts, but have been playing the game for a few years and have come to gain some knowledge that we think is helpful when starting out!

#1 Any Redemption is a Good Redemption

Keep in mind that when using miles, if you are redeeming them for a trip, experience, hotel, flight that you have been wanting to take….then it is a good deal! Don’t fixate on the points vs. $$ value if miles/points are getting you an experience you want.

#2 Gotta Earn Them to Use Them!

First off, you have to earn miles in order to use them! So where to start? The easiest, low-hanging fruit in the miles and points space is credit cards. (Please please please, this is only for folks who spend within their means and don’t have any debt…that would defeat the entire purpose of this! You also want good credit and are financially able to hold credit cards.)

What credit cards do you ask? Well, any can be a great start, but there are certainly some that are better than others. Here are three tips to finding the right one for you:

a. Welcome bonuses are key as these will get you a good bulk of points to work with right off the bat – Find a card that is offering an awesome welcome bonus for the initial spend that you feel is attainable within the timeframe allotted.

b. Annual fees are usually correlated with awesome cards and here is our opinion on them…they are great as long as there are benefits to the card that offset the cost! Things like travel credits, TSA pre-check reimbursement, hotel status, car rental status, entertainment credits, lounge access, the list goes on and on.

c. Look for cards with transferrable points…are we losing you? There are two catagories of points: a. transferrable b. fixed. Cards with fixed points would be for a certain hotel brand, a certain airline, a certain business…still great cards, but not as flexible when you are first starting out! Trasnferrable points are usually through bank travel cards where you can utilize transfer partners to use your points on multiple airlines, hotel brands and experiences! Better bang for the buck as you can more easily score deals!

Here are some of our favorite cards for flexible point spending:

 Chase Sapphire Preferred®

Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card

The Platinum Card® from American Express

#3 Have Points? Use Them!

Let’s back up and re-state what we started with…any point redemption is a good redemption in our opinion! That being said, there are some pointers to getting better redemptions for those hard earned points.

a. Transfer bonuses – those flexible spending cards? The travel partners of those cards occassionally offer transfer bonuses during a certain timeframe that allow your points to go farther!

b. Award flights – if you are wanting to use points for a flight (which is one of the best ways to use points in our opinion!) you have to find availability…not every flight can be booked with points or miles. To do this, you must sign-up for the loyalty program with the airline(s) you want to use. It is usually required to login to your account in order to find miles availability (go to the search and usually check a box that says book with miles/points). Economy class tickets are easy to find…upper class not as easy! Being flexible with timing is key to scoring those upper class tickets.

c. One-ways can be your friend! For flights, sometimes availability (especially in upper class) is only available one way so you may need to pair airlines to complete your round trip ticket (we are taking a business class flight to our destination on Virgin Atlantic and home on American Airlines business class). Also, when looking for availability don’t just check your home airport, check the big hubs for the airlines. Even if you need to add a positioning flight to get you to the hub airport it can be worth it for those upper class deals.