Straight To The Points

25/01/2024

If you have linked your Rakuten account to an Amex Membership Rewards card, there's an opportunity to earn 28,498 Amex points at a cost of ~1.05 cents per point.

Select Rakuten accounts have a 95x offer on Norton Security & Antivirus. You can make a purchase of up to $299.98 and earn 95x Amex points.

If you're new to Rakuten, you can get a $30 or 3,000-point sign-up bonus when you spend $30.

More details and my Rakuten referral in the comments.

12/12/2023

If you have Marriott Bonvoy status, you might be able to leverage it to earn Star Alliance Gold status via Singapore Airlines.

For context, Star Alliance Gold status provides lounge access even when flying domestic on United.

Similar to Marriotts partnership with United you can now link your Marriott Bonvoy account to your Singapore KrisFlyer account and get some flight

09/12/2023

Want to earn some extra cash for travel? This is an easy one via Capital One Shopping.

Sign up for Capital One Shopping
Add the Chrome extension
Spend $10+ within 30 days
Earn $200

Details in the link below.

If you sign up for Capital One Shopping add the Chrome extension and spend 10 in the first 30 days you can receive a 200 bonusThe key is signing up

20/07/2023

Fun Award Booking News!

You can now book ITA Airways with Virgin Atlantic Flying Club points. One-way/nonstop award rates:

From East Coast: 75,000 points
From Miami: 85,000 points
From West Coast: 100,000 points

East Coast is the best option, Miami is okay, West Coast could make sense in a pinch or if you highly value nonstop flights.

I called Flying Blue to see if they could see the award space as it wasn't showing only. Unfortunately, they could not.

Given that all transferrable points can be transferred to Virgin Atlantic, it shouldn't be hard to get the points you need. Even better if you're booking during a transfer bonus promo.

Would you book ITA Airways with Virgin points?

15/05/2023

Credit Card Reconsideration: Don’t Miss Out On A Bonus

At some point in your points journey, a bank is going to hit you with a denial when you apply for a credit card. It’s a fact of life.

It’s easy to take this personally, but it’s rarely about you. Most of the time, it’s simply a decision based on an algorithm. All hope is not lost!

A denial isn’t the end. It’s just a stop along the way.

📱What’s A Credit Card Reconsideration Call?

A reconsideration call is simply a chance to ask a human being to take another look at your application.

Sometimes, they can approve you on the spot. Sometimes, they can pass along the application with notes from your call.

There’s no guarantee of approval, but the call is more than worth the 20 minutes of your when a 50/60/70/100k points are on the line!

⭐6 Pro Tips For Your Call

Review your reason for denial: This can give clues as to what concerns the bank and help you craft your approach to convincing them you’re a good customer.

1️⃣Too much credit from the same bank… offer to transfer credit from another card’s credit limit. Too many cards with the bank… offer to close a card.

2️⃣Know your credit score/report: Take a few minutes to review your credit score and credit report. Make sure there aren’t any errors on your report.

3️⃣Check your application for errors: If you typos can cause issues whether it’s your income or name.

4️⃣Know why you want the card: The sign-up bonus is NOT an acceptable reason.

Maybe you want a free checked bag, you like the airlines & hotel transfer partners, or the bonus categories fit your spending well.

5️⃣Talk about the fact that you’re a good customer. If you’re already a customer of the bank, emphasize your relationship.

6️⃣Always be friendly, even if you get a grumpy phone rep. Everyone has bad days, don’t take it personally. Stay friendly or just call back later.

Please note that you have 30 days from your application to get approved.

See the comments for each bank’s reconsideration phone number.

💬Comment with any questions!

13/04/2023

How I Booked ANA First Class "The Suite"

🛑Like this post if you're a fan of first class flights!

A couple of months ago, I booked Japan Airlines first class from Tokyo to New York. I’d never flown JAL and was excited to finally give it a try after hearing great things!

Four days before I was scheduled to depart, I scrapped my plans and rebooked my flight home.

Why did I do this and how did this happen?

Let’s talk about it!

I was sitting at dinner in London with a friend, and as chance would have it, discussing Japan Airlines first class.

Toward the end of dinner, I noticed one first class seat on All Nippon Airways had opened up from Tokyo to New York the day after my JAL flight.

Not only was this a chance to fly ANA first class, but it was a chance to fly their new first class “The Suite”.

I’d previously booked this for March 2022 but Japan wasn’t open yet so I had to cancel the trip. Needless to say, I’d been looking for a chance (excuse?) to try it!

Once back at my hotel, I moved quickly.

While ANA is a Star Alliance carrier and can be booked via partners such as Air Canada Aeroplan, Avianca LifeMiles, and United MileagePlus, Virgin Atlantic is also a partner.

I had points sitting in my Virgin Atlantic Flying Club account from my previously canceled booking, so I called to confirm they could see the award space.

Note: Virgin’s online search doesn’t show ANA space. You can search with Aeroplan or United to find space.

The phone agent confirmed the space and that it would be 85k points + ~$446 taxes/fees for the one-way ticket. The entire call took exactly 6 minutes 9 seconds. Amazing!

I originally transferred Amex points to Virgin during a 30% transfer bonus in 2021 so I really only needed ~65k Amex points to book.

The flight was fantastic, but I'll share more about the experience in a future post.

For now...

🛑What questions do you have about booking ANA first class?

16/03/2023

Tricks Of The Trade: Positioning Flights

🛑Share this post. People need to know!

What Are Positioning Flights?

For a term that causes so much confusion, the concept is actually quite simple. They are flights that take you to the airport where you’ll start your main itinerary.

Why Should You Care?

If you don’t live near an international gateway airport such as JFK, LAX, Chicago O’Hare, etc., it can be tough to book award tickets at times.

This allows you to book an award ticket from the gateway airport and a separate positioning flight to get you there.

This can be particularly important from smaller airports, but often applies to cities with major airports as well.

Even when booking business class cash fares, a cheap positioning flight (award or cash) can help you take advantage of a great deal.

Positioning Flight Example

Let’s say I want to fly from DC to Zurich. I search for award space on 3 alliances from 3 DC airports but come up empty.

However, there’s non-stop award space on SWISS from JFK. I can book that with 60,000 Aeroplan points.

Since I can’t find award space with a United connection from DC, I need a separate ticket to make this work.

To position, I would book a flight on AA or Delta – award or cash. Since it’s such a short flight to JFK, I just look for the cheapest economy ticket.

Note: United doesn’t fly to JFK. Even if I could include a connection on my award, I’d have to fly to Newark or LaGuardia and then make my way to JFK.

Risks

Your positioning flight is completely unrelated to your main itinerary.

If your positioning flight is delayed or canceled for any reason, you won’t be protected on your main itinerary.

If you miss it, you miss it.

Pro Tips

Leave plenty of time between a positioning flight and your next flight, esp. if you need to clear security again.

If you check bags, leave even more time between flights to collect and recheck.

It might make sense to fly in the night before your main itinerary starts. You could even fly up a couple days early to visit another city on your way.

💬Comment with any questions!

08/02/2023

How I Booked An Around The World Adventure In Business & First Class

🛑What's your next trip? Or, what are you booking next?xt

It’s rare that I travel for a specific event but when one of my best friends says he wants to celebrate his birthday in the Canary Islands, I book flights!

🇪🇸Iberia Business Class

I booked JFK to Madrid for 34,000 Avios + $119 taxes/fees. I already had 5,000 Avios so I transferred ~29,000 UR points to BA.

After celebrating , I’ll find my way to somewhere in Europe for a few days (TBD on where, recs welcome) and then start my journey back to the states.

This is where things get interesting.

🇻🇳Bamboo Airways Business Class

I booked Frankfurt to Hanoi with 80,000 Aeroplan points + $144.14 taxes/fees. I had 20,000 Aeroplan points so I transferred 60,000 Capital One miles.

Should be fun to this new Aeroplan partner!

🇻🇳Vietnam Airlines Business Class

I booked Hanoi to Tokyo Haneda for 45,000 SkyMiles + $27 taxes/fees.

Considering the egregious SkyMiles rates from the US, I'm really happy about this booking.

🇯🇵Japan Airlines First Class

I’m flying from Tokyo Narita to JFK. I booked for 80,000 American miles + $48.45 taxes/fees.

While I’ve flown ANA several times, this will actually be my first time on JAL so I’m really excited to check it out.

There wasn’t award space on the connection to DC so I booked a cheap cash ticket.

For those curious, I will be spending a day in both Hanoi and Tokyo. I’ll probably spend that time eating amazing food.

🛫Flight Summary

Iberia biz class: 7 hours
Bamboo Airways biz class: 11 hours
Vietnam Airways biz class: 5 hours
JAL first class: 12.5 hours

💸Total Cost

Award Tickets: 239,000 points + $338.59

Positioning Flights: TBD

I haven’t flown Iberia in 5 years and this will be my first time on the other three airlines so I’m excited to check out the experience and share it with you.

🛫Let me know if there’s an airline you’d like me to review!

13/01/2023

Friday Fun: GoPuff Referral Bonus

$10 in GoPuff credit per order up to 10 orders in 30 days. Both the referrer and referred get the credit. Cannot exceed $1k in rewards per calendar year.

Many Chase cards also provide a $10 GoPuff credit each month that you could stack with this.

You can find a from one of my IG Subscribers in the comments.

30/12/2022

8 Popular Airline Programs That Let You Hold Award Space

🔴Let me know if you have any questions!

It’s a terrible feeling when you transfer points to an airline and the award space disappears.

While this isn’t a common issue since most transfers process instantly, it can happen.

🛫8 Airline Programs

American AAdvantage : Up to 5 days; 1 day if departing w/in 14 days

Cathay Asia Miles: YMMV - Depends on the phone agent. Having most of the miles needed in our account helps.

Emirates: Up to 5 days

Flying Blue: Up to 3 days

Lufthansa Miles & More: 5-6 days

Singapore KrisFlyer: YMMV

Turkish Miles&Smiles: 48 hours

Virgin Atlantic Flying Club: 24 hours

🟢The rules for holding award space are not consistent across airline programs.

For example, American, Turkish, and Virgin will hold award space on partner flights as well as their own flights.

Miles&More will let you hold space with its 4 airlines (Austrian, Brussels, Lufthansa, & Swiss) and on some Star Alliance partners. Personally, I’ve held award tickets on Singapore Airlines.

With some programs, such as Singapore KrisFlyer, it really depends on the phone agent you get. Some will let you put an award on hold, some won't.

Meanwhile, American makes it easier with the ability to hold awards online.

Remember, the program you use to book the ticket determines whether you can hold an award.

You can hold an award seat on United if booking with Turkish Miles&Smiles but you can't hold that United seat with United's own Mileage Plus program.

Similarly, you can't use United MileagePlus to hold award space on a Turkish flight.

Have you ever put an award ticket on hold?

14/12/2022

An Easy Amex Offer Stack

A little different than my usual content but this is a fun example of how credit card perks can work for you.

The end result of this process is $75 to use at select restaurants for $0 out of pocket via an Amex Offer and referral.

Step 1: Sign up for the inKind via referral to get $25 in credit when you spend $50. A referral from one of my IG Subscribers: https://app.inkind.com/refer/QTY0IQGI

Step 2: Add the inKind Amex Offer to a card. The offer is for $50 back when you spend $50+. Ideally, you'll add the offer to an Amex Gold or Amex Business Gold to earn 4x. It's a small purchase, but you might as well earn what you can!

Step 3: Purchase a $50 credit for $50. Use this link http://pass.inkind.com/amex-special or just click the link in the Amex Offer details (it's the same link).

So, spend $50 on an Amex to get $50 back from Amex and trigger the $25 inKind referral bonus. That's $75 to spend on a fun meal.

Let me know if you have any questions!

inKind Pass

04/11/2022

Best Credit Card Offers For Luxury Travel (November 2022)

🔴 What card are you getting next?

💳 If you find my content helpful and are applying for a credit card, please consider using the links in my bio. It's an easy way to support my work.

Don't be shy if you have questions about whether a card is right for you.

🔵 Top Team Blue Offers - Under 5/24

Ink Biz Cards (no annual fees): 90k UR points

CSR: 80k UR points

CSP: 60k UR points

Ink Biz Card ($95 annual fee): 100k UR points

Airline cards: United - up to 150k, BA/Iberia/Aer Lingus - up to 100k, Aeroplan - 70k points

Hotel cards: IHG (personal card) - 140k points + 1 free night cert (up to 40k points), IHG (biz card) - 140k points, Hyatt (biz card) - 60k points

🟢Top Offers - Over 5/24

Amex Platinum: 150k points via select referrals or 125k + 10x on dining up to $25k for 6 months via Resy.

Amex Gold: 90k points via select referrals

You can submit Amex referrals via the link in my bio. Comment if you want to apply and I can share a reader referral with you.

Citi Premier: 80k ThankYou Points

Capital One Venture: 75k Cap One Miles. There's a highly targeted 100k offer available.

Capital One Venture X: 75k Cap One Miles

Amex Business Platinum: 150k points via select referrals.

Amex Business Gold: 130k via select referrals.

Barclays Aviator Business: 80k AA miles + $95 statement credit

CitiBusiness AAdvantage: 65k AA miles

Citi AAdvantage Executive: 85k AA miles

Hilton Amex Aspire: 150k Hilton points

Hilton Business Amex: 130k Hilton points + 1 Free Night Certificate

💳 Bonus

Bilt Card - No bonus but you can earn points on rent each month with no processing fees. Particularly useful if your rent is steep.

To be transparent, I serve on an Bilt advisory board. Always happy to pass on feedback to them.

If you’re under 5/24, you might prefer to prioritize those cards.

If you see a better offer than one listed (or an offer you think I should add), please let me know so I can update the list!

03/11/2022

Wallet Wednesday: Is The Annual Fee Worth It?

Naturally, a day late.

🛑 Share this with friends who need to get into points!

One of the biggest sticking points when starting to learn about points is annual fees, so let's talk about how to approach them.

Here are a few things to consider when you evaluate whether an annual fee is worth it.

1️⃣Sign-up/Welcome Bonuses

Everyone wants big bonuses, but nobody wants annual fees. I get that. However, cards with annual fees often have the best bonuses.

Where does that leave you?

Look at what value of the bonus and compare that to the annual fee.

For example, the CSP generally has a 60,000-point bonus + a $95 annual fee.

UR points are worth 1.25 cents each in the UR Travel Portal. So, 60k points = $750.

You could transfer points to an airline partner to book a one-way biz class award ticket to Europe that would have cost $2,000.

2️⃣Statement Credits

Statement credits can help offset annual fees.

The Amex Platinum is a great example.

The annual fee is $695 but you can get a bonus of up to 150k points. Without factoring in the credits, you could book a biz class around-the-world award ticket and have points to spare.

Throw in a ton of credits, and it’s easy to offset most of the fee if not come out ahead. A few popular annual credits incl. $200 airline fee credit, $200 Uber/Uber Eats credits, $200 hotel credit, etc.

3️⃣Other Benefits

From hotel free night certs to lounge access to instant hotel status to trip/bag delay insurance, many cards come with benefits you might find valuable.

⭐️What about Year 2 & beyond?

With most cards, the sign-up bonus is more than enough to outweigh the annual fee.

However, once you hit year 2, that’s the real test for a card.

At that point, you want to consider a card’s bonus categories + how much you expect to use the card, the credits (if any), and the benefits.

I run the numbers and consider the benefits offered, then keep the cards which provide more value than the fee.

The answer will vary by person so don't feel like you have to keep/ditch certain cards.

🔵What are your keeper cards?

28/10/2022

Two 90,000-Point Sign-up Bonuses

If you have the CSP or CSR and are looking for a way to add more UR points, these are probably the two best offers out there.

90,000 UR points after you spend $6k in 3 months. Neither card has an annual fee. No brainers if you're under 5/24 and have a small business or even a side hustle.

You can apply for a biz card from this bank once per 30 days. You're eligible for the bonus if you haven't received the bonus from the same card in the last 24 months.

What do you think? Are you grabbing one (or both)?

If you'd like to support my work, I'll leave my affiliate link in the comments.

26/10/2022

Wallet Wednesday: Let Your Miles & Points Play Together

🛑Save this post!

Last week I talked about why I think focusing on earning transferable points gives you the best chance of booking award tickets when you want to travel.

The next step to that is points diversification and how that can help you use points to cover more of your travel.

Amex, Bilt, Capital One, Citi, and the bank that shall not be named (iykyk) all have transferable points programs.

Each program has credit cards with useful bonus categories, sign-up/welcome bonuses, and/or promos.

Let’s talk about a few ways in which they can work together.

🔵Overlapping Airline Partners

Let’s start simple.

Several airline programs partner with 4 or even 5 of these programs.

Air France-KLM Flying Blue, Avios, Emirates Skywards, and Virgin Atlantic partner with all five programs.

Air Canada Aeroplan, Cathay Pacific Asia Miles, Singapore KrisFlyer each partner with four programs.

So, for example, if you don’t have enough Amex points for a transfer to Asia Miles, you could also transfer Capital One or Citi points.

🔵Use Points More Strategically

This might be my favorite part of having points in different programs. You can choose which transferable program to use based on other travel needs.

I’ll explain through an example: Business class flights to Europe + a stay at a Hyatt property.

Let’s say you have Capital One and Bilt points and the best option for booking flights with points is on Swiss.

Rather than transferring Bilt points to Aeroplan, you could transfer Cap One miles which would allow you to transfer Bilt points to Hyatt.

🔵More Sign-up Bonuses & Bonus Categories

Between new card sign-up/welcome bonuses and a variety of bonus categories, you can leverage cards from a few programs to earn points at a faster rate.

💳If you’re applying for a credit card, please consider using the links in my bio. It’s an easy way to support my work.

⭐️What are your two favorite points programs right now?

21/10/2022

How To Get A Better Credit Card Sign-up Bonus After You’ve Already Applied

🔴Share this post with your friends!

Since the sign-up for the CSR + 2 biz cards just increased, a bunch of you said you’d like to know how to match to the higher offer.

💳If you find my content useful, please consider using my links when you apply for a credit card. It’s an easy way to ensure I can continue sharing tips and deals.

🔵How To Request A Match

If you’ve applied for one of these three cards in the last 90 days, follow these steps:

- Log into your account
- Go to the expandable menu
- Select Secure Messages
- Select New Message
- Select "I have a question about one of my accounts"
- Select the appropriate card
- Select Account Inquiry
- Click “Send us a message”
- Write a simple & friendly message

🟣What Should You Say?

*If you don't know which cards or bank I'm referencing, just ask in the comments.

Here’s a template I've used and had others use to get matched to higher offers countless times.

Hey!

I recently applied for the [insert card name] and saw the welcome offer has been increased from [original sign-up bonus] to [new sign-up bonus] points.

Would it be possible to get matched to the new increased offer? I’d really appreciate it.

Thanks so much!

🟢Final Notes

If you haven't hit the minimum spend requirement yet, they'll might give you the OK and tell you to message them again once you've done so.

This stopped working back in the fall of 2020 but it seems to be working again.

It’s not guaranteed to work but it’s certainly worth a quick message to ask.

⭐️Let me know if it works for you in the comments!

Photo: Qatar Airways business class on a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner.

20/10/2022

Wallet Wednesday: 4 Reasons To Ditch Your Airline Credit Card

(Forgot to post this yesterday. Whoops!)

⭐️Share this post with your friends!

Every time I hear an inflight credit card pitch for an airline card, I want to jump up and yell, “Wait, don’t do it!”

Somehow, I don’t think flight crews would appreciate that.

Still, airline credit cards are popular.

I hear from tons of people who have had one for years and are looking for ways to get another airline card to earn more miles. However, this tunnel vision can cost you.

So, let’s talk about it!

If you use a cobranded airline card to earn Alaska, American, Delta, United, etc. miles directly, you’re locked into using that specific airline program to book.

If you focus on earning United miles but there isn’t award space on United or a Star Alliance partner, you’re stuck.

Not to mention, it prevents you from taking advantage of better award rates offered by other airline programs.

Even worse, you earn enough miles with a single airline program and then that program devalues thus leaving you with too few miles to book.

4 Reasons To Focus On Transferable Points

1️⃣ Earn Points Faster

Generally, these cards have better earn rates on popular categories such as dining, groceries, gas, travel, etc.

2️⃣ Award Booking Arbitrage

With the ability to transfer points to a variety of airline programs, you’ll gain access to better award rates.

Want to book a one-way business class flight to Europe on Air France or KLM? That’ll be 120k Delta SkyMiles… or you can use as few as 53k Flying Blue miles.

3️⃣ Protect Yourself From Devaluations

Earning transferable points also insulates you from any given airline program increasing award rates. If one program raises rates, you can utilize a different program to book the same flight.

4️⃣ Easier To Find Award Space

It can be tough to find premium cabin award space. With options to book flights in each alliance (oneworld, Star Alliance, SkyTeam) + individual airline partnerships, you’ll have a better chance of finding a flight that works for you.

🛑What’s the focus of your points-earning right now?

16/09/2022

17 Great Ways To Use Amex Points - Business Class To Europe

🟢Which one would you like to book?

🛫Star Alliance – 88k ANA miles (round-trip only)

Transfers to ANA can take a few days and you have to watch out for surcharges on some partners.

🛫Star Alliance – 63k LifeMiles

No surcharges for the win.

🛫Star Alliance JFK to Lisbon – 35k LifeMiles

Only works on the outbound.

🛫Star Alliance on select routes – 60k Aeroplan points

Flights under 4,000 total flight miles.

🛫Air France/KLM – From 53k Flying Blue miles

You can find a bunch of origin/destinations pairs at 53k miles.

🛫Flying Blue Promo Rewards – up to 50% off

Flying Blue runs monthly promos from select cities to Europe that can save you a ton of points.

🛫Virgin Atlantic – 72k Flying Blue miles

Save on surcharges.

🛫Upgrade premium economy to business class – British Airways Avios

Better than booking an award outright.

🛫Delta One Suites nonstop - 50k Virgin points

So much better than using SkyMiles.

🛫Iberia nonstop to Madrid on select routes – From 34k/50k Iberia Avios (off-peak/peak)

Off-peak is a sweet spot among sweet spots.

🛫Aer Lingus nonstop to Ireland on select routes – From 50k/60k AerClub Avios (off-peak/peak)

Too often forgotten.

🛫Emirates, JFK to Milan – 72,500 Emirates miles

Best way to try Emirates biz class without steep surcharges.

🛫Singapore Air, JFK to Frankfurt & Houston to Manchester – 81,000 KrisFlyer miles

“Book the cook” before your flight to get your meal of choice.

🛫Qatar Airways to select cities - 85k Avios

Take the long way, enjoy an amazing flight.

🛫British Airways with lower taxes/fees or Finnair – From 61k Asia Miles

Lower out of pocket on BA and Finnair space other partners don’t see.

🛫American Airlines nonstop – 50k Etihad miles

Rare to see space on American but this is the best way to book if you see it.

🛫Brussels Airlines nonstop – 44k Etihad miles

Best of luck actually finding award space.

🛑What would you like me to write about next?