credit card points travel/miles/airline and hotel rewards

[Anonymous]

Agree it depends on how much effort you want to put in and your traveller profile.

For example, we fly a reasonable amount on United but usually discount economy or economy for private travel. This is a simplified snapshot of what has worked for me. Almost all benefits are from the sign up bonuses and saved bag fees (one-off benefit was $900 costs reimbursed by United when my bag went missing for 5 days). A significant additional benefit is DH flies 2/3 times year on United Business so his actual flights earn lot of points.
95% of the work is in meeting the minimum spend for each card (eg $4000 in first 3 mths).

Oct 2022 I signed up for a United Mileage Explorer card. Met the minimum spend to earn 60,000 points and parked card in my drawer, only using it to pay for anything on United (which saves on bag fees for discount economy trips and gives priority boarding). No annual fee first year.

I referred DH for his own card earning another 60,000 pts plus 10,000 pts referral fee for me. Parked his card.

In Sep 2024, I downgraded my card to a fee-less United Gateway card having paid $95 fee for the second year to save on bag fees and use the 2 free lounge passes. I downgraded to avoid cancelling and impacting my credit record.

In Jan 2025, I applied for a new United Mileage card and earned 60,000 points and parked card in my drawer again. New card saved me and DD $180 on bag fees on a trip. I Will downgrade this card in Dec 2025 to avoid the annual fee that starts after year one.

This month, I applied for a United Quest card and will earn 100,000 pts after min spend and 10,000 for referring DS (will park his card in a drawer). It was opportunistic as great bonus offer and I had a $3,000 insurance bill which would minimise work meeting $4000 minimum spend. Big annual fee of $350 is largely offset by an immediate $200 annual United credit plus monthly uber credit which will add to $100.

A big added bonus of using United miles for us is you can book open jaw flights with a free connection between arrival and departure points (eg we flew to Brisbane Australia and flew out of Sydney with a free flight in between). And you can book flights on miles and cancel for free (great when there is uncertainty over travel plans).

How much are the 300,000 Mileage points worth? Not as much as they were! In Summer 2023, our family of 4 flew return to Australia for 320,000 points saving over $6,000 in airfares. That’s definitely not possible now. I think they are probably worth $3-4,500 given we apply economy. We will see.

My strategy above is a simplified version. I also do similar with Chase Sapphire and use other credit cards for everyday spending.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just pick an airline and a lounge you want. Open the best credit card for those, and try to use that airline whenever possible.

In general I think the games are just to entertain people who have to travel for work and are stuck there anyway. It’s much better to be a leisure traveler and just pay for the perks you want as you go.

Except I do think it’s nice to have access to a lounge and they will give it to you just for opening a card so you might as well. I think it’s worth the Amex fee, but I would have had an Amex anyway.

OP here. Good point. I had miles for upgrades all the time when I used to travel for work, but haven't traveled for work in years.

Most airlines - and all the airlines I can think of - have made it MUCH harder to use airline points for upgrades now versus 10-15 years ago. Free economy seats via airline points seem readily available at least on United.

The airlines now often offer sell upgrades to front cabin seats at a discounted cash payment rate either at booking or at check-in. The airlines would rather have someone's cash than payment in points, even though award charts were devalued and then replaced with "dynamic pricing".

Now they release few if any front cabin seats for frequent flyer free upgrades at -96 hrs / -48 hrs / -24 hrs.

Booking partner airlines using airline points is harder to achieve in reality than it sometimes sounds from the various sites pushing travel credit cards.

For us, free hotel rooms (using hotel points) in places we travel have been so much easier to find. Status generally gets us free breakfasts.

[Anonymous]

Llfetime status is nearly impossible with Hyatt, but much easier for a frequent traveller who has a suitable Marriott Bonvoy card. Spouse has frequent travel for work (and his travel expenses go on his Marriott card) so she bounces between Platinum and Titanium status. Main family benefits are better hotel rooms at checkin and free breakfast and hotel lounge access.

She also is approaching Million Mile status on United, which gets lifetime Gold status. Gold has free United Club or StarAlliance lounge access for family on international trips, free checked bags, and somewhat earlier boarding

We find that it does still pay to try to concentrate spend on one airline and one hotel chain. The key to success on this is for one parent to have frequent work travel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

I have definitely found that it NEVER makes sense to use United or BA points to fly economy to the UK possibly mainly as the cash fees are so high. Don’t know about business class though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

I have definitely found that it NEVER makes sense to use United or BA points to fly economy to the UK possibly mainly as the cash fees are so high. Don’t know about business class though.

PP here. I should have said I found it never makes sense to fly back from Heathrow with points. That’s when they charge massive cash fees. However, for most mainstream airlines, it only makes financial sense to book return flights.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

You need flexible points like Chase that can transfer to wherever the best deal is. We paid 10k Virgin miles per person to London (transferred from Chase.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

Yeah you need to search out/hunt down the saver awards that are around 75-80k each way in business. But they are few and far between. That's why it's a bit of a game with a learning curve and straight up work- searching, booking, etc. That's why it's not for everyone.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

Yeah you need to search out/hunt down the saver awards that are around 75-80k each way in business. But they are few and far between. That's why it's a bit of a game with a learning curve and straight up work- searching, booking, etc. That's why it's not for everyone.

Yeah there are limited Business Class seats per flight offered at the Saver rate and they are snapped up by the people more fluent in the points world. Economy is easier to book. More seats available.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

Yeah you need to search out/hunt down the saver awards that are around 75-80k each way in business. But they are few and far between. That's why it's a bit of a game with a learning curve and straight up work- searching, booking, etc. That's why it's not for everyone.

Exactly this. Airlines typically release a saver seat which is a discounted price. Go look on a website like seats.aero and you can see a bunch of examples. Ideally you want to couple that with a say 20% transfer bonus from AMEX/Chase.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

That's a huge amount of points thanks to your employer! Considering this, it would be worth the annual fees of both Amex Platinum and Chase Sapphire. Are you at the point where you have to declare your points as income?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

Yeah you need to search out/hunt down the saver awards that are around 75-80k each way in business. But they are few and far between. That's why it's a bit of a game with a learning curve and straight up work- searching, booking, etc. That's why it's not for everyone.

This is the PP again and thanks for all the tips. My strategy so far has been to find the flight I want (searching for the cheapest/best times) and then check if it would be cheaper using points, which it never is! I will try next time searching for saver award flights and/or using the seats website mentioned above

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'll give my take as a frequent traveler with little spare time. I don't "churn" cards because I dont' have time for that. I have 2 cards:
AmEx Platinum
Chase Sapphire Reserve

AmEx gets all my airfare because you get 5x points. This also gives me gold status on both Hilton and Marriott hotels. Lots of free breakfasts and routine upgrades (usually outside the US).
Chase gets everything else.

Then, each partners with various airilnes so you can convert AmEx/Chase points to that airline's points, and it's diferent airlines for each. When I want a flight, I convert the points at that time.

Big caveat: the annual fee on these cards is $600-700/year. However, you get credited for various spending so actual cost is a lot lower.

But for all this, you need to spend a lot to make it worth it. Work lets me use my personal card for travel, so between the 2 cards I'm spending $200-300k/year.

As for the "just get a cash back card", you don't get much value from that _if_ you want to use it for business class travel. A simple example: a round-trip business calss flight from here to Europe may be $7k if you buy it, or 140k points. To earn $7k on your cash back card, you need to spend let's say $350k. To earn 140k points, that would be $30k on airfare (AmEx 5x points) or maybe $100k on typical regular spending (Chase gives 3x points on restaurants).

In summary, it's a balance of how complicated you want to make your life.. the marginal benefit compared to your time to manage the "tricks".

I feel like am doing something wrong. Every time I check, the flight cost in miles is not cheaper for me than just paying cash. For example, I was recently pricing out a business class flight on united to London, cost was ~4K, but also costs 400k miles! Is there a particular airline or hotel chain where this is more feasible? Would love to make this work, but have never had much success

Yeah you need to search out/hunt down the saver awards that are around 75-80k each way in business. But they are few and far between. That's why it's a bit of a game with a learning curve and straight up work- searching, booking, etc. That's why it's not for everyone.

This is the PP again and thanks for all the tips. My strategy so far has been to find the flight I want (searching for the cheapest/best times) and then check if it would be cheaper using points, which it never is! I will try next time searching for saver award flights and/or using the seats website mentioned above

Virgin has a reward seat checker tool that shows availability 11 months out for all classes of service and their cost. Economy can be as low as 6k. Business as low as 40-50k. If you have flexibility, just pick your dates many months out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
A big added bonus of using United miles for us is you can book open jaw flights with a free connection between arrival and departure points (eg we flew to Brisbane Australia and flew out of Sydney with a free flight in between). And you can book flights on miles and cancel for free (great when there is uncertainty over travel plans).

United is ending this next month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
A big added bonus of using United miles for us is you can book open jaw flights with a free connection between arrival and departure points (eg we flew to Brisbane Australia and flew out of Sydney with a free flight in between). And you can book flights on miles and cancel for free (great when there is uncertainty over travel plans).

United is ending this next month.

Which? Open jaw?