The Ten Commandments of Travel Rewards
So, you’ve finally decided to take the plunge and start collecting points and miles. Enough reading about how others are flying business class to Europe on points, while you’re stuck paying cash for an economy ticket in the back of the plane. If you aren’t yet earning points and miles for travel, you are missing out on an opportunity to travel better.
To help you get started or get smarter about points and miles, check out my Ten Commandments of Travel Rewards.
1. Sign Up for All Relevant Loyalty Programs
Nearly every airline has its own loyalty program, or at least participates in one. The same goes for most chain and even many independent hotels. There is no downside to membership, even if you don’t plan to gain status. With many rewards programs, points don’t expire. Even if you’re just an occasional customer, you could eventually earn enough for a free night or free flight. Plus, many programs (primarily hotels) offer some basic perks even to entry level members.
2. Develop a Plan
Chances are you had a goal in mind when you decided to earn point and miles. You may be planning a dream vacation, or you may want a more comfortable stay in your everyday travels. Take a few minutes to determine what you really want to achieve, then do a little research, and the path to your goal will become much clearer.
3. Treat Your Points and Miles Like Cash
Your points and miles have a tangible value., so treat them as such. As with cash, you should look to find value when spending those hard-earned points.
4. Do Not Let Points and Miles Expire (in most cases)
A few programs offer points/miles that never expire; Delta SkyMiles and United MileagePlus are two examples. But most other programs require some points activity during a specified time period to keep them active. Examples of activity include hotel stays, flights, use of a co-branded credit card, purchasing points, even a donation to charity using points. One easy way to track your points balances and their expiration dates is with Award Wallet.
Note that in rare instances, it won’t be worthwhile to prevent your points from expiring. Airline programs with short expiration windows and cheap base fares, like Frontier and Spirit Airlines, will often charge more to keep your points active than to simply pay the airfare.
5. Spend Your Points and Miles
It’s often easier to earn points and miles than it is to spend them. After all, you’ve put a lot of time and effort into building up your point balances. But you need to spend your points. Don’t hoard them without a specific plan. Because it’s a fact of life that points/miles will be devalued over time. Save up what you need, and then use them before the next devaluation.
6. Get One or More Travel Rewards Credit Cards and Pay Your Bills in Full
There are two types of travel reward cards, and both should find a spot in your wallet.
Co-branded credit cards align themselves with a specific travel brand. All major airlines, Amtrak and hotel chains have one or more relationships with credit card companies. Then there are the flexible rewards cards. These credit cards earn their own points currency, but you can use those points to purchase travel or transfer to any number of hotel/airline partners. Thus, flexibility to choose how you spend your rewards. Travel rewards cards give you points and miles when used for everyday spending, and they’ll typically offer you a nice welcome bonus of points and miles when you first sign up.
7. Don’t Be Afraid to Pay an Annual Fee
Most travel credit cards charge an annual fee, which can range from about $75 all the way up to $550 or more. I personally have three premium credit cards with annual fees of $450 or more. But I get plenty of value from each of them, from free hotel nights to airline fee credits to airport lounge access. I recommend you compare the annual fee with a card’s benefits and make your own determination of its value.
There are also a limited number of annual subscription services that may also be of value. For example, I have an Intercontinental Ambassador membership. Ambassador is a unique loyalty program, because you don’t earn status; you pay for it. For an annual fee $200 or 40,000 IHG points, I get some great perks when staying at Intercontinental Hotels — late check-out, room upgrades, and more. Plus, I can book an annual free weekend night with a two-night stay, enough money saved to justify the cost.
8. Take Advantage of Travel Partnerships and Alliances
Many of the world’s airlines participate in one of the three major airline alliances: Star Alliance, SkyTeam, and oneworld. Member airlines allow their loyalty program members to earn and redeem miles with their partners, they offer reciprocal lounge access to some elite members, and more. These alliances are your friend, as they allow you to credit points/miles from several airlines to a single program. Equally important, they allow you to credit flights on several airlines toward elite status across the alliance.
9. Play By the Rules
When you apply for a rewards credit card, the welcome bonus is often worth hundreds of dollars. So, it’s tempting to apply for a credit card, earn the welcome bonus and then cancel the card once the next annual fee comes due. While this is technically within the rules, it’s one that credit card companies are increasingly cracking down on. There are plenty of other practices which are plainly against the rules, and violations could cost you all the points/miles in your account. These practices, which I won’t get into here, ruin it for the rest of us who play fair. Maximize your points and miles, get all the benefits to which you’re entitled, and do it the right way!
10. Get Outside The Points and Miles Universe
Avoid the temptation to make every trip about the points and miles you earn and burn. There is a world of incredible travel experiences, many that you cannot touch with your loyalty travel program. Some of the world’s best hotels will not earn you a single point. Your favorite airline alliance won’t serve some of the world’s most amazing destinations.
Don’t worry about it! Loyalty programs exist to make us stick to their brands over a competitors’, not to broaden our horizons. And the most rewarding travel gets us out of our comfort zone, to a rich world of experiences apart from the everyday.
Final Thoughts
Once you start collecting points and miles, you’ll discover a world of better travel experiences. We’re talking suites at hotels and first class cabins on planes. And when you use your points for flights and hotels, the money saved can stretch your travel budget.
Because of this, collecting points and miles can be addicting. Many points collectors go to extremes to attain status with a particular program. There were no mileage runs before frequent flier programs existed. Today, mileage runs (and mattress runs, the hotel equivalent) are common. At the end of the year, you’ll find travelers trying to get in those last hotel stays or flights to achieve the status they want for next year.
But remember why you started collecting points and miles. In nearly all cases, it didn’t start out as a hobby. Most people simply realized they could improve their travel by joining a loyalty program. They learned how to earn status and willingly stepped on the hamster wheel of annual qualification.
It can be stressful trying to earn status every year, only to find you’re starting all over again when the calendar goes to January 1st. You should enjoy earning points, miles and status — just not at the expense of the real goal, which is to experience more travel, for less.