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Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Old Feb 22nd 2013, 10:23 am
  #271  
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by tonrob
Many of the Chase cards have a minimum credit limit of $5,000 - I think that the United card is one of them.
I was pleasantly surprised that Chase gave me decent limits on both my BA and United cards.
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Old Mar 2nd 2013, 10:34 am
  #272  
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Default Club Carlson (Radisson, Park Inn etc.) Facebook promo

1,000 free Club Carlson points for 'liking' them on Facebook.

See my earlier post here as to why Club Carlson and I are new best mates.
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Old Mar 2nd 2013, 10:42 am
  #273  
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Default Alitalia award tickets now bookable on delta.com

Just in case anyone's interested.

While airline miles can often be redeemed to fly on airlines that partner with the airline whose miles you hold, the process of finding availability and booking can sometimes be tricky (e.g. involving multiple phone calls), so it's always nice when an airline starts showing partner availability properly via their online booking tool.

Given that Mr and Mrs tonrob Snr. spend their winters in Italy this new development is one I might actually use, especially as Delta miles are just so easy to come by in large quantities using my SunTrust Delta debit card.
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Old Mar 4th 2013, 7:17 pm
  #274  
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Okay, I've got another question. Can you redeem Chase Ultimate Rewards miles with BA? We couldn't find a good flight with United so we're going with BA. However, the only credit card on the BA website is their VISA card. We like the look of the Chase Sapphire better. Can we therefore apply for the Chase Sapphire, book our trip on BA and then use our Ultimate Rewards point to redeem with BA? I've checked through the BA and Chase websites and can't find anything specifically confirming this. Many thanks again for your help.
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Old Mar 4th 2013, 8:07 pm
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by gatsbygirl8
Can you redeem Chase Ultimate Rewards miles with BA?
You can transfer the points into the BA Executive Club program. Or you can call the Ultimate Rewards travel number, or go online, and use the points towards a ticket on just about any airline.
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Old Mar 4th 2013, 8:29 pm
  #276  
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by lansbury
You can transfer the points into the BA Executive Club program. Or you can call the Ultimate Rewards travel number, or go online, and use the points towards a ticket on just about any airline.
Great. Thanks for your help!
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Old Mar 4th 2013, 11:07 pm
  #277  
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by gatsbygirl8
Okay, I've got another question. Can you redeem Chase Ultimate Rewards miles with BA? We couldn't find a good flight with United so we're going with BA. However, the only credit card on the BA website is their VISA card. We like the look of the Chase Sapphire better. Can we therefore apply for the Chase Sapphire, book our trip on BA and then use our Ultimate Rewards point to redeem with BA? I've checked through the BA and Chase websites and can't find anything specifically confirming this. Many thanks again for your help.
Also consider AMEX cards that earn Membership Rewards points. Those points also transfer to BA - normally at 1:1 but over the past few years they have run transfer bonuses 2 or 3 times a year, whereby when you transfer to BA you get a bonus of 30%, 50% etc. (bonus varies per promo).

The AMEX cards that give you Membership Rewards include Premier Rewards Gold, Gold Business, Platinum, Mercedes Benz Platinum and Platinum Business.

Sign-up bonuses vary, but you should in general be on the lookout for anywhere from 50,000 points to 75,000 or even 100,000 points. Also, unlike Chase, AMEX will pay out a bonus for the same card type more than once per lifetime. (Usually ok 12+ months after you last held a card of the same type but check terms before applying the second time around).

These cards are generally (for me, anyway) apply and then ditch after 11 months before the annual fee becomes due, as fees on these cards can be a bit steep. I just grabbed my second Gold card a couple of weeks ago giving 50,000 points after spending $1,000.

If your credit's ok you could always double up by applying for the Chase Sapphire plus one of the AME cards - both on the same day (so they're less likely to spot each other's credit enquiries).
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Old Mar 5th 2013, 10:49 pm
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Exclamation AMEX Gold Business - 75,000 points sign-up bonus

Expires 14th March. Need to spend $10,000 in 4 months. This is as good as this deal has been over the last couple of years.

Points transfer 1:1 to BA, Delta, Virgin Atlantic, Singapore Airlines and more. Transfer bonuses are relatively frequent to BA.

Fill your boots.
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Old Mar 8th 2013, 5:19 pm
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Tonrob - I need your opinion. I need to fly business class IAH - LHR.
My preference is to fly either BA or United (for cc and reward reasons), however I can get a much better fare if I fly AA through BA then any other option.

I've never flown business on AA - is it a good experience? It's about a $2k fare difference as opposed to BA/United options.
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Old Mar 8th 2013, 5:35 pm
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by Bink
Tonrob - I need your opinion. I need to fly business class IAH - LHR.
My preference is to fly either BA or United (for cc and reward reasons), however I can get a much better fare if I fly AA through BA then any other option.

I've never flown business on AA - is it a good experience? It's about a $2k fare difference as opposed to BA/United options.
Here's a review I found by the Points Guy on AA's older angled lie-flat international business class seats. The words "not if you paid me" spring to mind. They are introducing their "next generation" business class product, which is fully lie-flat, but I'm not following the roll out closely enough to advise. I'd suggest you find out the aircraft type and then try Flyertalk. I haven't set foot on an AA international service for several years (on purpose), and my only recent experiences with them were their flagshit first class JFK-LAX and back (dreadful) and also short-haul domestic first (even worse, of course) about 3 years ago (that said, both trips cost me $2.50 each way and my tolerance level does adjust accordingly under such circumstances).

One thing's for certain, and that is that the ground services and hard and soft product onboard the IAH-LHR flight will all be inferior to BA's Club World. That said, $2K is $2K - so perhaps the decision should be based on whose $2K it is..?

Last edited by tonrob; Mar 8th 2013 at 5:39 pm.
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Old Mar 8th 2013, 7:47 pm
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by tonrob
Here's a review I found by the Points Guy on AA's older angled lie-flat international business class seats. The words "not if you paid me" spring to mind. They are introducing their "next generation" business class product, which is fully lie-flat, but I'm not following the roll out closely enough to advise. I'd suggest you find out the aircraft type and then try Flyertalk. I haven't set foot on an AA international service for several years (on purpose), and my only recent experiences with them were their flagshit first class JFK-LAX and back (dreadful) and also short-haul domestic first (even worse, of course) about 3 years ago (that said, both trips cost me $2.50 each way and my tolerance level does adjust accordingly under such circumstances).

One thing's for certain, and that is that the ground services and hard and soft product onboard the IAH-LHR flight will all be inferior to BA's Club World. That said, $2K is $2K - so perhaps the decision should be based on whose $2K it is..?
It's company money but its an internal cost rather than being on a project where the cost is passed on so I do need to watch the cost.

I've done a bit more checking and managed to find a United fare for $3,500 which is 35% of the BA fare and less than the AA fare too so I'll stick with United even though I'm no longer their biggest fan. Their business product is fine and I'd find it hard to justify a fare for BA that's 2.5x more expensive.
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Old Mar 9th 2013, 10:51 am
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by Bink
It's company money but its an internal cost rather than being on a project where the cost is passed on so I do need to watch the cost.

I've done a bit more checking and managed to find a United fare for $3,500 which is 35% of the BA fare and less than the AA fare too so I'll stick with United even though I'm no longer their biggest fan. Their business product is fine and I'd find it hard to justify a fare for BA that's 2.5x more expensive.
Do you already collect United miles (or miles in the programme of any other Star Alliance carrier)?
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Old Mar 9th 2013, 1:41 pm
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by tonrob
Do you already collect United miles (or miles in the programme of any other Star Alliance carrier)?
Yes. I collect both BA and United on flights and with credit cards. It just depends on where I'm going.
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Old Mar 11th 2013, 4:32 pm
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Is there any way to search for flights that I can use my BA companion voucher on?

I have 2 vouchers, 1 will expire in January 2014, and I would like to use it this year, we also have thousands of miles. I'm open to where we go, there are loads of places we would like to visit, but would just like to search on companion voucher and dates. Any suggestions?
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Old Mar 12th 2013, 11:27 am
  #285  
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Default Re: Traveling cheaply and well using miles and points

Originally Posted by N1cky
Is there any way to search for flights that I can use my BA companion voucher on?

I have 2 vouchers, 1 will expire in January 2014, and I would like to use it this year, we also have thousands of miles. I'm open to where we go, there are loads of places we would like to visit, but would just like to search on companion voucher and dates. Any suggestions?
First things first, here's a general overview of the BA companion voucher from The Points Guy (for you or anyone else who's interested).

As for finding availability - you simply(?!) have to search for (and find) two seats available for award redemption, on the same flight and in your desired cabin of travel (please tell me this is business or first).

While BA miles can be redeemed on all of the various One World airlines, those done in conjunction with a companion voucher must be on BA-operated flights - so for you this means going to (or via) London.

When you search on ba.com, if there is no availability on your chosen date they show a nice calendar as to when other dates in the same month have availability. Availability often (but not always) gets loaded at some point 300+ days in advance, but then they often load additional award seats as the dates get nearer if they think the flight will be undersold. Best availability between US and UK is via routes that have multiple flights per day - especially from the east coast. From the west coast - BA had just announced that one of their first routes for the A380 is one of the LAX-LHR runs (from mid-October) so that might increase capacity on that route and therefore open up availability a bit (although mile-collecting plane geeks have probably wiped out a fair amount of that for the first couple of months).

Moving on from LHR, short haul is easier to find seats on, long-haul less so. A nice short-haul-dressed-as-a-long-haul is the 747 BA uses on one of the London-Moscow runs if you fancied going there. As you are looking to travel outbound before the expiry date of your voucher then this lack of flexibility may work against you.

Mrs tonrob and I will be letting a companion voucher go unused this year because we simply didn't need to use it for anything. We always make sure to get one each year just in case, as I don't see it as a waste as you get miles for your sending anyway - but this is as long as the act of meeting the spend doesn't in any way interfere with our other main mileage earning activities (which it doesn't).

Let me know how you get on.

Last edited by tonrob; Mar 12th 2013 at 11:31 am.
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