Boarding area has teamed up with American Express to offer a trip for two to the Gold Coast of Austrailia. See this official page for more details.
How To Enter
Simply leave a comment (at top of this post) in this post answering this question; What’s your top tip for travelers who want to earn and use their loyalty points?
My Tip
Since the question of the promotion is to share loyalty points earning and using tips, I”ll share mine. When booking your award tickets look into the use of open jaws or stop overs to ensure you get the most value out of your miles and trip. See my trip report here on how I used both an open jaw and stop over to get to the Seychelles, Mauritius, and Paris in business class all in one trip while using a minimum amount of miles.
Here are the details
- Seven nights/eight days hotel accommodations, transportation, meals, activities and round-trip airfare for two people to the Gold Coast of Australia (Queensland)
- Total value = $10,250!**
- American Express and Boarding Area are kicking in a combination of cash and cards to cover any related tax associated with the prize
- A winning reader will be chosen from a random comment selected on each blog, then 1 winner will be selected from the 20 blog selections
- The more you enter the more you have a chance to win
- Fine Print: Contest is only open to those 18 years and up/US Residents only (void in Canada and U.S. Territories)
Bottom Line
This is a great promotion being put on by American Express and Boarding Area. A very easy way to enter to win a trip to Austrailia for two. I would encourage you to visit the other participating blogs to get as many entries possible into this promotion.
About The Weekly Flyer
The Weekly Flyer writes about travel from a business traveler perspective. He travels the world every week accumulating points and miles along the way.
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I don’t always get to choose who I fly, so I make sure to maximise my miles by using companies with partnerships.
Be sure to keep an eye on those expiration dates! Sometimes simply renewing a magazine or buying flowers online will extend your FF miles expiration dates.
Read flyertalk and blogs like this one! Don’t redeem miles for flights (except BF upgrades, natch) until you’ve reached your desired elite status for the year.
One useful trick is to register for very promotion you come across on these blogs. Even if you think it cannot possibly apply to you (it may in the future), or if it’s just 50 miles (wouldn’t it suck to be 50 miles short for an award?), or for a program you don’t participate in (there are ways to transfer miles)… one never knows.
Read blogs like this one and grab the deals when they are there. Be sure to only apply for the most rewarding credit card and combine offers with your travel plans. If you don’t have one, just create.
Pick the best alliance for your travel needs, and back that up with another airline. For me, in Seattle, United (Star Alliance) and Alaska offers a good mix of earning and redemption choices.
It may take a long time to save the miles for two international premium class awards, so if you’re just a casual flier don’t worry about spending the miles on a domestic coach ticket – just make sure you’re getting a good value for the miles, such as using them for a late booking or a holiday period!
Use car rentals (which often earn pitifully small miles bonuses) to reset the clock on expiration of miles accounts in which you lack activity. This works not only mile accounts in your name, but for family members too: the rental companies report only the FF account number you give them, and not the renter’s name. I’ve used this many times without a hitch.
If you are about to lose miles or points, call the company and ask about ways to prevent such loss. Sometimes it as easy as registering a credit card for dining points and spending a few bucks at a nearby restaurant.
You can transfer SPG points to over 30 different airlines at a 1 to 1 ratio. Transferring 20,000 SPG points gives you a bonus of 5,000 miles, for a total of 25,000 miles — enough for a domestic award ticket.
Every mile counts so try to get every mile possible from dining, shopping etc. Use SPG as your primary credit card for easy ability to convert to other programs.
Decide on an airline/alliance, get the miles/points credit cards + PLAN AHEAD!!!!!!
Airline miles are usually more valuable than hotel points, in addition to all the perks reserved for elites. So the quickest way is to get an airline-branded credit card and shoot for the bonus miles.
Concentrate on one of the airline alliances, and funnel all of miles to one frequent flier program within that alliance. This way, you don’t “orphan” miles over several different programs.
My travel tips:
For airlines:
Get to elite status as soon as possible. Do Mileage Run if needed.
For hotels:
Use the promotions as much as possible. Do Mattress Run if needed.
(1) Never miss an opportunity to earn points, no matter how small; (2) Earn and burn — miles and points are only going to lose value with time.
There are so many ways out there to earn miles to get activity credit. Don’t let those hard earned miles expire. Use the shopping malls to earn with minimal purchases. Just remember to use the airline specific links to ensure you get credit for the spend.
Sign up for your points provider’s newsletter- and actually read it! You’ll often be pleasantly surprised by chances for bonus points. Consider buying points in small denominations when they are sold at a discount- I see them often listed at 20-30% off.
And follow your faves on Twitter, @IHG_Deals (I won 50,000 Priority Club points this way!) & @Lufthansa_USA for example have in the past offered points or flights as promotions- but there are tons of travel & points providers breaking into social media- if you have a good experience with a travel provider, talk them up on social media sites since they all like to build their reputations up with positive comments, etc.
And it’s a good way to keep up with special offers.
Read FT and these blogs for good tips, like 10k for car rentals and 20k for free hair appointments. Will definitely keep you updated as to the latest opportunities.
Network with frequent fliers.
Get a Hilton Surpass Amex and stay at lots of Hiltons, so you’ll earn 9 points to the dollar on every stay. Put $20,000 on your card in a year and score Gold VIP status with Hilton. Then, when you have 225,000 points, redeem them using one of Amex’ VIP Hilton special booking codes, GLONP, which will get you six free nights at a top of the line hotel in London – where the exchange rate isn’t favorable to U.S. travelers. You’ll wind up scoring a stay worth something like $3600, and it’ll only cost you about $8500 in spend if you stay at Hiltons a lot and earn the 9:1 rate.
Also – when you book the trip, use your Premier Rewards Gold Card to book your flight and get 3:1 Membership Rewards on the purchase. You can top up lots of airline and hotel programs using Membership Rewards, which makes it an extremely valuable card to carry (although I for one am very sorry to see Southwest Airlines leave Membership Rewards in June of this year.) You can even use MR points to transfer to Hilton at a great rate – more than 1:1 – so you can use them for another 225,000 point reward.
Also, don’t forget to add on Amex’ awesome baggage claim and trip delay protections, which will stop you from sightseeing in dirty clothes or having to sleep overnight in the airport – flights delayed more than three hours or past 9 P.M. mean you get generous rewards with these policies, up to $250 per night for a hotel. Enjoy!
Set up a Google Alert with keywords for your favorite airline’s name and something like “frequent flier miles” or “miles promotion”–go crazy and do all the combinations–it costs nothing and can help make sure you don’t miss out on an opportunity you might not have otherwise noticed.
Burn your miles for a few nice vacations with your better half. This way, you’ll at least find your keys still working when you get back from a MR.
Get a mile-earning credit card and use it for everything
Make sure your miles aren’t expiring.. redeem for a magazine or use the iDine service
My tips are simple: First, make sure you are earning miles/points on the major airline serving your home airport. Secondly, do the research on the best credit card for earning miles/points for the way you travel. There are many websites that will help you compare the various credit cards programs
Bonus offers from airline partners, like hotels. Some offer double miles for multi-night stays, etc.
Points have a cash value. Don’t get so blinded by earning a few more points that you spend way more that you may have. Sometimes a different brand may be a better value, even after loyalty.
Keep track of your credit score and if it can stand the small hit, apply over time, for a steady stream of credit cards that give you a sign-up bonus. Those bonuses are the foundation for building miles in many programs. You can easily earn 150,000 miles a year doing this, with no appreciable affect on your credit score. And you can do this for several years before exhausting all of the card possibilities.
Save your boarding passes. After your travel is finished, check your frequent flier account for the miles you traveled to show up. Once they do, you can toss the boarding passes. I use my boarding passes as bookmarks since I often travel with one or more new books. See, there’s two tips for the price of one!
My top tip is to try and accumulate miles in Membership Rewards by American Express since it allows you maximum flexibility to redeem the points and you can earn points for purchases, up to 10X points in the membershiprewards.com earn section and earn 3X points when you shop through the Bonus Points Mall® website.
My tip is always be aware of partnerships for both earning and burning. I know a number of people who have lost out because they’ve collected in multiple placed when they would have done better by collecting in one location–i.e. collecting on both United and USAir, or not knowing about Alaska’s various partnerships. Status in one progam is better than halfway to status in many programs.
Go with friends! It’s amazing how far you can get if you pool group resources — one person’s hotel upgrade with another’s free car rental etc. Works on three levels (1) You can often score a “stay with your friends” freebie (i.e., two of you have access to the first class lounge, the third can usually come along) (2) Friends who don’t have miles are often happy to pay any cash portion of a status change etc. as their contribution (3) Travelling companions!
Also, friends who “don’t bother” with “the whole miles thing” are often happy to lend a hand if you make it easier for them – i.e., “Hey friend, in advance of our trip – click this link, sign up for this promotion, earn 100,000 miles. I’ll show you how we can use them!” Then you have more to work with.
Read read read! Educate yourself! Learn the ins and outs of the mileage and award programs so you can get the best bang for your buck. Only a savvy customer gets the best deal!
Stick with one airline and hotel and even car company. It will be worth it when you can take a complete trip for free! Also, make sure you are signed up for all newsletters so you are aware of double miles/points, etc. And don’t be afraid to use the miles/points for upgrades!!
Run a few MRs or other enhanced itineraries in order to accumulate miles, once you have the miles redeem them for international Business or First class tickets… I spent 130,000 AA miles for a 20,000 miles RTW trip in Business Class
Use miles only for upgrades. It’s the biggest bang for the buck. It’s a total waste of miles for hotel nights etc. as well redemption reward tickets.
Pay for all of your purchases, no matter how small, with a mileage earning credit card.
When looking to book, use a dollop of ITA, gobs of patience, plenty of flexibility and a good dose of bull headedness.
Don’t overreach. If your travel is moderate, stick with one program and milk it all you can.
Try to fly only one airline most of the time. It is more likely that you will earn elite status than choosing the cheapest flights. It does eventually pay for itself.
Read BoardingArea blogs!
Stay loyal to one airline alliance or hotel brand. That’s the quickest and easiest way to accumulate points/miles and reap the benefits.
Do your research to find the alliance that best meets your needs. Also, subscribe to blogs such as this one for tips and advice on maximizing points!
Concentrate your loyalty to one hotel or airline program and try to earn the highest status level as possible in that program.
Use rewardsnetwork to earn miles on meals out. Even better if you can find a restaurant near work and do lunch runs for co-workers too to reap all those miles.
I try to accrue my miles flown to one FF account that will serve me best for future travel.
If the flight you want isn’t available, before paying double miles to get what you want, check business and first class, even for flights where the cabin makes little difference. Sometimes there’s unexpected availability for no extra miles.
Make sure to check the actual airlines/codeshares you’re flying on if you book from a third party site(especially discount ones) to make sure you get full mileage accrual.
Collect miles as cheaply as possible in one program and redeem on partner travel.
concentrate your earnings in one or two programs, and learn the rules going in, to maximize earnings, keep those points active, and get the best redemptions for you.