Travel Tips: Beginner's Guide to Using Points to Travel | Part 1

Let me start by saying I am not an expert on using points for trips, but over the years I've learned lessons (often times the hard way) and through all the traveling I've done, I've come up with the following tips and tricks to getting your money's worth with credit card and loyalty points.

1.  Follow blogs that document this sort of stuff.  

My favorite is The Points Guy and I follow him regularly to hear all his great tips for using points and making the most of them.  

Also sign up for your loyalty programs emails, that way you'll be notified of deals.

2.  Depending on your location, choose loyalty programs wisely.

You definitely want to choose points programs you will be able to utilize, for example, I live in the Pacific NW where Alaska's hub is, so I try to fly Alaska or partners of Alaska more than I try to fly United for example.  Then when we go on larger trips, we try and choose airlines that are already part of my loyalty program partners.  That way the points rack up a lot faster and you don't have a lot of little random points accounts. 

3. Utilize credit card points & bonuses.

Nick and I both have credit cards for airlines like Hawaiian Air and Alaska because we fly them so often.  It makes sense for us to have those cards because they are the majority of our travel each year in our area of the world.  Beyond that, I do open up cards every once in a while if they are offering a great bonus to sign up, but beware of yearly fees and interest rates before you sign up & then cancel the card later on if you're not using it.  

4.  Use points for hotels over flights.

In my experience, especially flying overseas, many points programs might look good until you realize how much you still have to pay in surcharges and fees even when using points (especially airlines like British Airways).  So I try to find good flight deals and just pay cash for them, then use my points for hotels and car rentals without having to pay a dime.  Which these expenses, usually end up costing more than the flights anyways.  

For our Ireland/Scotland trip later this year, I used our British Airways miles for really nice hotels for almost our whole trip (including our London hotels which are quite expensive) and didn't have to pay anything.  

5.  For those random loyalty accounts where you don't have enough points for major flights or hotels, use them for rental cars or other intra-continental flights.

For example, Nick and I had a couple Lufthansa accounts from a couple years back which we never fly anymore just because it isn't convenient for us, so while I didn't have enough miles for long haul flights, there are plenty for rental cars or short intra-Europe flights which end up saving you quite a bit of money.

Any questions on specific points topics, you can email me and I can try to help if you're planning a trip.
Have a great weekend!