So much has changed in the dozen or so years since I began learning about airline miles and hotel points. Particularly on the credit card side, we’ve seen category bonuses expand and increase, coupon benefits spread, and annual fees climb. Surprisingly, one thing hasn’t really changed much at all over the last dozen years: the card most often recommended as the best starter rewards credit card. The new 100K offer out on that card reminds me of the excitement I had when I first added it to my wallet more than a decade ago, a sign to myself that I was on my way to a future of award travel. It is fun to ponder how little I knew at the time about the places the ensuing journey would lead me.
This week at Frequent Miler, we have all the details you need to know about that offer along with posts and a podcast about how to travel more for fewer miles, some strategy for saving on surcharges, and which of your cards we think will catch the coupon contagion next.
This week on the Frequent Miler blog…
Awesome new 100K Chase Sapphire Preferred Card offer available online
If you’ve been anywhere close to a miles and points blog over the past few days, you are no doubt aware that the 100K Sapphire Preferred offer is now available online. That’s exciting news because it represents one of the best deals we’ve seen on a consumer credit card at this price point. It would be easy to get far more value out of the bonus than the cost of your first year with the card. And it’s a great card to have for its built-in travel protections. It isn’t a great card for unbonused purchases, so it’s not a card that I recommend using for every type of purchase, but it is nonetheless a perennially popular starter rewards card — and what a start it is when it comes with 100,000 valuable, transferable points.
Sapphire Preferred 100K Q&A: Everything You Need to Know
Along with the excitement over the 100K Sapphire Preferred offer come many common questions. We’ve been asked many of the same questions repeatedly over the past few days, so Greg put together a full set of the most commonly asked questions along with simple, straight-forward answers.
Air Canada’s United devaluation hurts less if you travel more
If you pick up that Sapphire Preferred bonus and you’d like to travel to Europe on United Airlines, you might think that United Mileage Plus is the right transfer partner for you, but in reality Air Canada Aeroplan might be the ticket. That same business class ticket to Europe that United will sell you for 88,000 miles could cost 60,000 miles with Aeroplan — even if you’re traveling on United. This post will show you how to save miles by flying more.
How to Save Miles by Flying More | Frequent Miler on the Air Ep300 | 4-4-25 | Podcast
Air Canada Aeroplan isn’t the only program that offers the opportunity to save miles by traveling more. On this week’s Frequent Miler on the Air, Greg and I discuss a number of ways that you might save miles by traveling further, from pretty simple and straight-forward options to those that require more complex strategy.
Dumping fees when booking Delta One with Virgin points
Speaking of complex strategy, you’ll need a dose of either that or an influx of cash if you want to travel more on Delta with your Virgin points. That’s because Virgin recently jacked up the surcharges on Delta flights departing Europe, which makes it far more expensive to use your miles. However, in this post, Greg reveals some excellent strategies to book those same flights — without the ridiculous surcharges.
Which Premium Cards are Keepers?
The “surcharge” of keeping a premium credit card is the annual fee, and my goodness those fees have been climbing quickly over the past couple of years. As those cards get more and more expensive, you have to make sure that the math still works out for you to come out ahead. Keep in mind that an annual fee can be thought of as buying a subscription to a set of benefits that you may or may not use. This post gives you a simple spreadsheet to figure out which cards are worth it to you to have and hold in the long-run.
Which cards will be couponized next? | Coffee Break Ep51 | 4-1-25
Speaking of those premium credit cards, the latest popular trend spreading across the market is the coupon book model. We’ve seen more and more credit cards offer a set of coupon-like benefits that have no doubt been added to make the cumulative benefits sound appealing. In this week’s coffee break, Greg and I try to predict which credit cards we expect will be couponized next. I don’t want to be right about everything on this week’s show….but I think there’s a good chance that we have more hits than misses.
US Bank Card declined for an overseas purchase? Call the bank.
The comments on this post made me realize that I may have missed the mark on the title or explanation. US Bank is one of a few banks where I still need to set a travel notification before I head overseas to be sure that purchases will go through. However, in this case, I was sitting at home and reserving rental cars for international trips and the prepaid charges for the rental cars kept getting declined. Several readers note that US Bank seems to fail at any merchant that uses Visa or Mastercard “3D” verification, but there is a mechanism to call the bank and get the charges passed through, so don’t give up.
Best Ways to get to Africa using points and miles (2025)
Freshly updated for 2025, this post includes the best ways to get to Africa using miles and points. While Aeroplan doesn’t necessarily offer the best “deal” to get to Africa, the ability to add a stopover for 5K miles and the breadth of partners they have would likely make that program a good option. But don’t sleep on Alaska, either. With Condor serving a handful of African destinations and often offering decent award availability, you might find appealing options through Alaska, particularly as mixed partner awards get off the ground.
Best Credit Card Offers for April 2025
Our Best Credit Card Offers page is a labor of love. We constantly work to keep this page up to date with the best publicly-available offers on the Internet, so while you’ll see the page republished at the beginning of every month, you should know that we are making updates and/or checking offers daily to keep it up to date with the latest changes.
Current point transfer bonuses for April 2025
Like our Best Offers page, we keep the current point transfer bonuses page updated with the latest transfer bonuses each time a new one drops. I always check here when I’m pricing out awards to see where my points could go a little further.
Current Hotel Promotions for April 2025
This is another resource to bookmark for the times when you need to book a paid stay and you want to see which promotions you might be able to stack to get the most bang for your buck. I like having this one bookmarked so that if I get stranded and need a hotel unexpectedly, I can quickly reference any promos before I even start searching for a room.
That’s it for this week at Frequent Miler. Keep an eye on this week’s last chance deals to take advantage of the best of them before they’re gone.
Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
