The world of loyalty programs and rewards credit cards is a dynamic place. From award availability to the best pricing to the benefits on your favorite credit card, it is all likely to change over time. This week, some of those changes hit us fast and hard, like Southwest’s move to dynamic pricing and United’s sweeping credit card changes. But dynamic changes also mean new opportunities to look for the bright spots and opportunities and I’m confident that we’ll continue to uncover those as we all dig deeper into those changes.
One key thing that hasn’t changed: there are still many great opportunities to leverage miles and points for outsized value. Sometimes, they can be harder to find than before, but this week we refreshed posts about how to get to a couple of popular regions and a new video showing you how to leverage a powerful award search tool to find some of those “impossible” awards.
Read on for more in this Frequent Miler week in review.
This week on the Frequent Miler blog…
United’s overwhelming coupon-book onslaught
The United cards have gone for full couponification, with most of the cards picking up numerous dribs and drabs of mostly dull coupons. I especially hate that many of the cards carry one type of coupon that requires annual re-enrollment and that several of them offer not statement credits but United TravelBank credit, which is only good on United-operated flights. This post has all the detail you need to know about the numerous new coupons.
Which United card is best?
Not only were the United cards couponified, but the entire suite of cards underwent sweeping changes this week. We’ve seen changes in benefits and annual fees on many of them, and couponification from top to bottom. Given these big time changes, which United card shines a little brighter than the rest? In this post, Greg helps us digest the changes and find the diamonds in the rough.
Southwest provides updates re checked bags, dynamic pricing & more
Southwest provided updates this week regarding what to expect when they begin charging for checked bags, attaching an expiration to flight credits, and more. A bit of good news here is that a cardholder or elite member will get at least one checked bag and that benefit will extend to up to 8 people traveling on the same reservation. That will help alleviate some of the sting of the changes in my household as we’re usually traveling as a family of four and we won’t actually need more than four checked bags, which we’d get thanks to my wife’s Southwest credit cards. Get more info in the post.
Southwest variable award pricing is live and values range from 1.1 – 1.7 cents each
Southwest had recently announced many changes scheduled for May 28, 2025, including fees for checked bags and the re-introduction of expiration dates on flight credits. I thought that one of those changes slated to begin on May 28th was a move toward more dynamic award pricing. Unfortunately, the dynamic award pricing launched far earlier than we expected and is already live. It’s not all doom and gloom since some flights offer more value than before, and it may now be possible to book a Wanna Get Away Plus fare at better value than before (and then same-day change to the flight you really want). Unfortunately, when demand is high across the board, expect to see reduced value in the 1.1-1.2c per point range — and if and when that changes for the worse, don’t expect another announcement since dynamic pricing allows for stealth devaluation at any time.
Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Complete Guide
Given Southwest’s many “enhancements” as of late, it was time to update this guide to reflect where Southwest is at the moment and where things are headed in the near future. We’ll revisit this complete guide again soon after the rest of the changes go into effect in May.
Is Citi no longer allowing product changes between AAdvantage and ThankYou point cards?
Citi long had one of the most liberal product change policies of any credit card issuer. For years, it has been possible to product change between a co-branded product like an American Airlines card and a Thank You product like the Double Cash or Strata Premier. However, that appears to be changing. Many data points indicate that they are no longer allowing changes between families. I’m thinking that this might be foreshadowing the launch of American Airlines as a transfer partner — they probably don’t want people product changing from AA cards that earn 1 mile per dollar on most purchases to cards that effectively earn more AA miles per dollar spent on many purchases in the form of ThankYou points. I could be wrong, but that’s what I’m thinking.
Bilt’s April Rent Day promos: Up to 100% transfer bonus to Avios & up to 100% bonus on Lyft redemptions
If you’re sitting on a pile of Bilt points, the coming Rent Day may be of interest as it will be possible to get a transfer bonus of up to 100% for top-tier elites. Even without elite status, a 50% transfer bonus beats the best we typically see from any other rewards program. Given that we do sometimes see bonuses of 30-40% from Amex, I’m not sure I’d speculatively jump on this bonus at the bottom end, but those with Platinum status certainly may consider it at 100% given that Avios are among the more useful Bilt transfer partners. Just keep in mind that this will be valid one-day-only, on April 1st….no April fooling.
Should I pursue elite status with Alaska or American Airlines? (On Nick’s mind)
I’ve recently used a bunch of Alaska miles to book award travel. Given that Alaska Mileage Plan award tickets now earn elite status at a rate of 1 elite qualifying mile per mile flown, I expect my entire family of four to earn MVP status this year. However, I’d really like to have oneworld Sapphire status, so I’ve been asking myself whether it makes more sense to stretch onward to MVP Gold status with Alaska or to spend my way to American Airlines Platinum status. I tried to find the answer with this post.
Best ways to get to Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific using miles (2025)
If you’re dreaming of a trip Down Under or to the South Pacific, this post will cover some of your best options to get there — if you can find availability. Keep in mind that actually finding availability to Australia and New Zealand can be quite a challenge. If you’re really serious about planning a trip to this part of the world, you should consider taking advantage of award alerts from one of the popular award search tools. I recently scored a couple of seats to Tahiti thanks to having an alert set and being ready to pounce when that alert came through.
Mastering AwardTool’s 32 degrees of freedom (Video)
Speaking of award search tools, AwardTool is probably the award search tool I use the most. That’s not necessarily because it is better than all the others, but rather it is because of the ability to customize a 32-degree search to fit my specific needs, whether that be multiple departing airports, multiple arriving airports, or multiple dates — or whatever combination of those makes sense to fit my needs. We published a Youtube video this week to demonstrate this powerful feature of the tool.
Wyndham’s Excellent Point Sale | Coffee Break Ep50 | 3-25-25
This week’s coffee break is about the current sale being offered by Wyndham Rewards when you buy points. At the higher end of the spectrum, getting a bonus of 70-80% means the chance to buy Wyndham points for well below our Reasonable Redemption Value, and on this episode we use some examples to illustrate how that can be a great deal. Unfortunately, this sale doesn’t appear to be as broadly targeted as we initially thought. Still, if you’re targeted for one of those rates, it’s worth taking a look at your travel plans over the next year to see whether any of the best Wyndham point uses might fit into those plans.
Whitney Peak Hotel Reno (with world-record climbing wall): Bottom Line Review
A Tapestry Collection (Hilton) property with both a fun-looking indoor rock climbing facility and a the chance to scale the exterior of the building and live out all of one’s childhood Spiderman fantasies would almost make this place a must-do in Reno in my opinion. After reading Stephen’s review, this place will certainly be top of mind if we ever plan a trip to or through Reno.
Best ways to get to South America using points and miles (2025)
I’m in the midst of planning a trip to South America, so I was glad to see Tim refresh this post this week. The sweet spots we’ll use to get to and from South America are well-represented here, though I’m realizing that we should probably also include a section in these guides about the best programs to use to get around once you’re in a foreign region. See this post for the best ways to get to and from South America, but also be on the lookout for the next round of updates to hit this series of posts as I think it would be helpful to have at least a section dedicated to “best ways to get around South America”, too.
That’s it for this week at Frequent Miler. Keep an eye on this week’s last chance deals to be sure that you don’t miss any, particularly those expiring as the month ends in just a couple of days.
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If the Citi product change policies have changed because of a possible AA transfer partner, then how will cards like Double Cash or Custom Cash fit in that picture? Fact is none of the Citi AA cards earn 5X. Maybe there will be revenue sharing on transferred TYPs? Or perhaps those cards will be excluded? Lots of questions?
I suspect Citi doesn’t want an exodus from AA cards given the anticipated transfer partner agreement. Bad optics. Citi likely had to promise AA that there would be no cannabilization of AA cards.
That has been the excuse in the past. Hard to prevent if it’s TYPs in general. Maybe it will just be points earned from the Strata Premier.