Anyone who followed our 3 Cards, 3 Continents challenge back in the fall may remember Greg’s culinary concierge Maisie. Greg showed that he could find award space for two to fly both of them around the world in luxury. This must have given Maisie a taste for business class travel, because this past week she dropped in to get some advice from Greg for a last minute trip of hers.
In this video you’ll watch the steps Greg takes to review all the reward options based on Maisie’s travel constraints and points on hand. You’ll watch him search for rewards with Roame.travel, Point.me, and Award Logic. With these three tools, (and even Google Flights), he got a good idea about what was available and how many transferrable points Maisie would need to book them.
In this case, he worked with the following constraints to help Maisie out:
- She wanted to fly from Detroit to Lisbon
- She didn’t want more than one connection.
- She wanted something comfortable (better than the $1,100, multi-connection economy flight she found on her own)
- She needed something with a reasonable cancellation fee, since her schedule was up in the air.
- She wanted to fly within 2 days.
Watch the video to see what Greg was able to find for her, (and a few tempting options that didn’t quite fit the bill). As you’ll see, the steps are actually fairly simple, but it does require a good bit of research before the final decision is made.
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Very helpful video, thank you! I hope Massie got a great trip.
Maisie is how I found Frequent Miler in the first place, and I have since gone back and listened to every podcast episode. Great video!
Great overview of all the award search tools! Excited that there is now a free tool like roame.travel
I agree!
Great content!!!
I love Maisie’s enthusiasm and hope she had an awesome trip! Thanks for walking us through this. I get really nervous and this helped me breathe and make my redemptions. Also – the reminder that business can be less than coach?! Game changer! Thank you!
I did, Robin, thank you! Thanks to Greg’s tips I had a WAY better experience than I would have on my own. I can’t believe it’s possible to find these flights—if you know where to look, of course! I’m a Frequent Miler convert for sure.
This was super helpful—and encouraging. Thank you. Couldn’t help being excited for Maisie!
Thank you, Kris! I had a blast. I even wished the flight was longer so I had had more time to sleep after dinner (!!!). Unfortunately my bag didn’t make my connection. It wasn’t anything to do with the airline or flight; it was just French workers being French. They were striking so fewer people were working that day. Le sigh.
Great stuff! I am curious why you decided to jump to using seat.aero when point.me works well? I believe you did this when you started looking for Lufthansa F class. Just curious.
Point.me works great if you know your origin and destination. I used seats.aero because it lets me easily find all Lufthansa first class availability regardless of which airport pairs are involved.
“Greg just dangling caviar and top shelf champagne in front of my nose.” Lol… that greg… such a tease.
SUCH a tease. C’mon, Greg! Where’s the caviar?!
What a fantastic video! Thank you. I know it can be off putting looking at these relatively new tools and this really helps.
Really enjoyed this! It’s informative and interesting to see how to use some tools I haven’t tried yet. And Maisie is delightful.
Thanks, Mary! Maybe Greg needs to take me on other business class adventures. Whaddya think)!?!
Definitely!
Really enjoyed the video. Lots of information but the best part was that she actually got to take the flight. Nice job.
Indeed, Christine! AND the surprise was the chef who created the menu for AirFrance is a buddy of mine. Food was delicious and I got to text him some pics of it. He also replied and said “request a pillow!” I didn’t get the text til later so I don’t know if maybe there are premium pillows upon request?!
My only gripe—seriously—was that it wasn’t long enough. I would have loved a few more hours to sleep after such a good dinner…
good video. I have taken Lufthansa 1st a few years ago and i had caviar on the flight and was pampered, however i would not choose 5 hour layover or multiple stops just to be in first class.
Superb video. I love her question regarding transferring from chase to Amex or the other way. Obvious to those of us in the game for so long but not to most people. A lot of good strategies here. Good on ya
I’m a total noob! But getting more into it with Greg’s help and knowledge. This is a fascinating world you’re all such experts in and I’m just happy to be here!
Great video to show people how booking is done for business class flights! Keep them coming!!
Yes, Josh! Maybe Greg will keep using me as the Guinea pig. I’ll take as many biz class flights as I need to. All in the name of educational videos. ✈️