Booking award flights can be difficult, frustrating and time-consuming — but it doesn’t have to be. In the latest episode of Frequent Miler on the Air, we talk about the challenges of booking the best flight awards and how to overcome them.
Also on the blog this week, American Airlines Loyalty Points are here and the news is mostly good on that front. Greg spent most of the past month workationing in California, Capital One and Amex continues to dominate the credit card market, and Tim writes a thought-provoking piece about how we choose to use our miles and points. Watch, listen, or read on for more.
2:29 What crazy thing….did American Airlines do this week?
10:50 Mattress running the numbers / Mileage running the numbers
14:43 Main Event: How to find the best flight awards
20:29 Individual airline miles
22:15 The Kayak-like tools for award flights
32:22 Expert Flyer
40:27 SeatSpy
47:10 How do you know an award flight is a good deal?
50:44 What about booking through bank travel portals?
59:15 Question of the Week: Can you get the Venture X card if you already have two Capital One personal cards?
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This week at Frequent Miler
Taking search tool Award Logic for a test drive
When we recently wrote about Kayak-like award search tool Point.me, quite a few readers asked about similar tool Award Logic. I hadn’t previously used Award Logic, so I signed up and took it for a test drive. A major advantage of the Award Logic tool is that it returns results very quickly. On the flip side, the regular monthly price is a bit high and it doesn’t support quite as many programs as its main competitor. The nice thing here is that you can sign up for the monthly plan and get the first month for free, which gives you plenty of chance to play with it and decide whether it works for you.
Best ways to get to cities in the US and Canada using miles
Looking to travel domestically this year? You’re not alone. While travel restrictions have eased in many parts of the world, the risk of time and money spent in quarantine has domestic travel top of mind for many. This post has the best programs to use to book your domestic trips — and has been updated to add cancellation policies and a few new sweet spots.
Workationing the Pacific Coast Highway
Each passing sunset photo Greg posted to social media in the month of February seemed to be set to a soundtrack that consisted of a single Beach Boys song on repeat (♫ Wouldn’t it be nice…♫). Ah, the benefits of telecommuting. Greg spent most of last month on the California coast and he got the chance to check out a bunch of hotels that may be of interest to those looking for the next work-from-hotel locale. I feel like I’m built for California, but I’ve never driven Highway 1 beyond Monterrey — I certainly look forward to following in Greg’s footsteps someday.
American Airlines Loyalty Points Now Live – Tracker Showing On Accounts
If you have been playing the American Airlines Loyalty Points game, you can now track your progress. There were some pleasant surprises this week as Loyalty Points not only posted for transactions the way we expected they would, but some of us got a bunch of Loyalty Points that we expected we wouldn’t. Game on!
Greg’s American Airlines Loyalty Point Progress
Does slow and steady win the race? If you believe it can, Greg has a fighting chance at reaching American Airlines elite status. Personally, I think he has set himself up for a tedious slog by missing out on some of the easier opportunities for American Airlines Loyalty Points early on. Still, he’s on his way and if he can indeed keep up the pace, he should at least make it to the finish line even if not the fastest in the race.
American Airlines is finally fixing its elite upgrade process
Suddenly finding yourself with American Airlines elite status? You may be very happy to read about the new upgrade process. On the other hand, if you previously purchased 500-mile upgrade stickers, these changes probably seem less customer-friendly.
Greg’s Top Picks for March: Amex & Capital One Dominate
Isn’t it strange to see Capital One dominating the top of a list of blockbuster credit card offers? Sure enough, the Venture X and Capital One Spark Cash Plus for Business credit card offers are huge opportunities, though Amex hasn’t been left behind either. Chase and Citi just haven’t made much effort to keep up with the leaders of the pack, but it is still great to see such a wide range of cards with offers listed as “excellent”. There is no doubt that the strong offers are sticking around for a while longer.
Hyatt Regency Huntington Beach: Bottom Line Review
Maybe it’s because I’m a child of the 90’s, but literally all I associate with Huntington Beach is the Huntington Beach “live cam” that used to show at the entrance of like every Abercrombie & Fitch (of which there were an overabundance at the time). I have what I am sure is a completely inaccurate image in my mind of Huntington Beach thanks to A&F that just hasn’t ever drawn my interest. I’m less turned off by the large factory resort than Greg is, but his review didn’t make me feel like this is a must-see on my next trip to Southern California.
Is the Maldives really overrated? The myth of one-size-fits-all.
Tim writes a thought-provoking piece here that echoes many things I’ve thought over the years. Every time I see a post about one redemption or the other being “overrated”, I have a similar mental reaction: popular places are usually popular because they are enjoyable. That’s not to say that every place will be enjoyable for every person, but I have often said over the years that tourist attraction A or B is famous for a reason. Spoiler alert: this post isn’t really about the Maldives, nor do I think everyone should go there, but I do think that Tim hits the nail on the head when he says that it is easy to “punk rock” our travel. I definitely had that phase (the “punk rock” my travel phase, not the “punk rock” phase) and I love getting off the beaten path but I no longer close myself off to things I might enjoy just because they are popular.
IHG Rewards Calendar: Two ways to find it
Got IHG free night awards? Here are a couple of ways to find availability to use them that you may not have realized existed thanks to the way that IHG likes to hide its most useful tools. I’ve been using the former method for years, but the latter was a nice surprise that I would have missed if not for Tim’s post.
That’s it for this week at Frequent Miler. Keep an eye out for this week’s last chance deals so you don’t miss those opportunities before they are gone.
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ExpertFlyer no longer has access to Delta or Virgin Atlantic (perhaps others as well?) award availability and haven’t for some time. They are aware of this and still advertise this capability and allow users to perform searches. Queries are returned with no results; however, cross referencing Delta’s site shows availability.
I really enjoyed the “How to Find the Best Flight Awards” podcast. One thing I don’t like about many of these search tools is that they can’t seem to find accurate Premium Economy awards. They either don’t bother or on some airlines (Like United) the results are polluted with economy plus versus true PE.
That’s a good point. It’s a fairly recent development to be able to use miles to book premium economy at all, especially on partner airlines. And it’s still not an option with most types of miles. Until it becomes standard, my bet is that many tools will continue to only partially support premium economy award searches.