Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is happening now! Follow us as Greg, Nick, and Stephen compete to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines before November 23rd. Who will complete the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
Brex Cash is offering one of the best deals in miles & points right now. You can sign up for a free account, with no credit pull, and earn 110,000 transferable points after $3K spend. That’s phenomenal. The only catch is that you need to own a business that is registered in the U.S. as an LLC, LLP, C-corp, or S-corp. For details about the deal, see: Brex Bonus – 110K transferable points without a credit inquiry. And, if you’re considering setting up your own LLC (hopefully for other reasons, not just this), see: Nick’s experience setting up a new LLC.
If Brex approves your account and you complete the bonus requirements, you’ll end up with at least 113,000 Brex points. If you’re only interested in cash, you can redeem those points for $1,130 and call it a day. If you’re interested in travel, though, you should pay attention to Brex’s option to transfer points to airline programs. In some cases, it’s possible to get far more than $1,130 in value from your points that way.
At the time of this writing, Brex points can be transferred 1 to 1 to the following programs:
- Aeromexico Club Premier
- Air France/KLM Flying Blue
- Avianca Lifemiles
- Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
- Emirates Skywards
- JetBlue TrueBlue
- Qantas Frequent Flyer
- Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
In a recent Ask Us Anything episode, a participant asked me what I planned to do with my Brex points. While I don’t have a set plan, I thought it would be fun to lay out some ways in which I’d love to use my points. These aren’t necessarily the most practical uses of miles, but they’d be awfully fun…
Emirates 1st Class, Newark to Athens or JFK to Milan
85K one-way or 135K round-trip with Emirates Skywards miles
This would be an awesome way to fly to Europe! While Nick has flown Emirates first class, I haven’t yet. Fortunately, Emirates no longer charges exorbitant fuel surcharges and so booking flights like these with Emirates miles is a very good deal. I could fly one-way to Europe for only 85,000 miles, but round trip for 135,000 miles is an even better deal. To make up for the extra miles needed for this round-trip flight, I could transfer 1 to 1 from Amex Membership Rewards, Citi ThankYou Rewards, or Chase Ultimate Rewards.
Another great option is to fly the same routes on Emirates business class for only 90,000 miles round-trip. Business class passengers also get access to Emirates’ famous on-board lounge:
Lufthansa First Class to South Africa (One-Way)
105K miles with Avianca Lifemiles
Lufthansa offers an excellent first class in-flight product (no suites though) and fantastic ground services when transiting Frankfurt. Normally when booking Lufthansa with airline miles, you’ll pay exorbitant fuel surcharges. Fortunately, Avianca Lifemiles doesn’t pass along these surcharges for award flights.
Flying from Detroit, I could get to South Africa on Lufthansa with just one stop in Frankfurt. Sometimes Lufthansa offers first class on the leg between Detroit and Frankfurt, but not always. Fortunately, if I fly that leg in business class, the entire flight gets cheaper. See: Avianca LifeMiles’ awesome mixed-cabin award pricing. First Class for less.
If I did my math correctly, it would cost 105,000 miles to fly the entire trip in first class, or about 93,000 miles to fly to Frankfurt in business class and then to South Africa in first class.
The hard part about booking this trip is that Lufthansa usually only releases first class award space to partners about two weeks before the flight. If I was serious about booking this, I would use a fully refundable award currency to book another flight just in case Lufthansa first class awards didn’t materialize when needed.
Cathay Pacific First & Business Class to South Africa (One-Way)
107K miles with Cathay Pacific Asia Miles
Cathay Pacific is known to have one of the best first class products available and so I’d love to try them out. One great use of Cathay Pacific Asia Miles is to fly a very long distance with one leg in first class and another leg in business or economy. By adding that less-than-first-class segment, you can actually lower the total cost of the ticket vs. flying the one first class segment alone. See: Cathay Pacific Asia Miles mixed cabin award pricing. First class for less.
Cathay Pacific no longer flies first class between Hong Kong and South Africa and so, a great option is to fly U.S. to Hong Kong in first class and then onward in business class to South Africa. The total cost for this mixed cabin award: 107K miles.
Singapore Suites: JFK to Frankfurt (One-Way)
86K miles with Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer miles
Singapore Suites are awesome. I know because I once flew Singapore Suites from Hong Kong to San Francisco and I loved everything about it. The flight attendant practically had to drag me off the plane kicking and screaming when we arrived in San Francisco. Singapore Airlines no longer offers suites class on that route, but they still offer it for their New York to Frankfurt, Germany flight.
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One thing I’m wary about with Brex is leaving points there for long. I realize they have some decent transfer partners and that is usually the best value, but this isn’t Amex/Chase/Citi. If these guys go BK when the venture cap money runs out, your remaining points are worthless. If they ever actually open my “approved” account, I will either transfer the points immediately or take the penny per. I don’t think the added flexibility of transferable Brex points is worth the risk of losing those points or having them devalued with little or no notice (bigger risk here than the big banks).
That’s a really good point and something I’ve been thinking more about lately (as more and more people run into problems with Brex). If you don’t have immediate use for the any of the transfer partners then I’d either cash out to cash or transfer to Lifemiles (since it is easy to keep those miles alive long term).
what’s the easiest way to keep lifemiles alive, transferring in another 1000 or donating 1000?
Transfer points in. Spending miles doesn’t reset the clock. https://frequentmiler.com/how-to-keep-your-avianca-lifemiles-alive/
This article depresses me
I love the idea of listing great redemptions but I think that a basic caveat is important: in 3/4 of your examples, it’s impossible to find two saver seats in first class. Maybe I’m being presumptuous here but I think that most of us wouldn’t want to do something so potentially awesome alone. If I’m wrong and getting two first class saver seats on Singapore or Cathay is possible, please say so and I’ll be happy to be wrong.
I think that’s what makes it a dream use — if the stars aligned, these would be the top ways he would use the points rather than a post saying “here is the easiest way to use the points” (which he actually did — you can cash them out).
In terms of two saver seats on Singapore or Cathay, it depends on the situation I think. I’ve flown Singapore First Class several times with my wife. My Singapore first class flights weren’t the JFK-Frankfurt route but rather Sydney-Singapore and Singapore-Hong Kong-San Francisco (old suites from SYD-SIN and “just” regular first class SIN-HKG-SFO). That wasn’t a bad way to come home from Australia (and at least at the time it was 105K miles, so you could do it with this bonus at the time — I haven’t checked what the rate is today).
Two first class seats on Emirates is as you know definitely possible.
Lufthansa is possible, but only if you’re flexible enough to book within 2 weeks of departure. While that won’t be possible for everyone, there are certainly some readers able to do that (for example, I find that many people in this game are retired and could easily book within 2 weeks of departure — that obviously won’t apply to everyone, but it does apply to a significant enough number of people).
Cathay First Class is much harder. The past couple of years, business class availability has been excellent, but I’ve still not been able to easily find 2 seats in first class. I do know many people in “the game” who will book one passenger in first class and one in business class and keep a close eye on it waiting for a second seat to open in first. I know many who have succeeded in that. I’d never be able to do it because my wife would never be OK with us sitting separately if the second first class seat never opened, but again I know that some people are fine with that.
Again, these 4 uses are his dream uses as opposed to his “most likely” uses or the “easiest” uses, so I’m not sure that the practicality here is of upmost importance — but I do think that there are at least a segment of readers for whom these could be feasible.
Thanks for the reply. Sad when I can’t count to 4 but good to be wrong. I guess I should return to drinking coffee.
Is Singapore still offering 2 saver first class seats to the west coast? I thought they killed that off when they reconfigured to only one row of first class.
I’d read that Cathay stopped opening up a second first class award saver seat even to their own members.
Greg, I applied for a Brex account on my C-Corp 3 weeks ago. I have now received a couple of emails apologizing for being slow but that they also need more information. I can log on but the site just says my application is being reviewed.
How do I contact them? A phone number?
online chat?
Don’t see any online chat or any other contact method. Which makes me wonder:
What happens when your money disappears? Do you go on Twitter?
Why deal with a place that has no address or phone number? at least not one that I can see.
After logging in, click “support” on the bottom left corner. That brings up an online chat window.
Well, the problem was that even that didn’t come up. However, I don’t know, but I believe that the people at Brex may be reading your postings because suddenly I got an email response and within an hour all is sorted out! So, I am giving you, Greg, the credit.
Now I have to go back and read up on why I signed up for this in the first place !!
🙂
Have you (or anyone else) had the 80,000 bonus post yet?
Yes, most people who signed up early have received the 80K as far as I know (including me). They’ve been swamped with applications recently though so I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s now taking much longer.
I signed up for Brex and was approved, added funds, spent money, etc. But how do you remove funds from Brex -> any other bank account via the Brex portal? The only way to remove funds I can think of us to do a reverse ACH from an external bank account.
I haven’t tried yet, but my first thought would be to simply pull it out from whatever bank I originally pushed it in.
“Dream” uses is an appropriate word choice considering 3/4 are virtually impossible for the average person to book.
Regarding Brex approval, I’ve had similar issues to LD. They sent a message yesterday stating the 7 day TAT is now closer to 15 but they would provide an additional $25 credit once approved.
Are they impossible to book because availability is so scarce?
First class terminal != First class lounge 😉
Still waiting for Brex approval. Account opened 13 days ago, paid $20 to get the certificate of good standing from the state, uploaded and nothing. Got the card yesterday and can’t use it… LLC in business since 2012.
I suggest emailing support@brex.com and asking them when you can expect to have access to your account. I emailed 2 days ago, and they unlocked my account yesterday.
I’m in the same boat, applied weeks ago, got the card in the mail, can not use it yet because my account is still NOT approved. Got an email today saying, sorry for the delay, we are working on approving your card, give us another 15? days or so and we will give you a free $25 when it is approved.
Just got the same email – applied a few weeks ago. I was feeling like it wasn’t going to go through but the email made me feel… cautiously optimistic ??
They have both the first class terminal and first class lounges in the main terminals. If you connect through FRA and arrive on Lufthansa first, but onward isn’t in first then you get into a lounge rather than the terminal. My understanding is that there’s not much difference other than whether they chauffer you to the terminal.
I waited for weeks to be approved. Called, later sent an email. Finally receieved an email asking for a deck sheet on my business and an answer to whether or not I invested other people’s money in my business. As I was responding to that (and before they received it), my approval came through in a totally separate email. I emailed with Mitch and Blake at support@brex.com and both were very helpful. I honestly think they are just understaffed for the huge response. Maybe try an email to support? Don’t give up…good luck!