When I left for my first RTW (Round The World) trip I got my main two flights totally for free. That was Chicago to London and Osaka to Miami both flights cost me nothing more than taxes and fees. Now what kind of witchcraft is this! It’s not witchcraft it is just cleaver spending. I am an amateur at this heck I could even be considered a hobbyist really. But because I am able to do it that means you can too.
The key ingredient incase you hadn’t guessed already is Airline Miles, lots of them. Miles have come a long way and have become crazy easy to acquire as of late. Just about every flight I take is with miles now. But how do you get enough? Where do they come from?
Credit Cards
This is your main source of miles. Most credit cards now have a huge sign on bonus in miles for spending a certain amount. My first experience with this was getting my British Airways Visa card from Chase a few years ago when I was still just dreaming of traveling. They had some crazy offer where if I spent $3,000 in 3 months they would give me 100,000 miles. That was enough miles for 2 round trip tickets to Europe from the US. I couldn’t believe it but I signed up anyway and gave it a shot.
At the time I spending tons of money so the 3,000 spend was easy to get to and just as they said 100,000 miles were put in my account. I continued to use that card as my “everything” card for the next few years. By the time I decided to finally go traveling I had over 200,000 miles! I was getting 1.5 miles per dollar spent and had some bonus amounts thrown in.
The main way to rack miles is with the sign on bonuses these cards give out and not your daily spend. You get a massive boost of miles when you sign up so try to pick cards that maximize this bonus. Most cards give about 50,000 on sign up right now and that one time bonus is enough for one round-trip coach ticket to London from the US.
Where Can I Go?
So say you have 200,000 miles. That’s got to be worth nothing right? Up until a few years ago I thought the same way. Isn’t it like impossible to get enough miles for a flight, and don’t they have these ‘black out dates’ or whatever the TV talks about.
They don’t! Maybe in the past this was a horrible ordeal and not worth the trouble but now it’s incredibly easy. So much so that I don’t see any reason to pay for airline tickets anymore unless I really have to.
Here is a little break down. My miles were with British Airways (BA) they are called Avios. BA is part of the One World Alliance of airlines so the miles are good on any other partners also, so you have a million flight options.
BA calculates its miles to ticket rate on distance and has zones at different mile rates. They even have a little tool called the Avios Calculator to tell you the miles you will need. For example Miami to Los Angeles one-way is 12,500 miles, so round trip is 25,000. Another example is Chicago to London, one-way is 20,000 miles or 40,000 round-trip.
The Miami to Los Angeles is with American Airlines and will cost you $2.50 +taxes/fees. The Chicago to London is with British Airways and will cost you $0.00 + taxes/fees. My fees and taxes have never been more than $300 USD. Usually a large part of this fee is the airport taxes. Landing in London is not cheap. But it is much much cheaper than if I had to also buy the complete ticket.
How Do I Spend Them?
To use your miles you just need to sign up for an account with the airline where your miles are. Each airline has a way to search flights and usually a check box that says miles or reward tickets. If you find the flight you are looking for this way you can just book your ticket right then and there with the airline at their website.
If you have a more complex flight in mind or need to plan really far ahead you can search for your flight on Orbitz or whatever site you choose. Find the flight date, time, and number and write it down. Then you just need to call the reward/mile desk for your airline and tell them you want to book a seat on that flight. They usually will charge you a small fee of $25 for the booking but you will be all set to go.
I have done all of my bookings on the British Airways website since it usually finds the flights I want and searches its partners for me. The only issue I run into here is that they can be horrible with the dates of flights. My Japan to Miami flight would only show available seats two weeks before the flight date. But this does not mean that there were not flights available. I could have just called in my flight details for piece of mind ahead of time.
Conclusions
If you are just using your debit card for purchases or some random card you got you are wasting your time and money! If you really want to travel or even just need tickets to visit family then you need a card that will get you airline miles. You don’t want a generic points card because points do not always equal miles. My grandmother has a PNC Bank Visa card with 86,000 points on it and they will give her $75 at amazon or a fancy toaster, coffee maker, or waffle iron. What a joke! 86,000 miles with BA would be two round trip tickets to London! Make sure you get a card that will turn your points into usable miles at a 1:1 ratio.
It is well worth your time to take a few hours and really research the different credit cards and airlines. Save your miles for a crazy massive trip, or use them to visit family for the holidays. Either way it’s a great way to put your money to work for you. Every dollar you spend in your normal life brings you one step closer to where you really want to be.
If you are looking for more information about miles programs there are a millions blogs and forums around the net that will teach you more. The #1 form is FlyerTalk.com for Blogs check out ThePointsGuy.com, FrugalTravelGuy.com, or MillionMileSecrets.com these people do this kinda stuff almost professionaly.
[…] Flights for Free […]