- Day 1 – What’s Travel Hacking all about?
- Day 2 – Getting Organized
- Day 3 – Types of Miles and Points
- Day 4 – Credit Card Strategy
- Day 5 – Southwest Companion Pass
- Day 6 – Business Credit Cards
- Day 7 – Hotel Free Night Sign-Up Bonuses & Annual Certificates
- Day 8 – How to Apply & Track
- Day 9 – Not Instantly Approved
- Day 10 – Meeting the Spending Requirement
- Day 11 – Cancel or Keep?
- Day 12 – Keep Miles from Expiring
- Day 13 – Shopping Portals
- Day 14 – MileagePlus X
- Day 15 – Hotel Stays & Rental Cars
- Day 16 – Dining Rewards
- Day 17 – Award Charts
Flexibility is the key to stretching your miles. In the last course unit, we saw the cost of a nonstop award ticket from Washington DC to Orlando, FL vary from 3,335 miles all the way up to 25,000 miles on a single day. If you had the flexibility to depart late at night and take the 9:50 pm Southwest flight, you would be spending a lot less miles.
One important thing I would also like to point out in the last unit’s example – do you remember in module 1 when we learned about the different types of miles and points? Do you remember Chase Ultimate Rewards as one of the flexible currencies? It turns out that Southwest, United, and British Airways are all transfer partners of Chase Ultimate Rewards. Having the flexible Chase Ultimate Rewards points gives you more options.
Did you also notice in the last unit’s example, under United’s award chart there were both two different economy award prices – 12,500 Saver award and a 25,000 standard award? Let me explain the difference.
Saver vs Standard Awards
Airline award charts typically have ‘Saver‘ award space and standard (anytime) awards. The saver awards are many less miles but also have less availability. Here’s an example of United’s award pricing for a ticket from Washington DC to Paris:
- Economy Saver Award tickets are 30,000 miles per person each way while the Standard Economy Award ticket is 65,000 miles per person each way
- Business Class Saver Award tickets are either 57,500 miles (if on United Flights) or 70,000 miles (if using Partner Flights) while the Standard Business Award is 150,000 miles
- First Class Saver Award tickets are either 80,000 miles (if on United Flights) or 110,000 miles (if using Partner Flights) while the Standard Business Award is 170,000 miles
As you can see by the numbers above, the Standard anytime awards are more than double the miles of Saver awards.
Saver Availability
Now let’s look at the availability of Saver awards. Here is United’s award chart for two people traveling to Paris from Washington DC in the next month. As you can see there is some saver award availability (both business class and economy). If these dates work for you, that’s great, if you wanted to fly on June 22nd, 23rd, or 24th – you are out of luck unless you want to spend a lot more miles. But if you are flexible with your travel dates and can make June 21st work, you would be able to snag the saver awards.
Now here’s the same search for two people traveling to Paris from Washington DC eleven months from now. Typically airlines open their schedules eleven months in advance. As you can see there is business class saver award availability every single day in April 2018. Booking far out in advance typically gives you more options. This is especially important to do during holidays and other peak travel times.
Alternate Destinations
But if you aren’t able to book that far in advance and you really wanted to leave the US on June 22nd, 2017, if you are flexible, you could fly to another city that is close to Paris. For example there is economy award space on June 22nd, June 23rd, & June 24th from Washington DC to Frankfurt. You can take one of these flights and visit Frankfurt for a day or two, then hop on a train or buy a cheap low-cost European carrier airline ticket to Paris.
Another example of an alternate destination, say you want to plan a beach vacation to Grand Cayman in the summer. It may be difficult to find saver level award availability for Grand Cayman, but if you were just looking for a beach vacation, it’s safe to assume that there will be saver level award availability to another Caribbean beach like the Dominican Republic or Aruba.
A few other ways to be flexible:
- Multiple-Destination Trips – if you want to visit a few destinations on a trip and are having trouble finding saver level award space, try reversing the order of the trip.
- Positioning Flights – If you live in Washington DC and can’t find any award availability to Paris, you can always check availability of different airports like New York or Philadelphia. Sometimes it’s worth it to pay for a cheap train ticket or domestic positioning flight to get you to another city if that city has award availability.
- Flexible points – in the last set of lessons, we learned about the flexible miles (i.e. Chase Ultimate Rewards) – if United doesn’t have award availability, we can always check Delta flights and transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards to Korean Air that can be used on Delta flights)
Need to Knows
- Being flexible is a key factor in stretching out the miles you have accumulated
- Flexibility includes time and date of travel, how far in advance you book, departure airport, destination, and airline alliances
- ‘Standard’ awards are more than double the cost of ‘Saver awards
