Am I eating the most possible miles?

This has been the year of the category spending bonuses!  I now find myself signing up for cards because of their spending categories, rather than simply their sign up bonus.
For example, the Chase Sapphire Preferred offers double miles on dining!  Being a fan of both Ultimate Rewards Points and American Airlines AAdvantage miles.

Let this post serve as a bit of a reminder that you can also register for the AAdvantage Dining Program and earn up to 5 American AAdvantage miles per dollar spent, in addition to the 2 Ultimate Rewards points per dollar spent.

All you need to do is sign up at:
http://aa.rewardsnetwork.com/

Read how it works, register ANY credit card with them (not necessarily an American Airlines card), then browse the restaurants in your area that are a part of the network!

The AAdvantage Dining Program is nothing new, but its amazing how many people either don't know about it or just pass up on these easy miles!

Happy Flying & Dining!

-Jason of TWiBT

Maximizing Points on Mother's Day!

Being recently married, I've found that there are now TWO types of points that I should be collecting.  Travel-related points and brownie points!  This post should help you with both!

Mother's Day is coming up and this is a perfect opportunity to maximize your mileage earning potential through ordering flowers or gifts from a couple different sites.  Some of the bonuses include:

-30 Miles per $1 spent on American, United, or Delta
-25 Miles per $1 on US Airways
-1,500 Point Bonus for Delta

For links & promo codes for all these promotions, check out the site "Heel's First Travel Blog"
http://www.heelsfirsttravel.com/2012/04/25/mileage-offers-for-mothers-day-flowers/

-Jason of TWiBT

"I want to travel for free, what is the BEST card right now?"

People:  Hey, that's amazing how you get to travel for free.
Me:  Yes, it is a lot of fun and quite addictive.
People:  Now that I see it is pretty easy, I want to do it too.  What is the best credit card for me to get to rack up some free travel?
Me:  How much time have you got to listen?

Newbies to frequent flyer miles are generally uncomfortable with the idea of opening a bunch of credit cards and/or checking accounts.  I monitor my credit like a hawk and I can reassure you that it doesn't affect your credit the way you think it would.  In the past year, both my fiance and I have opened many cards, checking accounts, and have even opened a mortgage.  After all of this, both of our scores are hovering in 740-760 range and we've never spent a cent in credit card interest, nor been late on a payment.   You need to be the same way if you are going to play this game.  If you don't pay your bill on time, close this website, find a new hobby.

There are many good travel credit cards on the market right now, so we'll try to narrow it down.  Let us go through a couple factors:

1.)  Assuming you're new to this world, you probably don't have a ton of frequent flyer miles built up, so you'll want something with a decent sign-on bonus.

2.)  You'll want a card that awards miles that can be used on an airline, rather than credit card points with a fixed value.  (ex:  CapitalOne Venture Card, Citi ThankYou Cards)

3.)  You probably don't have a specific airline that you are loyal to, so you'll want some flexibility.

4.)  You don't know how you want to spend your miles.  Flights?  Maybe.  Hotels?  Possibly.

5.)  The card should have opportunities to earn more than 1 mile per dollar.  (Ex:  Sapphire offers 2x miles per $ on Dining and Travel, also there are opportunities for huge bonuses on their Ultimate Rewards Mall).

This leads me to my suggestion.  I suggest you apply for the Chase Sapphire Preferred Visa.  Currently, it has a 50,000 point sign up bonus (after spending $3,000 in 3 months).  The points earned on this card can be transferred to a variety of airline and hotel partners.  It has bonus spending categories for double miles with dining and travel.  Also, it just looks and feels really cool.  No numbers on the front and its made out of some sort of metal.

See my full review of it HERE and follow the links to apply.

-Jason of TWiBT

Frequent Flyers in the News!

I always like to share stories of frequent flyers making the news and here's another one!  I recently attended a conference in Chicago to learn from and network with fellow frequent flyers.  ABC Nightline was there doing a story on our wonderful world of miles and sums it pretty nicely in a 5-minute video story.  You can see me in the audience, so I guess this elevates me to A-List celebrity status now?

Go watch the video and enjoy!

http://youtu.be/gt54Zb4mMc8

Mileage Runners in the news!

For those of you not familiar with what a mileage run is, it is when you take a flight for no other purpose than to earn frequent flyer miles for future travel/benefits.  To learn more about this, watch this video HERE.

This practice of mileage running has made the news, check out this article:
Mileage Runners

People who do mileage runs are usually focused on earning the sort of upgrades and services that are normally on tickets that can cost well over $10,000 each.  Upgrades to First Class, Lounge Access, legendary customer service!  Personally, I don't really do mileage runs, because I get more than enough miles from all the bonuses that go around.  Even still, I stretch my miles by flying coach a lot and taking advantage of transfer bonuses, so I don't really need to earn more miles with this method.  However, should I desire to start earning those sort of upgrades, mileage running is the best way to do it.  Everyone has different levels of obsession with this hobby!

-Jason of TWiBT

Frequent Flyer Documentary - Excellent Video!

Frequent Flyer Documentary

The hardest part of becoming a liberated traveler, someone who can travel the world for free on their terms, is always the first step.  When the average person hears that you and your fellow frequent flyer junkies are able to accumulate hundreds of thousands (or even millions) of frequent flyer miles for free, their initial reaction is that you are doing something wrong.  They will tell you that there is no such thing as a free lunch.  While I will agree with that, there are times when other people will buy you lunch for doing something.  This is what the game is all about.

There are many different methods on accumulating frequent flyer miles, which you will see as we cover the basics in our Liberated Traveler series.  This video is a short documentary that covers what this life is all about.  Personally, I use this video to convince people that there is a real and legitimate way to travel smarter.  Give it a watch and ask yourself if you are spending your money wisely on travel.  Enjoy the show!


Thanks for reading!  Please share and comment!
-Jason (TWiBT)

http://thisweekinbudgettravel.com/liberated-traveler-series-how-to-travel-for-free/