Travel rewards can cut your costs for a dream trip by hundreds, even thousands of dollars. While collecting travel rewards points can be as easy as swiping your card every time you make a purchase. Using or redeeming your travel rewards to put towards actual trips can be a little confusing. Travel rewards come as both miles and points.
Here are the basic ways to choose a travel rewards card, and to redeem your travel points and use them towards personal travel:
1. Select your destination
The primary step you should take is to make a list of destinations. The type of travel reward card will depend upon the aspects of lodging and transportation you desire. You can check for the best credit card travel rewards online.
2. Sign-up bonuses always make a difference
When choosing a travel rewards credit card, there are numerous financial institutions to choose from. Start with banks that offer sign-up bonuses as a way to draw new customers. Remember that the welcome offers and the sign-up bonuses can help you earn conveniences for your travel, before you even start swiping your card. So if you’re planning a trip in 3 to 4 months time, take that time to start collecting enough points to take a better trip (i.e., upgrade hotel, resort, or flight). For example, the Chase Sapphire Preferred card offers 50000 reward points on an expenditure of $4000 in 3 months. You can also transfer your points to leading hotel and airline partners like British Airways, World of Hyatt, etc.
3. Air Miles
Airline Miles is the most popular travel rewards program. However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t other programs to choose from. Look to airlines who offer rewards programs, such as Southwest Rapid Rewards or JetBlue.
4. Transferable points cards
Many rewards credit cards allow flexibility as far as points transfers between cards. For instance, Chase Sapphire Reserve, Chase Sapphire Preferred, and the Platinum Card let you easily transfer rewards into travel miles.
5. Lodging credit cards
You can also take advantage of hotel stays via travel credit card rewards. So if you stay with the same hotel chain regularly, pick up a hotel credit card and collect points to redeem at other chain hotels under the same brand. If you pick a global chain, you can redeem lodging points and redeem them almost anywhere.