Correct Ways To Use Your Miles For Holiday Travel

Travel over the holidays is expensive – even for frequent flyers! Seats fill out quickly, airfare skyrockets, and often your hard-earned miles aren’t enough to get a good ticket. Since the demand is so high, airlines have no motivation to offer deals, so for a good award fare, people will often be forced to deplete their painstakingly collected miles. However, you don’t have to lose your miles like that over the holidays.

With the Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks coming up, we thought it best to share a few tricks on how to use your miles for holiday travel:

1. Hoard Miles:

The simplest – and the most tedious – way is to collect as many miles as you can. The best way to do so is with a credit card that is attached to an airline’s loyalty program. If you have a good credit score, then you shouldn’t have any trouble getting a card with a thriving rewards system. Every time you use that credit card to eat, drink, shop or stay at the hotel, you’ll be earning miles.

2. Buy Miles:

Airlines often sell their miles at discounted rates, so keep your eyes open online throughout the year. For your winter travel, check which flight requires the least number of miles. You can then use a mileage calculator to see how many extra miles you’d need for that trip. If you can’t find deals directly from the airlines then you can also buy miles from 3rd party websites which sell airline miles at discounted prices. Some will even help you secure last minute business and first class tickets on a discount!

3. Be Flexible With Your Dates:

Air traffic is the most crowded the week of Christmas as that’s the most suitable time for everyone to travel. Flights during that week are the most expensive so don’t fly then. Fly the week before or the day after Christmas. Start planning your trip ahead of time and keep checking fares multiple times a week. Some travel websites give you a miles summary of every flight so you can then choose a flight which will consume your miles the least. If you’re a working professional then ask your boss if you can work that last week remotely. Such an arrangement can get you a good awards deal. If you can’t travel beforehand, then the day after is perfect. Yes, Christmas will be lonely at home but you’ll save so much money – and miles!

4. Travel AnyWhere:

If you’re a travel junkie then this is the best solution for you! Just look up online which route has the least expensive tickets, use your miles for a luxurious journey to a foreign destination for a truly memorable time of your life. They said unplanned trips are the best ones, and they’re right! So open your computer and see which part of the globe to trot over next. You’ll have a thrilling adventure with the least expenditure of your miles.

The holiday season is upon us! We wish you all the best and we hope you wisely use miles for holiday travel.