DAY 9 - Other Novel Ways to Earn More Miles!

So, at this point I have already talked to you about credit card bonuses, manufactured spending, and earning miles from flying. There's plenty more where that came from!

Car Rentals

 

Almost any car rental can be credited to almost any airline. You can do this in one of two ways: directly with the rental car carrier, or by booking your rental car through your airline's website.

Example... if you book your rental car using Southwest.com, you can earn 650 bonus miles per rental, and save off of retail price with several carriers.



If you are booking your rental car using the carrier itself, you can earn by making sure you select the airline you wish to earn with, when purchasing your reservation. You may have to pay a small additional fee to earn airline miles on a car rental, so make sure the fee is worth the miles.

Hertz has this drop box when filling in your billing information:

 

Hotels

 

Most frequent flyer programs allow you to link your paid hotel stay with your mileage account to earn either a bonus, or extra points per dollar spent. Just like with rental cars, you can book your hotel through the airline, or the hotel's site.

Delta has a unique program where you can earn Delta SkyMiles, and also SPG Starpoints on conjunction with each other:

 

 

Shopping Portals

Most major airline, and credit card programs have an online shopping portal where you can earn substantial miles just by doing the regular online shopping that you always do. All you have to do is get to a shopping portal, click through to the retailer you were going to use anyway, purchase something, and voila! points!

Many of them run promotions, especially during back to school spending times. Here is the front of American's today:



It's easy, and takes only a few extra steps:

1. Sign in to your frequent flyer account. I'm using American's here as an example.

2. Get to the shopping portal by following: Home > AAdvantage Program > Earn Miles > Retail and Dining.

3. Click on any store listed in the portal, and you will be redirected to that retailer's site.

4. Shop, and earn miles!



Each of these will give you a multiplier on every dollar you spend. Naturally, when you spend using a credit card, you will earn 1 point for every dollar from your credit card rewards points, or, if you are purchasing from Staples here, using your Ink Bold... you'll get 5 points for every dollar, because it earns 5x at office supply stores! DOUBLE DIPPING! AA miles, and extra Chase Ultimate Rewards points, YAY!

Any time I am going to be purchasing something online, I always check the website EvReward to see which programs are offering bonus miles. That way you can best decide which shopping portal will reward you the best, if you have multiple FF programs, like me.

For example, if I know I'll be spending money this upcoming Mother's Day to send my mom flowers, I will go to EvReward, and search FTD.com for example.


As you can see, Delta and United reward handsomely for being nice to Mom this Mother's Day. Saves you from having to search each program's shopping portal to see if FTD is a partner.

 

Rewards Network: Miles for Eating Out

Most major frequent flyer programs also have a corresponding dining network through a company called Rewards Network.

Follow the same path for clicking through to American's program:

Home > AAdvantage Program > Earn Miles > Retail and Dining

Or, if you want to choose a different program, go directly to www.rewardsnetwork.com




After signing up, you enter your credit card information with that airline’s program. Every time you use your card at one of the eateries in the network, you’ll earn up to 5 miles for every $1 you spend. You earn miles on your food, drinks, tax, and tip.

You can only register a credit card with ONE airline dining program at a time.  I usually register my Chase Sapphire card because it earns 2X miles on travel and dining. So for example, your registered CSP card will earn you AA miles, or United miles but NOT both. If you register your card with the AA dining program, but after a week also register it with the United dining program, you will only earn miles with the last registered program (United in this example). I prefer to link all my cards to one airline for the greatest impact.

I don't go out of my way to choose restaurants based on if they're in the program or not, but it's a nice surprise when you get an email saying that you've earned miles for spending that you were going to do anyways! I earned 115 American miles from my bar tab at an Irish pub on St. Patrick's Day, and didn't even realize.

 

Airlines have other partners, some that don't even make sense!

When I log in to my Delta account and search for some other partners, I stumbled upon this:



 United, has all these ways:

Some of the options to get miles are incredible values, and some are marginal, at best. For each one you have to do the math of how much the miles are worth and how much time or extra money you’re spending to acquire them. You also need to consider if the miles are worth less than any extra costs associated with earning them. I prefer methods that use as little of my precious time as possible!

I hope I've opened your eyes to learning that

You can earn miles from anything, and I mean anything.

It may be worthwhile to root around on the Earn Miles page of your favorite airlines, and see where you could be earning, and better yet, double dipping by earning miles for things you were already going to spend money on anyways!

What if you don’t want to spend time sifting through all those pages? My favorite way to keep in the loop of the best opportunities to earn miles is to check FlyerTalk's MilesBuzz forum daily. These guys do the dirty work, and they are super helpful in recommending where you should be banking your spend to get the most out of your buck. In it you’ll find all the best portal bonuses, all the deals I’ve mentioned in this post, and much more.


Peace, love, and an extra pack of peanuts,

LC