Booking last minute flights can be a challenge in itself, but if you know where to look and the options available it may make it easier or cheaper to book it while you might still be able to maximize the value on the same.
​Below is what I have learnt in booking last minute flights and it might be useful for you:
Start out with Skyscanner:
Skyscanner provides a meta-search engine which sources not only from the international airlines but often times from the regional/domestic airlines as well (which may be cheaper to book). It also provides something call as "maps" feature which allows to look for options by selecting your source airport. If the place you are flying in-to is an expensive one sometimes the neighboring airport might be cheaper to fly into. Below is an example view when you select your "flying from" airport.

As you can see from above, it also provides suggestion as well as an idea on what general prices you are looking at. If you are looking at specific dates then it may be easier to just search from home page, by selecting specific airports.

Search Google Flights next:
Google Flights has become go-to place to search for flights off late. It has much of its roots from ITA Matrix. You can easily search with multiple airports for both source and destination. This is a useful feature because you might find an alternative flights between different pair of airports which could be much cheaper and thus worth that extra travel trouble. Let's say you are looking to fly from San Francisco (SFO) to Hong Kong (HKG) on Oct 15th. Below is an example one way search which shows cheaper one stop options if you are willing to switch airports.

Search for reward flights next:
While the above flights example looks pretty cheap it is always prudent to search the "reward flight cost" for the same route/airports. A cheaper last minute ticket might be sometimes the one booked with miles! You can easily search the cost of reward flight by going to "milez.biz" and using their award calculator with just entering source and destination without entering the mileage program. Below is an example search for SFO-HKG which reveals the cheapest round-trip mileage cost of 45,000 miles + taxes/fees with ANA program. Do weight that not all airlines would allow one-way redemption of tickets and the taxes/fees might vary across programs (not to mention the "last minute booking" charge). 

Next search the flexible currency portals:
If you have flexible points currency and the credit card which gives higher redemption value when you book for travel you should search on their booking website as well. If points redemption shows similar price as shown by "Google Flights" or "SkyScanner" then it might be worth to just redeem those points. Few of the flexible currency which give higher airline redemption value are:
Citi ThankYou points redeemed for 1.25x value when you have their "premier" or "prestige card.
Chase Ultimate Rewards points redeemed for 1.25x value when you have their Sapphire Preferred, Ink Plus or redeemed for 1.5x value if you have Sapphire Reserve card.
U.S. Bank Altitude Reserve rewards redeemed for 1.5x value either through their travel portal or using their "real time mobile rewards" for flight redemption

So, here you go. Hopefully above will make it easy to maximize your cash, miles or points while making that last minute booking.

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IHG has launched the Q4 2019 Accelerate promo valid for stays from Sept 1st, 2019 to Dec 31st 2019. You can register for the promo here. The promo provides for bonus points for completing various tasks which includes booking stays at various hotel brands, staying X number of nights or booking special rates or booking via their IHG App. The promotion is targeted with folks having different points earning offer based on their past stays and/or having IHG Credit Card from Chase. This offers could be useful in racking up Priority Club points if you already have planned stays coming up and can align some of them for this promotion. You can effectively use the points on some of "PointBreaks" hotels at discounted points rate of 5k, 10k or 15k IHG points.

Below are few of the offers available on our family accounts:
Offer on Account A: Stay a total of 5 nights and earn 22,900 IHG points: 
This offer has interesting aspect of earning 4,500 IHG points for staying 1 night on points+cash. If done correctly all tasks can be completed by staying 4 fully paid nights and 1 points+cash night.

Offer on Account B: Stay a total of 7 nights and earn 40,000 IHG points:
This offer requires total of 7 nights. 3 stays has to be Weekend nights (Fri+Sat or Sat+Sun) thus 6 nights plus an additional night to get the complete points of 40,000. 

Do remember you can complete only some of the tasks and still earn partial points. None of the offers below are mattress run worthy, but if you already have stays coming up you would want to register for this promo and take advantage of the bonus/extra points offered.

So, go ahead and register for this promotion right now and it might earn you some extra/bonus points for any of you upcoming stays with IHG.
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Delta Skymiles has been regular in doing flash sales where they discount the mileage cost of reward tickets to various destinations. We have wrote about this regular flash sales in the past and you can find one of our posts here. This time they are discounting flights to various Caribbean destinations and although they advertise the cost starting from 16k+ miles (plus taxes and fees) and certain restriction on dates / city pairs you can find deals from lot more cities and dates starting at 14k+ miles round trip! You can find the current set of deals listed here but "do not trust what you see" as you may be positively surprised when you do the actual search for your dates.

For e.g. although not being listed as discounted cities you can find round trip tickets from San Jose (SJC) to Los Cabos (SJD) starting at 14k miles round trip. The best part is if you plan to leave on Friday/Saturday the mileage cost does not increase by much and you can have 4-5 days of short beach vacation!!

So, if you are looking for quick Caribbean vacation and have Delta Skymiles to spend do check out this flash sale. 

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Mastercard updated some of the benefits available to all U.S. Based consumer card holders of World and World Elite Mastercard back in April of 2019. The most common cards which are "World Elite" are Citi Premier, Citi Prestige and Barclay Arrival+. Below are few of the benefits added which are useful in today's world of ride shares, food delivery and cell phone services. ​

$10 of Lyft credit every month:
Lyft ride sharing service has tied up with mastercard to provide "World Elite" cardholders $10 in credit each month in which you take 5 rides. The credit expires 30 days after it has been added to your lyft account. Simply add "World Elite" qualified mastercard to your lyft account and activate it in "promos" tab in the lyft App (You might need to update the lyft app to its latest). More details about this can be found here.

$5 off Postmates order of $25+:
Postmates food delivery service will give you $5 discount on every order of $25+ (before taxes and fees) when you pay using your "World" and "World Elite" mastercard. This is a useful and repeatable benefit for folks who are regular users of Postmates delivery service. More details about this can be found here. 

Up to $1,000 in Cell Phone Protection:
"World Elite" mastercard holders who pay monthly cell phone bill with their card can claim up to $1,000 per year ($800 max per claim, 2 times a year) for any damage/repair to their phones or if their phone is stolen. The benefit is directly provided by mastercard but is secondary to any coverage already available. 

Apart from above there are other benefits such as 5% back in rewards with Boxed, identity theft protection, other travel benefits. Details about all the benefits available can be found here.

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City National Bank Visa Infinite is a unique card which comes with a special benefit of $100 Visa Infinite discount air benefit where you get $100 discount on purchase of between 2 and 5 U.S. domestic round trip coach tickets. The benefit is available only on select "Visa Infinite" credit cards in the United States. The terms and conditions of the benefit can be found here. One of the other card with similar $100 discount benefit is "Ritz Carlton Rewards Visa Card". 

The discount is applied per ticket purchase so if you have party of 2 travelling and you are looking to purchase tickets which are cheap then the discount can be substantial as the only requirement for the discount is that the total cost has to be more than $100 for the discount to be applied. Let's look at the example below for round trip flight from SJC-LAX-SJC for 2 persons.

As you can see from above 2 persons can travel for the cost of 1 person with this discount. Also both the passenger can earn redeemable as well as elite miles for the air travel.  Another benefit is that the discount is available for unlimited number of trips throughout the year.

Also the benefit is available to the authorized users on the credit card. CNB Visa Infinite Card allows maximum of up to 3 authorized user on a credit card (No additional fees) and thus a family of up to 8 can easily maximize the benefit by booking in pairs of 2 tickets on each reservation. 

CNB Visa Infinite Card currently has sign up bonus of 30,000 points after spending $3,000 or more in first 90 days. These points can be redeemed for travel through their portal for minimum of $300 or can be redeemed for gift cards etc. Although the card is one of difficult one to get but it comes with amazing benefits out of which one is the $100 Visa Infinite travel discount.

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American Express has one of the common benefit across all credit cards which is called Amex Offers. These offers provide discount in the form of statement credit or membership rewards points for purchase at certain merchants. While some of these offers are targeted, most of them are available to all customers. The offers usually have rebate in the range of 10% to 25% depending on the merchant. American Express also provides "Amex Offers for travel". Below are some of the offers available as of now.

As you can see they are different offers available with hotels and airlines. For hotel offers, although you need to make booking online you can pay with the card enrolled in the offer at the time of check out. This also present's a nice stacking opportunity. For e.g. Hilton Honors Aspire Card provides $250 resort credit every year at participating resorts. This could easily stack with the $100 back on $500 spend on Hilton Brand Hotels in Europe if you have that offer added to your Hilton Credit Card and use it for paying at the participating resorts in Europe.

The other example of possible stack is if you have Delta Offer above of $40 back on $200 which can stack with the Companion ticket which comes with Platinum Delta Skymiles or Delta Reserve credit card. 

Since American Express only allows one Amex Offer of given type across all American Express card on person's name, it would be best to add the offer to the credit card where you can possibly stack. So, next time you see any travel Amex Offers do not forget to add it to the card where you can maximize it!!

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Alaska Airlines credit card is issued by Bank of America in U.S.A. Although the card has annual fees of $75, it does comes with a decent sign up bonus for 25k to 40k miles and a great companion fare ticket which you receive after the minimum spend requirement and then annually after paying the annual fees. The companion fare allows the purchase of companion ticket for $99+ taxes and fees (Or for $0+ taxes and fees for 1st year of companion certificate if you had hop on the promotion last year).

Alaska Airlines maintains an FAQ for the companion fare, but the real incredible feature is not mentioned there. Below is the quick summary about the companion fare:

• The companion fare can be used to book tickets for any 2 person as long as the ticket is purchased and paid with the credit card of the person who was issued the companion pass (Note: Starting Oct 1st, 2019, Alaska Airlines will require the use of Alaska Airlines credit card for purchase of the ticket).
• All economy class tickets can be booked with companion fare, in fact you can book up-gradable tickets which can be later upgraded to premium class using cash, miles or upgrade instruments.
• Both passengers on companion pass tickets earn full redeemable/elite mileage as well as any bonus associated with the actual fare purchased. 
• The ticket only needs to be purchased by the expiration date on the companion certificate, but the travel could be up to 12 months in the future. (Note: Any itinerary cancellation or changes after the expiration of certificate might void the certificate for future use).
• You can travel to any of the 115+ destinations of Alaska Airlines using the companion fare including Canada, Mexico and Costa Rica.
• The companion fare can be used to book one way, round trip, multi-city itinerary where the companion ticket costs only $99+taxes.

There are other details/restrictions of the companion fare and the official Alaska Airlines blog details the booking process, but the biggest highlight is the multi-city itinerary. Since you can enter up to 4 city pairs online you can technically have two stopovers of as many days you wish before you hit your final destination. Take a look at below example:

As you can see from above, you can fly from Honolulu to San Jose and to New York and back all in for a great price and stop at multiple locations for a good amount of time. That's a lot of flying. On top of it you can have open-jaw ticket flying in and out of different airport and thus you can maximize your companion fare further.

Given that each passenger would also earn 1 mile for each mile flown, you would earn good amount of miles. Also Alaska Airlines partners with various international airlines such as Cathay Pacific, Emirates etc, so in addition to Alaska Airlines you can redeem your miles on these partner airlines as well. So, if you are on the sidelines but do plan to travel with your companion and stay close to Alaska Airlines flight destinations, you would definitely want to take a look at Alaska Airlines credit card!

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U.S. Bank Altitude Reserve Card is a premium version of credit card offered by U.S. Bank. One of the main feature of this card is capability of earning 3x points on all mobile payments spend (Apple Pay, Samsung Pay, Google Pay etc) as well as certain travel spend. There are other compelling features such as Priority Pass Select, TSA Pre or Global Entry Credit of $100, $325 Annual travel credit for eligible travel reimbursement but the card comes with hefty annual fees of $400. 

As per recent reports folks when ask for retention offer are offered 5,000 to 10,000 points retention offer after one year when 2nd year fees are billed or due on account. But what if you are not given that offer and you want to cancel or downgrade your card but have points available in your account? Below are you options..

1. Transfer points to Spouse or a Friend:
You can transfer points in any amount to your spouse or a friend who has either the U.S. Bank Altitude Reserve Credit Card or the U.S. Bank Flexperks Credit Card. All you need is there credit card number (account number) and you can do the transfer olline..

2. Real Time Mobile Redemption Rewards:
The great thing is U.S. Bank Altitude Reserve Card has something called as Real Time Mobile Redemption Rewards where you can redeem each of your Altitude Reserve Points at 1.5 cent value as statement credit when you make a travel purchase directly with Airlines, Hotels, car rental companies, taxis, limousines, passenger trains, and cruise lines. This also includes rides with Uber and Lyft in United States. Although there are limits on minimum amount you need to spend of $250 for car rentals and $500 for lodging; for other categories you can redeem for as low as $10 of charges. 

So you can purchase airlines gift card (American Airlines, Delta Airlines, Southwest Airlines and Alaska Airlines sells gift card which can be purchased online) and redeem the real time mobile redemption at value of 1.5 cent/point. (The only requirement is that the charge has to be less than the available points value available for redemption for using Real Time Redemption Reward).  You could also redeem them for airline ticket and subsequently cancel those ticket before 24 hours cancellation period and retain the statement credit for the same.

This is the easiest way of always getting a value of 1.5 cent/point and redeeming all your points before you go ahead with your cancellation or downgrade of the credit card.

So, go ahead and redeem those points for cash before you cancel your card.

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Aeroplan has current transfer bonus of 35% more miles when you convert your Marriott Bonvoy points to Aeroplan miles. Usually Marriott points transfer at ratio of 3:1. Transferring 30k Marriott points would yield 10k Aeroplan miles. The current transfer bonus offer of Aeroplan is set to expire on 06/26/2019. Below is one example of how the offer would work.

If you are planning to take advantage of this promotion, do remember to check the award space including the phantom space on Aeroplan website before you transfer any points as otherwise you might be out of luck. Below is an example search which shows availability for Singapore Airlines in Business Class.

Given above it might be easy to believe that award is available to book with Aeroplan miles. The important thing to remember is to click the "Book" button to see if it allows to go forward. Usually if it is phantom space as is the case above it will error out saying the space is not available. Alternatively you can call Aeroplan and confirm the availability with them before you transfer your points. 

The above will ensure that your transferred miles are put to use as intended. Aeroplan miles expire after 1 year of no activity on the account so only transfer if you have immediate use and the award space is available.

​Disclaimer: Some of the links used in the post may be referral links and earn referral to this site. We appreciate you supporting the website.

As Lyft expands its service in the United States it is also expanding the partnership where you can earn miles and points as well as cashback for the rides taken with them. You do need to link up your mileage or points earning account to earn miles and points. Below are the current partnership where lyft provides potential to earn miles/points.

JetBlue Lyft Partnership:
JetBlue offers existing Lyft users opportunity to earn JetBlue points for rides to/from airport. You need to link your JetBlue account with lyft. For every ride taken you earn 30 JetBlue points. Although those are small amount of points they are free. More details can be found here. 

Delta Lyft Partnership:
Delta Airlines has also partnered with Lyft where you earn 1 mile/$ for non-airport rides and 2 miles/$ for airport rides for exiting Lyft users. This has potential of earning variable amount of Delta Airlines miles depending on the cost of the ride you take. You need to link your Delta Airlines account with Lyft to start earning. More details can be found here. 

Hilton Lyft Parnership:
Hilton Hotels has partnered with Lyft where you earn 2 points/$ on shared ride and 3 points/$ on all other Lyft rides. You can earn variable amount of Hilton Honor points based on the spend. You need to link your Hilton Honors account with Lyft to start earning. More details on this partnership can be found here. 

Earn Cashback with Ebates App:
Although not a significant amount you can earn cashback for every ride you take with Lyft while launching the Lyft App from Ebates App and booking your ride. As of this writing Ebates is offering $0.25 per ride but in the past it has been as high as $1. So, if you have cashback account with Ebates it would be nice to earn cashback for the ride you are going to take anyway. More details can be found on this blog post. 

When linking the accounts make sure you enter the names correctly. For e.g. Delta Airlines webpage will throw error if you do not enter correct name as per your Delta Airlines Mileage account. 

So, get going and link your accounts today so you earn the miles/points on JetBlue, Delta and Hilton. Also do remember the cash back through Ebates App.

Disclaimer: Some of the links used in the post may be referral links and earn referral to this site. We appreciate you supporting the website.