Stay ConnectedEarn miles without flying. Frequent Miler is all about getting the most out of the loyalty game. You can easily earn hundreds of thousands of points and miles without traveling, then learn how to use those points towards luxury travel.
In this podcast, Frequent Miler founder Greg, and senior author Nick debate current topics in the points & miles world.
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This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
On today's episode, we'll talk about the interesting new business cards from US Bank, discuss how Choice now gives you the choice to share points, how Bank of America points are soon to be transferable, and complete details of IHG's new credit card lineup.
(02:02) - Alaska News
Learn more about the Atmos debit card here
(10:43) - Chase card updates
(14:04) - Rove transfer bonuses
(18:41) - Choice point sharing now live
(20:45) - Hyatt promo: Earn 3K bonus points for every 3 nights you stay (Max 36K points)
Learn more about this promo here
(21:06) - Wow: A new 5% office supply store card from U.S. Bank hits the market
(27:16) - Amtrak added as a Bilt transfer partner; transfer ratio is 2:1
Read about Amtrak being added here
(29:01) - Bilt adds upgrade/downgrade terms and conditions
Read about Bilt's upgrade/downgrade terms here
(29:52) - Greg: Capital One is back, AA Globe is gone
(32:26) - Read more about the new IHG One Rewards Premier Select credit card here
And read about the changes to the rest of the IHG cards here: https://frequentmiler.com/all-the-existing-ihg-credit-cards-have-been-refreshed-here-are-the-changes/
(33:00) - IHG One Rewards Traveler Card
(35:42) - IHG Milestone Rewards
(39::36) - IHG One Rewards Premier World Elite Mastercard
(46:49) - IHG One Rewards Business World Mastercard
(51:35) - New Premier Select Credit Card
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
In our third check-in of the Wild Card Challenge, our contestant's were in their final destination, nearly done with their travels. However, judges and viewers were not quite ready to score everything we were catching up on. In this check-in, we scored the second destination's activities and caught up with what our travelers had done since then, in preparation to finish scoring and announce a winner soon!
(01:15) - Who is Annie?
(05:35) - A quick recap of where the scoring left off
(07:47) - Nick recaps his destination 2
(09:29) - Greg recaps his destination 2
(11:41) - Tim recaps his destination 2
(18:28) - Nick's scores for destination 2
(20:53) - Greg's scores for destination 2
(24:00) - Tim's scores for destination 2
(26:43) - Invitation for feedback
Comment with your thoughts on how the scores could or should be adjusted here: https://frequentmiler.com/wild-card-challenge-the-scores-so-far-a-final-opportunity-to-influence-the-scoring/
(27:40) - Nick shares what he's been up to since destination 2
(35:34) - Greg shares what he's been up to since destination 2
(49:15) - Tim shares what he's been up to since destination 2
You can read more about Tim's award booking here: https://frequentmiler.com/costa-rica-to-korea-and-australia-on-one-business-class-award-tims-wild-card-challenge-journal/
(01:08:49) - Our favorite elements of each traveler's trip
Subscribe and Follow
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
While Greg and Nick, along with Tim, are traveling for the ongoing Wild Card Challenge, our podcasts will feature each of 3 live check-ins occurring throughout the challenge. On Saturday, we caught up with our Wild Card Challenge travelers for our second live check-in to discuss everyone's second destinations, (even though not everyone was still in their second destinations!) We started out by making some scoring adjustments based on your suggestions, so give the full video a look for some fun discussion around score adjustments!
What is the Wild Card challenge? For this challenge, our contestants have picked from wild card decks to set the parameters of their trips. First, they selected travel destinations, then hotel, airline, and transferable points cards, which provide their points and miles budgets. And finally, they selected power-ups and obstacles to make their travels a little more realistic to the challenges our readers and listeners face, and make things a little more interesting! Learn more about the ongoing challenge here.
(00:33) - Quick check-in on where everyone is
(03:55) - Review of previously assigned scores at the Destination 1 live check-in
(05:15) - We reveal our score adjustments, based on our feedback
(19:02) - Greg destination 2 summary
(26:52) - Nick destination 2 summary
(39:58) - Tim destination 2 summary
Tune in Wednesday, September 30th at 9AM (yes, that's AM) Eastern Time for our final live check-in in the third Wild Card destination!
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
Greg and Nick, along with Tim, are busy flying around the world for the Wild Card Challenge, which is going on now! That means they didn't have time to film our usual podcast episode. Not to mention, we want to make sure everyone gets the chance to hear an update for the first destination of the Wild Card Challenge, even if you missed the live stream last evening. In this episode, relisten to the Destination 1 travel summaries and scoring.
(01:17) - Greg summarizes his Wild Card Challenge Destination 1
(08:22) - Nick summarizes his Wild Card Challenge Destination 1
(15:21) - Tim summarizes his Wild Card Challenge Destination 1
(26:56) - Greg's scores
(34:10) - Greg offers a rebuttal for his scoring
(35:43) - Nick's scores
(46:41) - Nick offers a rebuttal for his scoring
(49:00) - Tim's scores
(54:57) - Tim offers a rebuttal for his scoring
Subscribe and Follow
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
Citi has added a valuable new transfer partner to their collection: Japan Airlines. This is good news after a roller coaster of good and bad news from Citi, but even this good news comes with some bad news too.
(00:17) - ThankYou Rewards: For the best transfer ratios, you need: Citi Strata Premier℠ Card, Citi Strata Elite℠ Card, or the old Prestige card
(00:41) - Citi ThankYou roller-coaster
(02:11) - New: Added JAL but with lifetime language...
(03:37) - Why JAL is amazing
(09:02) - On the other hand...
(09:42) - Citi advantages
(11:37) - Citi disadvantages
Subscribe and Follow
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
Is this points & miles hobby worth my time? Reader John asked this question recently, saying:
Do you ever calculate the return on your time in the points and miles game? We spend a lot of time talking about return on spend and cents per point, but I rarely hear anyone talk about return on time invested. For me, points and miles are a hobby, not my job, so I sometimes catch myself asking whether saving an extra $200, or getting that credit or getting another 30,000 points is really worth two or three hours of my time. I tend to think about what my time is worth financially, but I also think about the opportunity cost. That might be time with my family (which really prompted this question) , working on my business (this honestly has much better return) , exercising, or just doing something else I enjoy.I know you guys sometimes go to extraordinary lengths because there is value in being able to report the results to your readers and listeners. But outside of the journalism side, do you personally put any value on the hours you spend playing the game?
(01:04) - Why Greg's answer is "Absolutely!"
(07:14) - Why Nick's answer is "Yes and no."
We’ve been answering a reader or listener question at the end of each Frequent Miler on the Air podcast episode. Now, we’ve turned the question of the week into its own weekly episode. Tune in every Monday at 1pm for our Question of the Week podcast. And if you have your own question you’d like to submit, you can send it to mailbag@frequentmiler.com.
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
In today's episode, we'll get a Wild Card challenge update (including some cool tips regarding Capital One travel), Greg reveals that he's considering a United status match, Nick reveals he's considering a Delta status match, and we discuss the latest huge Delta card offers and how they relate to status matching.
(01:22) - Learn more about the ongoing challenge here.
(03:01) - Nick's Wild Card update
(09:52) - Greg's Wild Card update
(17:16) - Find the Wild Card challenge landing page with more information here
(17:39) - Patrick asks, "Do we make hay while the Amex sun is shining, or are we crazy to keep piling into a currency we’re already very rich in?"
(22:43) - Amex/ANA
(24:40) - Award Wallet is changing how expiration alerts work
(28:50) - Chase news...
(35:04) - Qatar Airways removed restrictions that limited the ability to redeem Avios for other people
Read more about this update here
(37:25) - Efteling: Book it through any of the major channels. Theme park tickets included with your stay!
(40:57) - Greg's considering the 120-day United status match
(45:36) - Nick's considering the Delta status match
(49:58) - Through November 4, Amex has some of the biggest welcome offers we've ever seen for Delta credit cards... all the way up to 200,000 miles...
(50:28) - Some notes before we dig in...
(56:13) - Quick overview of the 6 cards we'll be talking about
(1:01:45) - Gold card offers
Learn more about the Consumer Delta Gold card here
Learn more about the business Gold card here
(1:05:18) - Platinum card offers
Learn more about the Consumer Delta Platinum card here
Learn more about the Business Delta Platinum card here
(01:10:06) - Reserve card offers
Learn more about the Consumer Delta Reserve card here
Learn more about the Business Delta Reserve card here
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
Many hotel cards come with free night certificates each year upon renewal. That's great, but those certificates expire after 12 months. If you don't time your applications well, you may struggle to use those certificates...
(00:17) - Greg's been considering getting the Hilton Aspire, but... is this the right time?
(01:05) - Example Problems
(03:55) - When do free night certificates post?
(07:52) - Nick & Greg's thoughts/analysis
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
For this challenge, our contestants will pick from wild card decks to select which hotel, airline, and transferable points cards will provide their points and miles budget, then they’ll select their travel destinations from another deck. And finally, they’ll select power-ups and obstacles to make their travels a little more realistic to the challenges our readers and listeners face.
(03:45) - Destination 1 cards are drawn
(08:12) - Destination 2 cards are drawn
(18:03) - Airline credit cards are drawn
(25:29) - Hotel credit cards are drawn
(30:56) - Transferable points credit cards are drawn
(36:46) - A surprise extra credit card is drawn
(43:31) - Reader-submitted obstacle cards are drawn
(51:13) - Power up cards are drawn
(57:39) - Stephen reveals the final, third destination where each contestant will need to meet up
(1:02:44) - Surprise! Contestants get a hail mary option they can choose to take...
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “swappin’ back n’ forth” by up @ night
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
This podcast episode is sponsored by Saily. Saily is an ESIM service app created by the security experts behind NordVPN. Instead of paying absurd daily rates to your home carrier or swapping SIM cards on arrival, Saily gives you flexible prepaid data plans in over 200 destinations worldwide. Download Saily from your app store and use our code FREQUENTMILER at checkout to get 15% off your first purchase. https://saily.com/frequentmiler
In today's episode, listeners weigh in on Nick's pick for "best Hyatt Place breakfast", Hyatt breaks up with one airline and ties up with another, and we review Chase's refreshed Air Canada Aeroplan card.
(01:15) - Which cards did our contestants pick for the Wild Card challenge?
Learn more about the ongoing challenge here
(09:02) - In our Hidden Gem Awards Ep373, Nick said Hyatt Place Amsterdam Airport had the best breakfast in the world... but do people agree?
(14:24) - Marriott Amex Offer: Spend $450 & get $200 back (targeted)
Learn more about this targeted offer here
(17:06) - US Bank adds Avianca LifeMiles as transfer partner
(18:28) - Rove adds Copa Airlines as transfer partner, launching with 40% transfer bonus through September
Learn more about Rove adding Copa here
(20:13) - Hyatt dissolves partnership with AA
Read more about Hyatt's ending partnership with American Airlines here
(22:27) - Hyatt adds partnership with Delta: https://newsroom.hyatt.com/DeltaAirLines
(24:39) - Amex Bonvoy Business Card is coming
(26:48) - Chase Sapphire Reserve enhances DoorDash benefit
Learn more about this enhanced benefit here
(29:34) - Chase IHG Premier Business anniversary free night certificate will increase to 50K points in 2027
(31:16) - Chase return protection success
(35:54) - Atmos Summit $60K spend
(38:25) - New Cardmember Offer
(39:54) - The changes that really matter
(52:20) - Quick summary of the good stuff and bad stuff
(53:35) - Nick and Greg: Never got the card before. Is it worth it now?
Visit https://frequentmiler.com/subscribe/ to get updated on in-depth points and miles content like this, and don’t forget to like and follow us on social media.
Music Credit – “Ocean Deep” by Annie Yoder
This podcast is part of the Voyascape Network, a collection of some of the world’s best travel podcasts. Explore more at Voyascape.com. For advertising or sponsorship opportunities on this show and across the network, email advertising@voyascape.com or you can find more information at Voyascape.com/advertsing.
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