April 16, 2014

750 Free United Miles + Potential for 750 More!

It seems almost every week there is a way to get some free miles out there and this week’s offering includes 750 United Miles for joining MyPoints. You will receive 500 miles for signing up and verifying your account and an additional 250 miles for completing your profile. I did both and it took approximately 5 minutes.

1,500 United Miles!

1,500 United Miles!

MyPoints is an online shopping portal that allows you to earn bonus points or miles for shopping online. So for shopping you might already be doing, you could be earning 2x, 5x or I’ve even seen 40x the amount of points or miles! I plan on discussing the benefits of online shopping portals in a future Points & Miles 101 post but to summarize quickly, instead of heading to say Macys.com or Target.com, you would first log in to your MyPoints account and click through to a store’s website from the MyPoints website. They will track any potential order you make and award you a certain bonus amount of points (typically ranging from 2x-5x) per dollar spent.

So for a quick example, let’s say you need to buy a new bathing suit for the upcoming summer season and Macy’s has a great one at $30. Let’s ignore tax and shipping for a moment – if you were to purchase this bathing suit normally, you might earn 30 points if you use a rewards credit card. However, for a few extra clicks and logging in to MyPoints first and seeing Macy’s is currently offering 4 bonus points per dollar spent, you would earn an  additional 120 points for buying that same bathing suit (4 points x 30 dollars)! 

I mentioned in the title for a potential of 750 more United Miles and you could earn that if you make your first purchase of $25 or more via MyPoints within 30 days of membership. Full terms below.

Terms & Conditions

Terms & Conditions

 

(h/t to Gary  via Mile Nerd)

April 15, 2014

Good Deal Alerts: 15% off Frontier Flights, $400 Flights to Norway & 12,000 Free Melia Hotel Rewards Points

Tax day brings up a trio of good deals in the travel industry. Without further ado:

1) Frontier Airlines is celebrating tax day by offering 15% off most domestic flights flown by June 12th if travel is booked by April 17th. A 15% discount on airfare is pretty rare so you might be able to score solid airfares here.

2) Via The Points Guy, you can find flights from the NY area to Norway for only $407!  Availability is greatest for travel between November 2014 through March 2015 (skiing in Norway anyone?) for flights on United and Norwegian Air. If you have a choice, I’d choose United to earn miles for flying vs Norwegian which I don’t believe has a frequent flyer program.

3) Lastly, most of you have probably never heard of Melia Hotels, but they are currently giving away 12,000 points for signing up for their rewards program. The downside is you only have until April 30th to use the points but 12,000 points can be a free night at some of their locations in Europe or Asia. They do not have a big North American presence (only 3 hotels in the US and some in the Caribbean) but if your travel plans over the next year take you near a Melia hotel you might get a room for free! Or if the 12,000 points doesn’t cover a free room, you could use a points & cash option, effectively using those 12,000 points to lower the price of a room.

Hopefully some of you can take advantage of these deals!

April 12, 2014

$20 Off your First Trip on Uber…Expires on 4/25!

UPDATE 6/21: The offer is now for $30 off your first ride. Click on this link to sign up.

This isn’t really related to points & miles per se but this is still a great deal I wanted to pass along before it expired. If you signup for Uber directly, there are generally no credits but if you are referred by an existing user you can get $20 in free credits to use on your first Uber ride!

Until, 4/25 Uber is offering new users $20 in credit to take off their first ride if they sign up for Uber by 4/25. If you signup after 4/25, you will only get $10 in credit to use towards your first ride. The best part is you do not need to actually use them by 4/25 to get the $20 credit – you just need to sign up by 4/25.

In short, sign up before 4/25 to get $20 off your first ride with Uber even if your first ride does not occur until afterwards. By signing up now, you are locking in a free $2o credit – if you wait until 4/26, you will only receive $10 in credit.

Since you need to be referred by someone to get the $20 in Uber credits, please consider using my link here to signup. We will both receive $20 in Uber credits – remember if you do not sign up via a referral, you will receive no free credits!

April 10, 2014

Good Morning America Discusses Points & Miles

A co-worker passed this along to me (knowing how obsessed I am with points & miles) and wanted my opinion if the GMA crew did a solid job discussing the world of points & miles. Furthermore, a bunch of you may have seen this as it was on national TV, so let’s break it down!

GMA Discusses Points & Miles (click here for video)

Generally when I see mainstream media discuss our little hobby, I see a lot of misinformation and generalities that wouldn’t apply to most individuals. However, in this piece, I think GMA actually does a fair job discussing when to use and not use points and miles.

A few of the good things they discuss:

  • The biggest mistake people make is not getting full value for their miles. They go over the example of using miles for expensive flights like NY to Seattle instead of using them for NY to Miami as the NY to Seattle flight will almost always be more expensive. So since those flights cost the same amount of miles, use them for the more expensive flight!
  • GMA brings up how confusing understanding miles can be and I think there is some truth in that for novices in this game. It can be overwhelming at first and I’m glad they didn’t downplay this notion to make what we do super easy and made for everyone (hey this is why my consulting and award booking services exist :p )
  • And probably the best point they make, do not redeem your miles for car rentals or merchandise online. This is by far the worst value you could possibly get for miles, so simply don’t do it.

GMA wasn’t perfect though as they discussed a very specific example where you could upgrade an economy ticket to a business class ticket for only 15,000 miles. The amount of miles greatly varies depending on the program and some even charge an additional co-pay (i.e. United) and most of the time, only certain economy tickets are eligible to be upgraded – the lowest, most discounted economy tickets (which is what most people buy) may not be upgradeable in some cases.

Watch the video and look forward to more specific posts in the future on my site where I’ll go into much more detail on some of the items they discussed.

April 9, 2014

Points & Miles 101: Getting Your Credit Score for FREE!

As I alluded to in my last post in Points & Miles 101, in addition to getting your free credit report, there are a few ways to get your credit score for free as well!

There are several companies out there they will provide you with an accurate representation of your credit score for free with the two most popular companies being Credit Karma and Credit Sesame. Now I want to be very upfront, the scores provided are not your FICO score but instead a CLOSE estimate to what your actual FICO score is. Now I’m sure their names sound ‘gimmicky’ to you but as a user of both services (in addition to thousands of other), I can personally vouch these companies are legitimate and 100% FREE.

Each company has developed algorithms that closely mimic the calculation FICO uses to determine your credit score. By inputting your social security number, you agree to give them access to your credit history which then allows them to run their algorithms to determine your credit score.

I’m sure I just set off a big red flag in your head since you have to provide your social security number to a company you’ll probably never heard of before this post. However, I’m here to assure you these sites are VERY secure with high level encryption software. If you think about it, if you’re comfortable giving your social security number while applying for a credit card on a bank’s website why would you not be comfortable doing this? You can read more about their security here.

Ralph's Credit Score

Ralph’s Credit Score

Additionally, because I know this question will come up, there is absolutely NO impact to your credit score for doing this. If you were to check your FICO score, there is a very small impact to your score because an inquiry was made on your account. However, since the score provided is not your FICO score, you don’t have to worry about this.

I think every person should review their credit reports and know their credit score – this is financially responsible behavior.  If your credit report is wrong, fix it. If your credit score is under 700, start taking steps to improve it. Even if you have no interest in doing these items related to points and miles, you should do it to remain financially healthy. Plain and simple, this is just good personal finance advice.

Signup Links

Credit Karma

Credit Sesame

*Please note if enough people signup for Credit Sesame via the link above, I will earn a small commission. As a user of this product, I would strongly recommend it whether I was paid a commission or not. I do not earn a commission on Credit Karma.