Booking Turkish Air Business Class to Israel

As airline prices surge, points and miles can make a big difference in stretching the travel budget.  We experienced this when booking a great deal on a business class flight to the Middle East.  Our first stop on the Middle East trip is Israel and we wanted a flight we could book with points and miles. Turkish Airlines offered a one-way business class flight for 45,000 airline miles plus, $233.60 in taxes (per person).  The business class flight departs from Dallas, flies to Istanbul, and then connects through to Tel Aviv.  Turkish Airlines is not an airline we considered much in the past,…

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Remember That a Trip to Rome Was Not Built in a Day

Travel blogs can portray a picture of non-stop travel in luxury hotels and first-class flights.  These trips are certainly possible, but like the fine print regarding the person in the weight loss commercial who lost 50 pounds, in small print it says “results not typical”. Miles and points do allow ordinary people to travel to extraordinary places, but it takes time and effort to earn those miles.  Dream of where miles and points can take you, but also be realistic as you get started.   We'll help point you in the right direction if you want to travel more using points…

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Which Credit Card Should We Get?

Points and Miles have allowed us to travel in a way we couldn't do on our own. Many of these points have been earned through credit cards. Our travel plans have been put on hold during the last year, so we've pivoted to earning cash back for our credit card spending. We’re looking to sign up for a new cash back credit card and we’ve narrowed it down to two options.  Card Number #1 - This card earns a sign-up bonus of 40,000 points for spending $3000 in the first 90 days. The 40,000 points can be cashed in for…

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Frequent Miler Goes the Extra Mile

Our respect for the team at Frequent Miler just went up. A Quick Background In the points and miles space, it's not unusual for blogs to make money from readers who apply for credit cards using links on their website.  When the reader is approved for the card, the blog/blogger receives compensation. In light of this, it would make sense for bloggers to post credit card links that directed the money into their pockets. In some cases, the links posted, benefit the blogger, but are not for the best available credit card offers. Readers Come First Philosophy Frequent Miler has a…

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Keep or Cancel our American Express Hilton Aspire Credit Card?

The American Express Hilton Aspire card comes with a strong set of benefits.  This includes:  Diamond status with HiltonA $250 resort credit at select Hilton propertiesA $250 Airline creditAn annual free night at Hilton Properties It also comes with a $450 fee.    We’ve had the card for over a year, and got great value for the $450 annual fee.  This card easily paid for itself during our trip to the Conrad Maldives in February of this year. This week the annual fee once again hit our account.  With travel on hold, we couldn’t justify paying $450.   So what to do? Options included: Cancelling the cardDowngrading…

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Saving Our Trip to Paris – Why We Applied for an Air France Credit Card

As the saying goes, “Paris always a good idea”. We love visiting Paris and had a trip planned for May 2020.   The flight was booked with Air France Miles.  The trip was cancelled due to Covid 19. We called Air France, cancelled the flight, and the Air France miles were redeposited into our frequent flyer account. So far so good.  The problem is, these miles, along with our existing balance, resulted in over 300,000 Air France miles that were set to expire in May 2021.  This is over $3000 worth of travel that would evaporate unless we took action. Air France miles expire…

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Giftcardmall no longer offering $500 Visa Gift Cards?

Giftcardmall recently took two negative steps for those who earn points and miles via Visa gift cards. This includes: 1) Eliminating free shipping. 2) Limiting portal payouts to $2000 of purchases a month. Has Giftcardmall taken another limiting step? The website currently shows that the maximum value for a Visa Gift card is $250. The fee stays the same at $5.95. Is this a glitch, or a permanent change? We'll keep our eyes out regarding this development. P.S. Thanks to Chris K for pointing this out.

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Earn Points Through Credit Card Sign Ups – Part 2: Ten Steps to Follow

Do you want to earn a large number of points and miles for travel? Here are ten steps to earn points and miles through credit card sign ups. When it comes to earning points and miles, the biggest bang for the buck is usually the welcome bonuses offered by credit card companies.  It’s common to see offers of 50,000 – 100,000 points for signing up for a single card.  In this article we’ll share ten steps to consider when you sign up for a credit card.  This article is part of a series in which we lay out steps to save money…

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Poker, Points and Miles

The following are three recent posts which take a mathematical look at points and miles. Placing Our Bet What’s better, a cashback card, or a card that earns transferable, yet cashable points?  To help make the decision, we take an approach more likely to appear at a poker game, than a flyertalk forum.  Read more at https://cafesandalleyways.com/placing-our-bet Is the Discover It Miles Card Really a 3% Card? The Discover It Miles card is touted as a 3% Cashback card. But the first-year value of the Discover it Miles Card needs to be evaluated in terms of how the 3% is delivered: As a…

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How to Value Points and Miles

How much is an American Airline mile worth? What about a Chase Ultimate Reward Point? In this article we’ll layout a simple process for how to value points and miles. Specifically, on how to value points and miles based on your unique travel habits. Travel blogs might value a Citi ThankYou Point between 1.6-1.7 cents a point.  But how much is a Citi Thankyou point worth to you? In this article we share four simple steps on how to value a point or mile.  Without further ado.  Here we go:  Step 1 - Create a List of Ways in Which You Will Potentially…

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