End of Year Checklist & Transfer Bonus
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New to credit card points & miles? Start with the mini-course!
Welcome back!
Before we get into it, have you completed the 3 part mini-course yet? If not, check it out at www.allwaysaway.com
👨🏫 Lesson 2: Rules of the Game
Before signing up for a new credit card, you should start by taking stock of your existing cards, understanding your credit score, and ensuring you don’t owe any debts that you’re in danger of not being able to pay off. Once ready to proceed, we can review bank-issued rules and then finish with a few more financial best practice reminders.
📓 Today’s Agenda
Quick Update on Points Tracking from Last Month
End of Year Checklist
Limited Time Offers
Guest Speaking Tour!
Points Tracking, after 4 weeks of testing various apps, I’m disappointed (yet somewhat relieved) to share that none of the apps or tools worked better than maintaining my own spreadsheet. AwardWallet and MaxRewards showed a lot of promised but ultimately I felt uncomfortable sharing my credit card passwords with AwardWallet, which drastically reduced the functionality. MaxRewards on the other uses tokenized passwords which is akin to the security of Plaid, but it than has access to your personal financial data. Ultimately, I’m choosing the privacy and security of tracking my points using my own template, which I’ll be sharing soon™.
✅ End of Year Checklist
Hard to believe we’re already halfway through November and have less than 7 weeks before 2023. Now is a great time to start reflecting on annual goals, preparing to track resolutions for ‘23 and perhaps even start budgeting before the the temptations of Black Friday.
But, I digress… let’s refocus on the task at hand. A short list of considerations before the end of the calendar year.
🧐 Credit card benefits aren’t always based on the calendar year, instead they may be based on your cardmember anniversary. Be sure to keep track of your cardmember anniversary date.
Calendar Year Perks, I’m not going through all of these, but here’s a quick example using the American Express Platinum Card:
Uber / Uber Eats Monthly Bonus, FYI December monthly bonus is $35 (vs $15)
$200 Fine Hotels & Resorts Credit, this is applicable for any prepaid booking so you’re not limited to using it in 2022, you can book a hotel for next year
$200 Airline Incidentals, if you haven’t already used a part of this budget, you're able to change the airline once a year and can buy snacks or drinks for everyone sitting near you!
For detailed coverage across many cards, I recommend this article.
On the cards side, I’m more interested in the following:
Reflect
Budgets, which categories entail the majority of your spend?
ROI, are all all of your cards delivering as much value as they cost?
Adjust
Consider changing spend habits to maximize point bonuses
Consider downgrading existing cards, reaching out for retention offers, or applying to new cards to better serve your spend
Plan
Choose a destination or cash back goal for 2023, perhaps you finally want to plan your trip to Bali, or if you’re in savings mode, perhaps you’re looking to optimize cash back on everyday essential spend. Either way, make your goal specific to the year ahead so you can break it up into 4 (quarterly) checkpoints and ensure you’re on track.
Share your goal, once you have a goal set it’s great to have an accountability buddy. My personal travel goals include:
Make it back to Japan
Shift from Marriott to Hyatt loyalty
Visit one new country
Explore another National Park
What are your goals? You’re welcome to reply to me directly and with your consent I’ll share them next month to inspire others. If you’re not sure how to achieve your goals, schedule a complimentary 1:1 session with me here.
💸 Limited Time Offer
Air Canada Aeroplan 30% transfer bonus from Chase Ultimate Rewards through November 30, 2022.
I wouldn’t transfer to most airline partners without having a specific flight or destination in mind and knowing that availability exists. In the past I have transferred points “proactively” and it feels like a chore to keep track of them.
Aeroplan offers a distance and zone-based award tiers, and can be searched via United Airlines (one of many Star Alliance partners).
A few Sweet Spots to call attention to:
Hawaii for 12,500 points each way in economy // 9,616 points w/ 30% bonus
SFO or LAX to Honolulu, Maui, Kauai and Kona.
Aeroplan is also known for the flexibility they afford for stopovers, while keeping carrier imposed fees to a minimum. For a small fee of 5,000 points you can add a stopover to any route, making it that much more valuable, especially if you have multiple destinations on your itinerary.
Three European cities for 12,500 points each way in economy // 9,616 points w/ bonus
London to Brussels (stopover) to Rome.
Barcelona to Paris (stopover) to Frankfurt.
Paris to Vienna (stopover) to Berlin.
If you’re feeling fancy, you can upgrade the European itinerary to Business Class for 25,000 points (19,231 with bonus) or First Class for 30,000 points (23,077 with bonus).
Note that you can only transfer points in intervals of 1,000, so it’s best to calculate your grand total, send a test transfer of 1,000 points, and then transfer the remainder once you see the bonus has posted and the points made it to your Aeroplan account safely.
🕴️Guest Speaking Tour!
Next time I’ll be sharing a reflection of my favorite cards from 2022.
In the meantime, I’m in the midst of planning some office visits to friends at various companies to share rewards travel tips through an overview of the THE 3 LESSONS.
If you or someone you know would be open to hosting me as a guest speaker, please reach out. I love talking about points and helping people unlock their dream vacations!
❤️ A&A
🗺️ Photo Locations
Playa Blanca, Cartagena, Colombia
Éze, France
Coconut Grove, Miami, Florida