If you are exploring the world of award travel for the first time, there is one card you should consider first: the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card!
The main idea of points and miles travel is that you open a travel card with a welcome offer, meet the required spend for the bonus offer using your normal expenses, and then use the bonus points to book free flights or hotel stays. The best kinds of points are the ones that are flexible and can be transferred to whatever hotel or airline is the best fit for your trip. Our absolute favorite points are Chase’s travel points called Ultimate Rewards points because they can be transferred to travel partners like World of Hyatt, Southwest, United, Marriott, Air France, and more, allowing you to get great value out of your points AND have flexibility in your trip planning.
There are quite a few Chase cards that earn Ultimate Rewards points but the primary card you need to be able to transfer your Chase points to travel partners is the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card. This card is our favorite “starter” card and serves as a “home base” card when you add in additional cards from Chase Bank. Many other cards from Chase are marketed as cash back earning cards, BUT when you hold the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card, those earnings can be used as points rather than cash back. You can combine them with the points on your Chase Sapphire Preferred® to really maximize your points earnings and value!
The Signup Bonus:
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card bonus will earn you a substantial amount of Ultimate Reward points after meeting the minimum spend in set time-frame. Basically, you apply for the card, meet the spend, then those points are deposited in your account and you can transfer them to a hotel or airline to get a free trip! The sign up bonus points would be more than enough to book several nights at a hotel or a few flights for your family. And if you referred your spouse for their own card and combined their bonus points with yours, you’d have enough points to put toward several flights or something like 4-5 nights at an all-inclusive resort in Mexico!
Transfer Partners
Once you have earned the points, there are a couple of ways to use them. We typically recommend transferring our points to travel partners. When you transfer flexible rewards points to a travel partner, you are essentially turning those points into brand-specific points. We have found that the deals are usually better when using your points with the actual airline or hotel brand verses redeeming your bank points in the travel portal.
To transfer to a travel partner, you will first want to have an account with the travel partner (Southwest Rapid Rewards account, World of Hyatt account, etc.) Make sure the name on the travel partner matches the exact name listed on your credit card bank account. Also, I would recommend checking the dates/hotel/airline etc. for availability before getting ready to transfer your points.
Our favorite brand that we transfer these points to is World of Hyatt. We love this hotel group for the value we get with our points. To find out more about why we love World of Hyatt, be sure to check out this blog post!
Transfer partners include: Aer Lingus Aer Club, Air Canada Aeroplan, Air France-KLM Flying Blue, British Airways Executive Club, Emirates Skyward, Iberia Plus, JetBlue, Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer, Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards, United Airlines Mileage Plus, Virgin Atlantic Flying Club, IHG One Rewards, Marriott Bonvoy, and World of Hyatt.
Travel Portals
Another way to use your points is with the Chase Travel℠. We usually tend to find more value transferring our points to partners. But, we have used the portal couple of times with success for quick overnight stays and car rentals.
Benefits Beyond points:
We know that earning points to travel is one of the best benefits of holding the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card. But, did you know that there are so many more benefits to holding this card?
Travel and Rental Car Insurance
Travel rewards credit cards help cover insurance on your travel. You will definitely want to read the fine print on this to know exactly what it covers for you. But, the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is one of the best cards to have for this kind of insurance. It can cover trip delay reimbursements, travel emergency assistance, roadside dispatch, lost luggage, travel accident insurance, and auto rental collision damage coverage. Many point travelers decline the rental car’s collision coverage because the Chase Sapphire Preferred® has better coverage just by holding this card and using it to pay for all or even a small part of your car rental.
Chase Offers
We love this feature from Chase, and many people don’t even know about it! When logging into your online account, each credit card offered by Chase has cash back bonus offers for a variety of stores, restaurants, etc. You do have to click through and select them, so it is wise to check back every so often as these offers do change. Simply go through once in a while and look at all of the available offers and click anything that you may possibly use (even if you don’t plan on using it).
It’s fun to see credits back in your account every so often. It’s like saving money and not even realizing it! We’ve gotten statement credits for $2 back from a Panera purchase, or $15 from a Lowes purchase etc. These offers help offset that yearly annual fee of $95.
You can definitely see why the low annual fee of $95 is more than worth it. We have definitely been reimbursed a lot more than $95 for the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card with the insurance coverage, offers, and statement credits alone. This doesn’t even account for all the money saved by earning points!
If you’re thinking about trying to earn free trips through credit card points, this would be the PERFECT card to begin dipping your toes in the water of points and miles travel. The Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is a solid card to have you in your wallet for it’s travel perks and earning potential!
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