The first question I usually get asked when I begin regaling (or annoying) people with my tales of traveling around the world for free is “Are you rich?”. As soon as the chuckle escapes my lips, the person immediately follows up with “Well, is your wife rich?”.
Again, I chuckle, and then begin explaining that I use frequent flyer miles to travel. Question three is usually “how many freakin’ credit cards do you have?”.
As I enter my second full-fledged year in the the frequent flyer mile game, and prepare for my summer App-o-rama, I figured now was as good a time as any to take stock of the cards I have.
I’ll reveal which cards I prefer to use to maximize my points, and then ultimately decide which ones are worth keeping based on the anniversary bonus they offer and the annual fee they charge.
Hopefully, this will help prove useful for the many of you out there who are facing many of the same decisions of closing or keeping open accounts and also deciding which cards you should add to your stable.
I’ll list the cards in chronological order of the date I got them.
Without giving away the answer, I will tell you to settle in and get comfortable, because the number is quite large.
Sooo….how many cards do I have?
1. Citi/AAdvantage Visa
See Best Current Deals page for further breakdown of this card, how to get both the Citi/AA Visa and Amex at the same time, which I highly recommend doing, and the application links for these cards
Signup bonus: 75k when I got it, 50k now
Date approved: July 29, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after meeting the minimum spend and getting the signup bonus.
Annual fee: $85
Anniversary bonus: Nothing
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 25%. If I call in to cancel and they over me a great retention bonus (7,000 AA miles or more, an $85 statement credit, etc) than I’ll keep it open. If not, thanks for the signup bonus but this card is history!
2. Alaska Airlines Visa
Signup bonus: 40k when I got it, 25k now
Date approved: August 8, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after making the first purchase and getting the signup bonus.
Annual fee: $75 (not waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: $99 companion pass.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 0%. If I made good use of the companion pass than this card might be worth keeping open. However, I didn’t use the companion pass this past year, so I’m assuming I won’t make use of it this upcoming year either. Plus, you can “churn” this card and get the signup bonus again, so if I’m going to pay the fee, I might as well get the extra 25,000 as a bonus again!
3. Chase Sapphire Preferred
Signup bonus: 50k when I got it, 40k now
Date approved: August 22, 2011
What I use it for: Almost all my everyday spending. I especially focus on using it for travel and dining, which earns me 2x. Since I live abroad, I use this card all the time because it has no foreign transaction fee.
Annual fee: $95 (waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: 7% bonus on all points earned, including the signup bonus.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 100%. This is my favorite card and my go-to for almost all of my spending. I love that it has no foreign transaction fee and also that it gives me 2x for travel and dining. I almost always transfer my Chase UR points to United miles, which I love. The 7% bonus is nice too, although I wouldn’t consider just that enough to keep the card open. I’ll keep it open because I love the everyday earning potential!
What I use it for: Occasionally, and sporadically, for groceries because it offers 2x on groceries and gas. However, I don’t even usually use it for airfare, which it offers 3x on, because I’d rather the 2x Chase points (for travel by using the Sapphire) than the 3x Amex points.
Annual fee: $175 (waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: None.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 0%. The 3x on airfare and 2x on gas and groceries could be lucrative for some people but I don’t really put much value Amex points because they don’t offer good transfer partners. I’d rather use my Sapphire for 2x on travel and my Ink Bold for 2x on gas and build up a nice point balance through Chase and then transfer those points to United. The $175 is too high a fee to justify the extra points I’d get for spending on groceries.
5. Barclays USAirways Mastercard #1
Signup bonus: 40k
Date approved: September 25, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after the first purchase to get my signup bonus and once every 6 months to adhere to the terms and conditions.
Annual fee: $89 (waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: 10k USAirway miles
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 100%. The 10k USAirways miles are worth over $89 for me so this is a no-brainer. I’ll whip it out every 6 months and use it once just to make sure I’m abiding by the terms and conditions, but other than that, it’ll collect dust on the shelf.
6. American Express Hilton HHonors
Signup bonus: 60k when I applied, 40k now
Date approved: November 9, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after meeting the minimum spend and getting the signup bonus.
Annual fee: $0
Anniversary bonus: None.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 75%. Normally, this would be 100%, as it never really makes sense to close a card with no annual fee. However, it is being reported that some people have had success getting this card and the signup bonus again after closing their original card. If that is the case, I may close this card so that I’m eligible to get the bonus again. If not, then I’ll just leave it open indefinitely.
7. Chase Marriott Rewards Premier Visa
If you apply for this card, the application page will show a 50k signup bonus. Many people have reported that Chase will honor the 70k offer if you ask them to “bump the bonus” through a secure message after applying.
Signup bonus: 70k + 1 free night in a category 1-4
Date approved: November 9, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after making the first purchase and getting the signup bonus.
Annual fee: $85 (waived for the first year)
Anniversary bonus: 1 free night at a category 1-5 each year.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 65%. This one will be a tough decision. If used right, the one free night can easily be worth up to $150, which more than makes up for the annual fee. However, I usually prefer to stay at locally run boutique hotels and hostels when I go on vacation. If I needed to “go out of my way” to use the free night, then it wouldn’t be worth it.
Odds are that I’ll keep this open, not only for the free night but also because keeping cards open helps your credit score and having this card open will give me more leverage with Chase when trying to get other Chase credit cards…Ok, basically I just talked myself in to keeping it open!
8. Chase Ink Bold Business (old version)
Signup bonus: 50k
Date approved: November 9, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after making the minimum spend and earning the signup bonus.
Annual fee: $95 (waived for the first year)
Anniversary bonus: None.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 0%. Now that I have the new Chase Ink Bold card (which is much better), there is no point at all for me to keep this card open.
9. Citi Thank You Premier
Signup bonus: 50k
Date approved: November 9, 2011
What I use it for: Nothing after making the minimum spend and earning the signup bonus.
Annual fee: $125 (waived for the first year)
Anniversary bonus: 1% on all Citi TY points earned through purchases (does not include the signup bonus)
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 0%. There are a few reasons I won’t be keeping this card open; the $125 is super high for a card of this (low) caliber, the anniversary bonus is of little value since I don’t put any spend on this card, and Citi TY points are not that valuable compared to Chase UR points.
Lastly, I had to fight tooth and nail with Citi not only to get this card, but also for them to credit me with the signup bonus (think 10+ emails and even snail mail letters) so needless to say, I’m not a fan of their company or their customer service.
10. Barclays USAirways Mastercard #2
This is the exact same card as #4.
Signup bonus: 40k
Date approved: April 3, 2012
What I use it for: Nothing after the first purchase to get my signup bonus and once every 6 months to adhere to the terms and conditions.
Annual fee: $89 (waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: 10k USAirway miles
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 100%. The 10k USAirways miles are worth over $89 for me so this is a no-brainer. I’ll whip it out every 6 months and use it once just to make sure I’m abiding by the terms and conditions, but other than that, it’ll collect dust on the shelf.
What I use it for: Nothing after the first purchase to get my signup bonus. However, if I were to purchase United tickets, I would use this card to get the 3x on United purchases.
Annual fee: $95 (waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: 2 free United Club lounge passes each year.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 60%. I’m completely on the fence about this one. The lounge passes are nice (and $100 retail value) but I debate how much I actually value them. Sure, its nice to have lounge access for a day, but I normally wouldn’t pay $50 for that privilege.
However, the card does also offer a free checked bag ($50 value) on United flights and like the Marriott above, gives me leverage with Chase when I go to apply for other cards. Those two reasons will probably be enough to push it over to the “keep” side, but I’m glad I have a while to decide!
12. Chase Southwest Rapids Reward Business card
Signup bonus: 50k
Date approved: April 3, 2012
What I use it for: Nothing after the first purchase to get my signup bonus.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 60%. I know I sound like a broken record, but I’m slightly leaning towards keeping this open just to have leverage with Chase. The 3,000 points aren’t enough to justify the annual fee (although it’s close), so what I’ll most likely do is keep this card open for the time being.
When I go to apply for other Chase cards, they may say I have too many accounts open with them, and that time, I’ll happily give up my Southwest account in order to get a new card and the signup bonus.
13. Chase Ink Bold Business (new card)
This card is no longer available. The Ink Plus is still available.
Signup bonus: 50k
Date approved: April 23, 2012
What I use it for: Cable, cellphone, and internet bill (5x points), gas (2x) and gift cards from office supply stores (5x) that help me earn a TON of Chase UR points. I also flip-flop the Ink Bold and the Sapphire Preferred for everyday spend items that don’t fall in those categories.
Annual fee: $95 (waived the first year)
Anniversary bonus: None.
Odds of keeping it open after 1 year: 100%. I absolutely LOVE this card. The fact that I can buy gift cards at office supply stores for all types of products and get 5x for them is amazing and keeps the points continually rolling in.
The only downside to this card is the high minimum spend in the beginning (although there are tons of ways to make it easier than you think), so now that I’ve hit that, I’ll keep using the awesome earning power of this card for years to come!
Recap
As do I! If it’s a good bonus, I’m there!
If you’ve been tallying the cards up mentally, you’ll see that I currently have a total of 13 cards. Many people ask me how I manage to have all those cards and not get confused, but if you break it down, you’ll see that I have:
2 that I use for everyday spending (Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Ink Bold)
1 that I pull out very occasionally (Amex Personal Rewards Gold)
10 that basically go unused after making the minimum spend
In reality, I’m not juggling 13 cards, but really only 2. Most of the time I’ll carry one of them and my wife will have the other. Pretty simple.
People also always ask me how I keep track of all of them and how I know when to cancel them.
I employ a simple system that even a caveman could understand; I use a really basic Excel spreadsheet (feel free to EPoP Credit Card Tracking Template) which lists when I need to cancel each card.
Additionally, if you do App-o-Ramas it is easier to keep track of your cancellation dates because a bunch of the cards fall on the same day! Yet another perk of the AoR!
Lastly, here is the breakdown of which cards I will and won’t keep after the 1st year and pay the annual fee for:
4 On the Fence- Chase Southwest, Chase United Explorer, Chase Marriott, Amex Hilton
5 Definitely Closing- Citi Thank You Premier, Chase Ink Bold (old), Amex PRG, Citi/AA Visa, Alaska Airlines Visa
As you can see, having a large amount of open accounts doesn’t have to be scary or difficult to manage. Pick a few cards that you prefer to use for everyday spending and then supplement them with cards that you’ll use for the signup bonus and then close after a year.
That way, it only takes a tiny bit of brain power and small amount of organization to keep you on top over everything.
Disclaimer: This content is not provided or commissioned by the credit card issuer. Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of the credit card issuer, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the credit card issuer. This site may be compensated through the credit card issuer Affiliate Program.
As I’ve mentioned many times before BA points can be incredibly valuable, but ONLY if you used in very specific circumstances.
Therefore, it is even more important with BA than with other airlines to know which circumstances give you the best bang for your buck because if you use them wrong, you could end up paying HUGE fuel surcharges…and nobody wants that!
If you’ve already got a nice stash of BA Avios points, great!
Using Avios points for short haul domestic flights can offer some incredible value. Because of the distance-based award chart, you can get flights that are as low as 4,500 points one-way if the distance flown is below 650 miles.
Only 4,500 points? That’s crazy, considering that the same flight would cost you almost 3x as much if you were flying with AA, United, or USAirways!
This works best for people who live near American Airline US hubs, which are Dallas/Forth Worth (DFW), New York (JFK), Los Angeles (LAX), Chicago (ORD), and Miami (MIA).
There are tons of flights that fly out of these 5 hubs to places all over the United States, so if you live near one of the hubs, you can really make out like a bandit!
If you don’t start your journey at one of the hub cities, you won’t have as many options, and depending on where you are flying, you may have to pay for the leg from your home airport to the hub airport (minimum of 4,500 miles) and then pay for the leg from the hub to your destination.
This isn’t the end of the world, and can still be less than a regular airline would charge for a domestic flight, but its not the amazing deal that those lucky people near hub cities can get.
Examples (all examples in this post are for a roundtrip ticket in economy)
New York-Chicago Using Avios Points: 15,000 Using regular carriers (AA, United, USAirways, Delta): All 25,000
New York-Miami Using Avios Points: 15,000 Using regular carriers: All 25,000
Boston (non hub)-Miami Using Avios Points: 21,000 (4,500 for BOS-JFK, 7,500 for JFK-MIA x 2) Using regular carriers: 25,000
2. From the West Coast to Hawaii
Again, since the rewards chart is distance-based, it doesn’t matter that Hawaii is normally considered a different zone than the rest of North America by other airlines. All that matters is how many miles you are flying.
This means that by going to Hawaii from somewhere on the West Coast you can get a suuuweeettt deal!
If you are flying American Airlines, anywhere you fly from on that side of the country will route you through the main hub in Los Angeles, so if you can start in Los Angeles, you won’t have to pay for that extra leg to get there.
However, don’t forget that British Airways also partners with Alaska Airlines, meaning that you can also fly direct from Anchorage, Bellingham (WA), Seattle, Portland, Oakland, San Diego or San Jose to Honolulu using your Avios points.
Each route is under 3,000 miles, which means you’ll only pay 12,500 one-way or 25,000 roundtrip! Hello, hula!
(huge thanks to reader planodude for pointing that out in the comments of last post…that’s why I love you guys; always helping each other, and me, out!)
Examples
Los Angeles-Honolulu Using Avios Points: 25,000 AA 35,000 (off-peak) AA 45,000 (peak) Delta, USAirways, United: 40,000
San Francisco (non-hub)-Honolulu Using Avios Points: 34,000 Using regular carriers: AA 35,000 (off-peak) AA 45,000 (peak) Delta, USAirways, United: 40,000
3. Boston to Ireland (Dublin or Shannon)
This is a very specific circumstance, but if you are able to make it work, this is the best deal out there for Avios points, even better than domestic short haul flights. Why? Two reasons:
1. Boston and Dublin are 2,993 miles apart, which puts it just below the 3,000 mile threshold in the Avios award chart, meaning you’ll only be paying 12,500 Avios points each way!
8 measly more miles and it’d be bumped up to category 5 (and cost 20,000 Avios points). Talk about cutting it close.
This route, from BOS to either Dublin or Shannon, is the only route that BA or it’s partners operate from the United States to Europe that falls under the 3,000 mile mark.
2. The route is flown by Aer Lingus, which for reasons unbeknowst to me, imposes only a small fuel surcharge ($150ish) when using BA Avios points and flying on their planes.
BA and every other one of its partners that fly between North America and Europe have huge fuel surcharges (think $400-600) when you use BA Avios points.
This makes it pointless to redeem Avios points on them, seeing as you could buy a ticket outright for the same price. For whatever reason, Aer Lingus has been spared (for now) so take advantage of it while you can.
Aer Lingus also flies to Dublin from New York and Chicago, but those tickets will cost you 40,000 Avios points instead of the 25,000 from Boston because they fall in category 5 on the Avios award chart. Still a really good deal, especially for people who wouldn’t be able to easily get to Boston.
If you’re looking to stretch your Avios points and save your dollars (and who isn’t) and can make your way to Boston (or even New York or Chicago) fairly easily, jump on this amazing deal to Dublin for only 25,000 Avios points roundtrip.
This isn’t just for people wanting to visit the Emerald Isle. If you want to continue on to the rest of Europe, down a quick pint of Guiness and then fly from Dublin to wherever else you want to go in Europe using a budget airline like Ryanair.
Examples
Boston-Dublin Using Avios Points: 25,000 AA: 40k (off-peak), 60k (peak) USAirways: 35k (off-peak), 60k (peak) United and Delta: 60k
New York or Chicago-Dublin Using Avios Points: 40k AA: 40k (off-peak), 60k (peak) USAirways: 35k (off-peak), 60k (peak) United and Delta: 60k
4. Flying to Central or South America
Sometimes the actual amount of Avios points required will be less than the amount of miles other airlines charge because the distance is fairly short (like Miami to Bogota, Colombio in the examples below).
If this is the case, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to understand that you are getting great value.
Since you’ll never pay a fuel surcharge when using Avios points to fly LAN or for the AA flights that fly to Central or South America, this is a no-brainer if you are flying from somewhere pretty far south already (Miami, Dallas) or if you are flying to the northern part of South America (Bogota, Caracas, etc.)
However, even if the amount of points required isn’t less than other airlines, I still consider using Avios points to go to South America a good value.
If you ask me whether I’d rather use 25k Avios points or 25k United miles to get to Buenos Aires, I’ll pick the Avios points each time!
Any time you can get a flight using BA Avios points and not pay a fuel surcharge, take it, because they are few and far between.
Many of you may be unfamiliar with, so to give you a brief overview, LAN flies from Los Angeles, Miami, New York (JFK), San Francisco and Orlando in the United States and Toronto in Canada and flies to a ton of destinations in Central and South America.
Direct flights on LAN from North American include:
New York (JFK) to Santiago and Lima Los Angeles to Lima Miami to Bogota, Caracas, Santiago, Punta Cana San Francisco to Lima
Of course, you can always fly in to one of these cities and then continue on from there, so your options are basically limitless.
In addition, AA operates a good amount of flights to Central and South America as well, hitting a bunch of cities in Central America and all the major ones in South America as well, including Buenos Aires and Rio. Did someone say Carnaval?
Examples
Miami to Bogota Using Avios Points: 20,000 AA: 30k (off-peak), 35k (peak) United: 40k USAirways: 60k Delta: 45k
New York to Santiago, Chile or Buenos Aires, Argentina Using Avios Points: 50,000 Using AA: 40k (off-peak), 60k (peak) United, USAirways, Delta: 60k
5. Flying to the Caribbean from the East Coast
Much of what was written about Central and South America holds true for flying to the Caribbean as well. If you are flying from somewhere pretty far south, such as Miami, you can get roundtrip tickets for as little as 15k Avios points to most places in the Caribbean (some are just a touch too far and cost 20k).
Amazingly, even coming from New York you can get tickets to places like the Dominican Republic for only 20k roundtrip!
Even the most generous of award charts, such as USAirways off-peak special of 25k roundtrip to the Caribbean, can’t match that!
Of course, if you are flying from further away, such as Los Angeles, you’ll be paying much more because its distance based. Still, at 40k roundtrip to a lot of the Caribbean, the value isn’t that bad. You West Coasters have cheap flights to Hawaii, us East Coasters can have the Caribbean!
Examples
Miami to Santo Domingo Using Avios points: 15,000 USAirways: 25,000 (off-peak on USAirway flights), 35,000 (peak and on partner airlines) AA, Delta, United: 35,000
New York to St. Thomas
Using Avios points: 40,000 USAirways: 25,000 (off-peak on USAirway flights), 35,000 (peak and on partner airlines) AA, Delta, United: 35,000
Final Word(s)
As you can see, it’s not all bad news when it comes to the British Airways Avios program. When used properly, Avios points can be much, much cheaper than other airlines (I’m still shaking my head at Miami to the Caribbean for 15k roundtrip!).
Just remember that you must use them in very specific situations.
Obviously, it’s best to use them if you can for shorter flights (since the chart is distance-based) but more importantly, only use them on routes that don’t impose a fuel surcharge, which are the ones above.
Do that, and you’ll be singing a different tune than the ol’ doom and gloom that typically accompanies Avios!
If the above trips sound enticing, go and grab the Chase British Airways card and start planning your trip!
When British Airways totally revamped their frequent flyer program last year, rebranding it as Avios and calling their new currency Avios points, many people bemoaned the changes, and rightfully so.
Overall, the program is worse than it was before, with British Airways Avios points much less valuable now than they were a year ago.
However, that doesn’t mean that you should write BA off completely. Earning miles in many different programs is always a good idea, as it gives you great flexibility when trying to book flights and travel for free.
And BA is one of the easiest airlines to earn miles with.
Most airlines have a zone-based award chart, meaning that it will cost you a set amount of miles to fly from one zone to another.
For example, with American Airlines, it would cost you the same to fly from New York to London (North America zone to Europe zone) as it would to fly from Los Angeles to Budapest (again, North America zone to Europe zone).
With BA Avios there are no zones and the amount of Avios points you pay is based on the distance that you fly.
Anything that falls under 3,000 miles will cost you 12,500 Avios points, regardless of whether you cross oceans or continental lines. Boston to Dublin will cost you 12,500, same as New York to Los Angeles, because both routes fall in category 4.
You can find out how many Avios points you’ll need for a trip 1 of 3 ways (warning: it isn’t always easy).
For easy itineraries:
1. Use the Avios Points Calculator on BA’s website. This is an incredibly non-intuitive system and will only work if you are plugging in really easy routes (such as direct flights or sometimes routes with only one connection).
2. Use milez.biz. Enter the two cities you are flying between and select the British Airways program. If the itinerary isn’t too complex, this should spit you out the number of points it will cost.
For more complex itineraries:
3. Find out the amount of miles each leg of your trip will cost by using Milecalc.com. Once you have the mileage for each leg, use the Avios award chart to tell you how many Avios points each leg will be. Then, add them all together to get your final amount.
2. You pay for each leg of the trip separately, even if you are just laying over.
This is by far one of the most annoying aspects of the Avios program for people who don’t live near a hub city (which are New York-JFK, Dallas/Fort Worth, Chicago, Miami, and Los Angeles in the USA).
Let’s look at an example. If you want to fly from San Francisco to Honolulu, you’ll have to first stop over in Los Angeles as there are no direct flights. For each leg, you’d have to figure out the mileage and pay accordingly.
San Francisco to Los Angeles is 500 miles and so it would fall under category 1 and cost you 4,500 Avios points.
Los Angeles to Honolulu is 2556 miles and so it would fall under category 4 and cost you 12,500 Avios points.
You’d then add these two legs together to get your total, which would be 17,000 Avios points one-way or 34,000 Avios points roundtrip.
If you live near a hub then this won’t bother you much, since you’ll never be paying for that extra leg, but for many unfortunate souls, this Avios rule can really add points on to your trip fast, especially if you have more than one layover before arriving at your destination!
3. BA charges huge fuel surcharges on MOST of their flights, but not all.
One of the major, major downsides to Avios points if you use them on most partners (or BA itself) is that you’ll get crushed with a huge fuel surcharge.
Most of the time, the fuel surcharge is so large ($400-600) that it makes no sense at all to even use your Avios points since you could buy a paid ticket for almost the same price.
Flying American Airlines domestically in the North America region (and including Hawaii)
Flying LAN to Central or South America and the Caribbean
Smaller fuel surcharge (about $150)
Flying Aer Lingus from North America to Ireland (Dublin or Shannon)
4. You won’t ever get charged a close-in booking fee
While #1 could be either a good thing or bad thing depending on where you are flying, #2 and #3 are big time negatives of Avios program. But now let’s turn to a positive and end on a good note!
Almost all airlines will charge a booking fee when you book an award ticket within 21 days of flying. Usually, this fee hovers around $75.
Thankfully, BA has decided to waive this fee, so even if you decide to book an award ticket with Avios points and fly out THAT SAME DAY you won’t get nicked the extra $75. A
fter all the changes they made to their program for the worse, I guess this is the least they can do!
Getting BA Avios Points
The best way to currently get a large number of BA Avios points quickly is to sign up for the Chase British Airways Visa (see the Airline Credit Cards page for all details).
While BA’s once awesome awards program has definitely taken a tumble with the rebranding of Avios and all the new rules they’ve instituted over the past year, its not all doom and gloom.
Take advantage of opportunities to get Avios points easily, such as the through a credit card signup or American Express transfer bonus.
The Maximize Your Miles series will teach you how to squeeze the most possible value out of your frequent flyer miles by getting free one-ways and taking 3 vacations for the price of 1!
Additionally, United’s rules when dealing with stopovers and open jaws are (fairly) simple and straightforward. If you’ve read parts 2 and 3 of Maximize Your Miles you know how convoluted the rules can be on American Airlines and USAirways, so luckily, United makes life a little easier.
Let’s take a look at their main rules, build an incredible sample itinerary using a stopover and open jaw and then talk about an awesome “trick” you can use to score a free one-way ticket to anywhere in North America (including the Caribbean).
Rule #1: United does not allow stopovers or open jaws on domestic tickets
This is standard procedure for all airlines, with the lone exception being Delta. Therefore, everything we will be talking about from here on out will deal with international itineraries.
Rule #2: United does not allow stopovers or open jaws on one-way tickets
The fact that United allows you to book one-way tickets with your frequent flyer miles is a good thing (remember, USAirways doesn’t allow one-way tickets).
The major downside is that you can’t take advantage of the perks of stopovers or open jaws if you book a one-way ticket.
Another difference between United and USAirways is that United representatives are not near as lenient as their Star Alliance counterparts over at USAirways. You can try to bend the rules at United (after all, it never hurts to try) but the odds are that you won’t get a rep that will let you break this rule.
If you want a stopover or open jaw, you’re going to have to book roundtrip.
Rule #3: United allows 1 stopover and 2 open jaws on roundtrip international tickets
This is where United has AA beat hands down. Let’s first look at the stopover, build a simple routing, and then add in the open jaws and get a little crazier!
The stopover
The stopover can occur in any city that is within your route, meaning you don’t have to worry about having your stopover happen at a “North American gateway city” like AA.
If you are flying to somewhere in Europe, you can have your stopover in another European city before continuing on to your destination, which basically means the possibilities are endless.
For example, a basic itinerary could look like this:
Going: New York to London (stopover) to Paris (destination)
Return: Paris to New York
On AA, you couldn’t stop in London because its not in North America, but with United, it doesn’t matter. You can stop in any city that United or its partners on Star Alliance flies to that is on a somewhat reasonable route to your final destination.
Since this is ALOT, the world is your oyster!
Adding in the first open jaw
You may think you’d be content with getting to visit two cities on one award ticket, but remember, we are all about MAXIMIZATION!
Why visit two when you can visit three?
Let’s keep the original plan of flying New York-London (stopover)- Paris (destination). But now, instead of simply flying Paris-New York on the return leg, we want to add in an open jaw. This means that we will arrive in Paris but we will leave out of another city for our return leg.
Rome sound enticing to anyone? Now, our itinerary would look like this:
New York-London (stopover)-Paris (destination)
Return flight: Rome-New York
Of course, you’d be responsible for making your own way to Rome, but this is easily done, especially in Europe, where you can fly budget airlines between cities for less than $100 or simply take a train.
If you found that it would cost more to make your own way between Paris and Rome than it would be make your own way between London and Rome (which could be the case since Ryanair offers some amazing deals out of London), you could always flip flop your stopover and open jaw and book this itinerary:
New York-London (destination) then open jaw
Return flight: Rome-Paris (stopover)- New York
Either way, you’d have to pay your own way to get between the open jaw cities, but this is easily done, especially in Europe, and it allows you add in a completely other city for a fraction of the cost.
Trick: How to get a free one-way ticket to anywhere in North America
Ok, so you’re happy with your itinerary, but you know that you still have another open jaw, and you have really taken the “maximize, maximize, maximize” mantra to heart, so you don’t want to waste the second open jaw.
First, I’ll start with the bad news: If you want to be able to use your second open jaw, you are going to have to give up your stopover in Europe so that you can “save” it for later.
But, there’s plenty of good news: The reward is free one-way ticket to anywhere in the North American region, which includes the US (minus Hawaii) and Canada (or a super discounted ticket elsewhere).
Here’s what you can do:
You can still use your first open jaw in Europe, as you originally planned, so let’s continue with our original itinerary. We’d now book something like this for the European part of our journey:
New York-London (destination) then open jaw
Return: Paris-New York
Since we still have a stopover and an open jaw left, we can call New York our stopover city (and stay there for up to a year) and then add on an extra leg to anywhere in the North America region, which includes the continental US, Alaska, and Canada. You’ve always dreamed of seeing Alaska, right?
Our full itinerary would look like this:
New York-London (destination) then open jaw
Return: Paris-New York (stopover for up to a year)- Anchorage (final destination)
You are now using your one open jaw in between London and Paris, your stopover in New York, and your second open jaw to have Anchorage as your ultimate ending point even though you originally flew out of New York.
All you’d have to do is get yourself a ticket home from Anchorage (which will cost 12.5k miles one way) and you not only a European vacation visiting 2 amazing cities but also an Alaskan adventure.
And all for the price of one award ticket!
Other options for your free one-way ticket
The above example shows how to get a free one-way ticket to Alaska (or anywhere else in the North American region) but what if you want to go somewhere else? That’s also possible.
For wherever you’d like to go, simply sub out Anchorage in the above example and add in the place you desire.
Instead of charging you for separate tickets (North America-Europe roundtrip plus North America-2nd region one-way), United will simply charge you the difference between the two regions, which is alot less.
Caribbean
For example, if you’d rather your free one-way get you to the Caribbean, you’d simply book your return leg to go there. An example would be:
New York- London (destination) then open jaw
Return: Paris-New York (stopover)- Grand Cayman (final destination)
Since United’s award chart actually charges you less to fly from the Caribbean to Europe than North America to Europe, you’ll actually only pay 57,500 miles for this ticket as opposed to the 60,000 you’d pay if you ended your trip in North America (like the above example to Anchorage).
If you were to book these tickets separately, you’d pay 60k for your roundtrip ticket from North American to Europe and then 17.5k for a one-way ticket from North America to the Caribbean.
Instead, you are saving 20k miles by making New York a stopover and Grand Cayman your final destination.
Hawaii
Same rules apply. You’d book:
New York-London (destination) then open jaw
Return: Paris-New York (stopover)-Honolulu
Your total cost in miles would run 62,500.
You’d be getting charged an additional 2,500 miles because Europe to Hawaii prices out at 32,500 as opposed to 30,000 for Europe to North America region, but you are still saving a ton. If you were to book this as two separate awards, you’d pay 80k (60k for Europe to NA roundtrip and 20k for NA to Hawaii one-way).
South America
You can do the same thing with South America. An example would be:
New York-London (destination) then open jaw
Paris-New York (stopover)- Buenos Aires (final destination)
The final price for this itinerary would be 77,500 miles.
If you were to book these seperately, you’d spend 90k total (60k from New York to Europe and then an additional 30k for a one-way from New York to Buenos Aires). By using the stopover trick, you’re saving 12,500 miles!
Free one-way vs. stopover in Europe: Which should you choose?
Determining whether you should book a free one-way ticket or keep your extra stopover in Europe is a good problem to have, and in the end, it comes down to preference. If your one-way falls in the North American region, both awards will price out the same, at 60k miles apiece.
With the stopover in Europe, we were able to build an itinerary that looked like this:
New York-London (stopover)-Paris then open jaw
Rome-New York
With the free one-way, we would have an intinerary like this:
New York-London then open jaw
Paris-New York (stopover)-Anchorage
Each is a great trip, so just decide whether you’d enjoy visiting an extra city in Europe or getting a free trip out to somewhere in North America later on. Either way, you’re making out like a bandit and taking a trip that you could probably have only dreamed about before.
How To Book Stopovers and Open Jaws on United
The second best thing about booking stopovers and open jaws with United (behind being allowed to stopover at basically any city) is that you can do it all online.
Unlike American Airlines and USAirways, whose computer systems are stuck in the era of Zubaz pants and Fraggle Rock, United has decided to join the rest of us in the new millenium and has a system that is not only highly functional but also user-friendly.
You’ll quickly get the hang of it once you do it once, but for those people who are new to booking with United, especially when using stopovers and open jaws, I’ve created a short video tutorial:
Still Confused? Have Questions?
If you’ve read through and are thinking:
Stopovers and open jaws are awesome, I want to use them…but I’m still confused as heck about how to actually do it!
Don’t worry, you’re not alone!
I’ll walk you through, step by step, every single thing you need to do to learn about and book stopovers, open-jaws, and free one-ways. I’ve spent hundred of hours creating the #1 place for people who want to become EXPERTS at booking awards and maximizing their miles and want to do it fast!
4 weeks, and you’ll be an EXPERT, guaranteed! And you’ll be saving yourself $1,000’s of dollars!
Interested? Check out the Frequent Flyer Bootcamp page for more information. I look forward to whipping your butt in class!
Stopovers and open jaws can be an incredibly powerful tool to help you put together a vacation of a lifetime, and on no airline is this more apparent than United, which allows a ton of freedom in which choosing which city to stopover in. Add in the fact that you are able to add a free one-way for a later date and really, the possibilities are endless!
I would highly recommend that everyone consider using these to your advantage if you are booking a roundtrip ticket with your United frequent flyer miles.
The fact that you don’t even have to call in and book the tickets but instead can play around on United’s system till your heart’s content to figure out what works for you means that you really have no excuse.
So, what are you waiting for? Remember: MAXIMIZE, MAXIMIZE, MAXIMIZE!
Questions, comments, and unabashed bragging of the awesome trips you’ve booked is all welcome below. Fire away folks!
If you haven’t already, check out the other awesome Maximize Your Mile posts:
[bluebox]The Maximize Your Miles series will teach you how to squeeze the most possible value out of your frequent flyer miles and allow you to take trips of a lifetime for even less!
The rules below are for AA’s “regular” zone-based award chart. If you’d like to have stopovers in multiple cities on either an international or domestic trip, you may want to consider using their “secret” Explorer Award chart.[/bluebox]
Open Jaws
Let’s start with the easy stuff first.
Since American Airlines allows you to book one-way tickets, understanding open jaw rules on American Airlines is easy: it’s always allowed.
For example, you could book one ticket from New York to Paris and then a return ticket from Rome to New York.
Since you are booking the flights separetely anyway, American Airlines does not care if your return ticket is from Paris or Rome, so open-jawing is easy.
Stopovers
Unfortunately, stopovers on American Airlines is not as easy to understand.
Let’s break down the rules first, and then see how we can use them to our advantage to get the most out of our miles.
1. Stopovers are not allowed when you are flying within North America.
North America is defined as the United States (including Hawaii and Alaska), Canada, Mexico, Bermuda, the Bahamas, and the Caribbean.
This means that you would NOT be able to fly from Vancouver, stop over in Chicago, and then continue on to New York because all of your travel occurred solely in the North America region.
If you wanted to take this trip, you would have to book two seperate tickets: one from Vancouver to Chicago and one from Chicago to New York.
When traveling within North America, you can only stop for up to 4 hours in any city before having to move along to your final destination (called a connection).
Basically, you can’t spend any real time in a city because 4 hours isn’t enough time to get in and out of the airport anyway.
The only exception is if you arrive late at night and the next flight isn’t until the next morning.
Then, you’ll be allowed to stay the night in that city, even if it is over 4 hours, and not have to book two flights.
2. Stopovers are allowed on international flights but only at North American “gateway” cities.
Ok, here is where it gets tricky.
AA defines a “gateway” city as the place that you either enter or leave the North American region.
Basically, is the last place that you stop before leaving North America or the first place that you land when you enter North America.
Let’s use the example of flying from Los Angeles to Paris.
There are many routes that AA and its partners fly to get you from LA-Paris, but you are not allowed stopovers on all of them.
Route #1
Los Angeles- New York- Paris
You are allowed a stopover in New York City because it is the final place before you leave the North America region and therefore is a North American gateway city.
Route #2
Los Angeles- London- Paris.
You are NOT allowed a stopover in London because it is not a North American gateway city because is not located in North America.
If you want to have a stopover, it is going to have to be somewhere in the North American region.
Before you begin to scoff at that (“who would want to stopover somewhere in North America, how boring!”), take a look below:
Hmmm….not so bad, is it?
Changing your mind a little bit?
Yep, you could be either of those two places, and you can get there FOR FREE using the “gateway city” stopover rule.
Adding Extra Legs to the Beginning and End of Your Ticket
(or How to Get to Hawaii and Alaska for free!)
What?
A free trip?
How?
Let me explain. It’s probably best to use an example.
Let’s say that you are planning a trip to Paris for May, 2013.
Your home airport is New York (JFK). You decide to fly from New York to Paris direct.
Instead of simply booking your return ticket from Paris to New York, why not add on a trip to Hawaii, with New York being your stopover city?
Remember, you can stay in your stopover city for up to a year before continuing on to your final destination.
Use Honolulu as your final destination, and New York as your gateway stopover city.
This means you have a whole year before you have to use the flight from New York to Honolulu.
Even if you don’t have exact dates planned of when you want to go to Hawaii, pick a random date and add that extra leg to your ticket.
American Airlines allows you to change the dates later, and you’ll have a whole year to use that free flight to Hawaii.
It’s important to remember that you can add an “extra leg” on to both end of your trips since AA allows you to stopover at a gateway city for each ticket, and you are booking two one-way tickets.
Let’s again use the example of going New York to Paris. Here is what booking “extra legs” on both tickets would look like:
Anchorage-New York (stopover)- Paris
Paris-New York (stopover)- Honolulu
Even though my home airport is in New York, I’ve built in a return flight from Anchorage and a flight out to Honolulu for free.
The ticket from Anchorage to Paris with a stopover in New York will cost 30k and the ticket from Paris to Honolulu with a stopover in New York will cost 30k, the exact same prices as if I flew from New York to Paris (30k) and Paris to New York (30k) direct.
Of course, I’d be responsible for getting to Anchorage in the first place and then home to New York from Honolulu.
New York to Anchorage runs 12,500 miles and Honolulu to New York will cost 22,500.
For 3 vacations (Alaska, Paris, and Hawaii) you’d only pay 95k miles!
If you didn’t use the “extra legs” trick and simply booked them all as regular tickets, you’d pay 130k miles.
Even if you aren’t sure whether you’ll be able to travel to Hawaii within a year, there is no harm in booking that extra leg on to the end of your trip.
The worst that happens is that you simply never use that ticket. You haven’t paid anything extra, so what do you have to lose?
Adding an Extra Leg in the Middle of Your Trip
(or How to get to Disneyworld for free!)
Ok, time to get really nerdy on you. If you’ve followed along so far, good. Now it’s time to step it up a notch.
What is MPM and Why Is It Important
Each route has a certain number of miles that you are allowed to fly attached to it, called a maximum permitted mileage (MPM).
Unfortunately, to find out the MPM for a route you either have to have access to a paid program, like Expert Flyer ($10/month) or call the airline and ask.
What’s the value of knowing the MPM? Once you know the MPM, you can figure out what places you can use as a gateway city.
American Airlines is very generous and allows you to exceed the MPM by 25%.
Let’s revisit our New York to Paris example again.
The MPM for New York to Paris is 4362 miles (I used Expert Flyer to find this out).
Because AA allows you to exceed the MPM by 25%, I can actually fly 5452 miles.
This allows you to add a stopover you want in between leaving your home (New York) and getting to your destination (Paris).
When we talked above about going to Hawaii or Alaska, we were looking at how to add on extra legs before or after you got back home (New York).
This allows you to add on legs “in between”.
Ok, so now I know my number. As long as I come in under that number, I can fly from New York to somewhere else before heading off to Paris.
So, I want to visit Disneyworld before going to Paris. By using milecalc.com, I can calculate the total miles from JFK-MCO (Orlando)-CDG (Paris).
The total mileage? 5451!
Well, isn’t that funny? 1 mile to spare! Without even knowing it, I picked a route that illustrated how to use the MPM + 25% rule to perfection!
Because 5451 is less than 5452 (the MPM + 25%), I would be able to fly from New York to Orlando, stopover in Orlando for however long I wanted (up to 1 year) and then continue on to Paris.
Pretty sweet!
Because AA allows you to exceed the MPM by 25%, this opens up a ton of possibilities.
It’s an awesome way to visit somewhere neat (or visit friends and family) across the North America region before heading off to your international destination.
Gotta love two vacations for the price of one!
How to Book These Extra Legs
By now you’re convinced that adding an extra leg on to your international flight, whether it is before, in between, or after, is an awesome idea (duh, it’s a free one-way ticket to anywhere in North America)!
You need to know how to book it. Luckily, it’s not that hard.
If all your flights are on American Airlines
If all your flights are on American Airlines itself, than you can book this directly on the AA.com website. Below, I’ve created a short 3 minute video to show you exactly how to do that. Have a look:
If your flights are on partner airlines
You’ll have to call up the AA AAdvantage Center to book your tickets (1-800-882-8880 in the US and Canada).
If you don’t trust the AA rep to figure out the best flights for you or simply want to find the flights out for yourself first, use Qantas’s website to search for all OneWorld partner availability.
I’ll walk you through, step by step, every single thing you need to do to learn about and book stopovers, open-jaws, and free one-ways.
Video tutorials.
Private Facebook group.
Live Q&A’s with me, one on one.
I’ve spent hundred of hours creating the #1 place for people who want to become EXPERTS at booking awards and maximizing their miles and want to do it fast!
4 weeks, and you’ll be an EXPERT, guaranteed! And you’ll be saving yourself $1,000’s of dollars!
I highly recommend everyone begin considering using stopovers and open jaws when booking award tickets.
With AA, they both giveth (25% extra over MPM is super generous) and taketh away (only allowing stopovers in gateway cities and not any international cities).
But even though you can “only” stop in North American cities, there are still some awesome opportunities available.
How often can you get an extra trip to somewhere cool like Hawaii or Alaska put on to your ticket for free?
Take advantage of it every chance you can get!
If you have any questions or comments regarding stopovers and open jaws on American Airlines, please let me know in the comments. This is a difficult topic, and the only question that is a stupid one is the one that goes unasked.
[bluebox]If you haven’t already, make sure to check out the other awesome Maximize Your Miles posts:
(Big thanks to Lucky at One Mile at a Time for breaking down the MPM rules and regulations with American Airlines in this awesome post, which I used as a guide).
