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🤙🏿 Welcome back to the Better Than Points Newsletter - the premier place for all things Credit Card Points News and Travel

My name’s Luis and I’m the one writing this (hit me up here!)

Hello from a little island in the middle of the ocean! We arrived yesterday, and wow, traveling with a five-month-old is a whole different game compared to solo travel. But, hey, that 8-hour flight wasn’t too bad, thanks to those lie-flat first-class seats. (Don’t worry, I’ll spill all the details on how I booked them with points in today’s email!)

Enough about me, let’s dive into the good stuff!

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🗞️ Travel News

Flying Blue November Promo (LINK)

Every month, the KLM/Air France program drops some promo deals on flights, and this month’s promo includes select U.S. cities! While we didn’t get any long-haul business flights to Europe in the promo this time, there are economy deals out of Boston, New York, Denver, and Seattle.

For those of you asking about budget-friendly ways to get to Europe, this is a great opportunity. Just remember, you’ll need to book in November, but your travel dates can be anytime through April 30, 2025.

And while my client services focus on international business and first-class travel, here is some availability for routes like SEA-CDG that include the promo. Quick tip: when searching, leave the date range blank to bring up the full calendar view!

Hawaiian Miles on Sale (LINK)

Now through November 15, 2024, you can buy HawaiianMiles with a 100% bonus! That means spending $2,540 will get you 200,000 Hawaiian miles. While I usually don’t recommend buying miles speculatively, especially Hawaiian miles, this deal is worth considering. Why? You can transfer those miles 1:1 to Alaska Airlines, giving you more options if Hawaii isn’t on your travel list.

With Alaska Airlines’ wide range of partners and decent redemption rates, this bonus could be a great strategy. Just keep in mind that miles may not appear in your account instantly after purchase. So, if you already have a flight in mind, you might need to cross your fingers that the transfer goes through in time.

And if Hawaii is on your radar, this is a solid way to get there! You can find first-class flights from the mainland to Hawaii for as low as 40,000 HawaiianMiles.

Seats aero has two new features (LINK)

Seats.aero just rolled out two new features, but I’ll focus on the one you’ll find most useful, the seat map viewer. This tool lets you view seat maps for specific planes, which is super helpful given the many plane configurations out there. And while free tools like Aerolopa are still around, the real perk of the seat map viewer is that it shows which seats are already taken, a must-have feature if you’re traveling with a group and need to plan seating.

Seats.aero is quickly becoming my favorite search tool. It seems they’re stepping up their game, especially as ExpertFlyer’s functionality has started to die. If you’re looking for a user-friendly, reliable tool to streamline seat selection, this is definitely worth checking out.

🤓 Hacks

• Take a quick look at your passport and check the expiration date right now. If you’re planning an international trip, remember that some countries, like Morocco, won’t let you enter if your passport is set to expire within six months. It’s always a good idea to renew well ahead of time to avoid any surprises at the border.

• If you have a Hyatt milestone award to choose from and want to extend your Suite Upgrade Award’s validity for an extra year, consider waiting until January 1 to make your selection, as long as you're within the 90-day milestone selection window. For awards earned at 40, 50, or 70+ nights, you can delay selecting the benefit (up to 90 days), and by choosing it in January, you’ll extend it by a full year, taking it to 2027.

🧑🏿‍💻 Question From You

Every week I answer one question from the community. Reply to this email with yours because you’re probably not the only one that has it.

Question

Tracey recently asked whether it’s better to have a credit card that gives you transferable points or a co-branded credit card.

For most people, a card that earns transferable points is the way to go. With transferable points, you have more flexibility when it comes time to book your trip. You can choose from a variety of airline partners, which means more flight options and the ability to shop around for the best deals. With a co-branded credit card, your points are tied to a single airline, limiting your options and availability when booking.

🔬 Secret Travel Research

This section includes some of the best award flights of the week bookable with points and miles.

• Don’t transfer points over to JetBlue for this one, this was just to be able to pull up Business/First class availability for the AUS to HNL Hawaiian Airlines flight

• These 4 dates show up as 40k Hawaiian Airline miles or around the same for Virgin Atlantic miles but with Virgin miles make sure to reach out to them to confirm availability before transferring miles

• If you don’t have miles, you could spend $508 buying miles with the current bonus to book this as well.

👀 My Favorite Finds

This section includes some of the best links videos and articles of the week around the points and travel community

• Staying at a Kimpton this Winter? Say the secret password “It’s Giving” for some complimentary treats (LINK)

• Alaska might be cutting some flights to Hawaii now that they’ve merged (LINK)

• Step-by-step how I booked my flight to Hawaii in first class (LINK)

  P.S. I’d really appreciate it if you’d like my step-by-step video ⬆️