Frequent-Flyer Miles Are Hotter Than Cash This Summer
With airfares soaring, especially for international flights, travelers are raiding their loyalty accounts.
Matt and Karen Mazanka have been making at least two big trips annually—to Hawaii and Europe—for years and have juggled the use of various airline- and hotel-linked credit cards to help maximize their loyalty miles and reduce the number of tickets they have to pay cash for. “We take these trips all the time, and this is how we basically do it. There’s no way we could afford to do it without the credit cards,” says Matt, a pharmacist from Livonia, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit.
Now the Mazankas have found that their awards don’t go as far as they used to. The number of miles that once paid for two round-trip tickets for a long-haul getaway may only cover one now—and usually the couple can only start and end their travel on weekdays, when award availability tends to be greater, Matt says.