I've been getting a lot of ads for these "elite travel" services and points guys that help you search award flights in business international and then help you with a strategy to transfer points for max value towards airline miles.

Anyone ever play this game? I'm not going to pay a service to do it, esp since some of these sound like subscription services rather than a one time % fee or something like that.

I have AMEX plat for work and a AAdvantage card for personal. But just seeing if anyone has experience doing this and what all it entails.

Sounds like (after doing research on chat) you just have to do your own digging for what business class flights have the best value for points to book. Then just transfer your points from AMEX to that airline to book. There's probably a way to efficiently do this and that's where I'm looking for help.

Bsaed on some research on a site like PointsYeah, it seems like often times the best points value flights may not be the least connections or quickest routes either- so I guess that's the trade off.

I've been in the points game for 8+ years now and it's constantly evolving. When I started there was no consolidator like PointsYeah but the points required were much cheaper and easier to find. The airlines have devalued the programs big time the last 4-5 years so what used to cost 60k one way in business is now upwards of 200k - 300k.

I use PointsYeah all the time if I'm trying to see what my options are but it doesn't pull in every single option (e.g. Fifth Freedom Routes) so it helps to just get a general understanding.

r/awardtravel is a great thread on Reddit where people share what they've done for bookings so you can get inspiration, they have tons of guides for each type of
Point currency and the hottest destinations (Japan and Maldives to name two).

There are sweet spots with airlines that have distance based award charts but the availability is limited and for the top destinations, is often gone the day it comes out about 330 days out.

I would suggest to just start researching "best point options from the US to X". It'll give you ideas, but most of them are pipe dreams, Reddit will then give you more context as to the feasibility of said plan. The daily question thread and FAQ will answer most of what you want to know getting started.

The actual transferring of points to airlines is super easy, the work is in finding the availability.

Happy to answer questions if you have them.

Do you have destinations / regions in mind?

Kreg17 said:

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I've been in the points game for 8+ years now and it's constantly evolving. When I started there was no consolidator like PointsYeah but the points required were much cheaper and easier to find. The airlines have devalued the programs big time the last 4-5 years so what used to cost 60k one way in business is now upwards of 200k - 300k.

I use PointsYeah all the time if I'm trying to see what my options are but it doesn't pull in every single option (e.g. Fifth Freedom Routes) so it helps to just get a general understanding.

r/awardtravel is a great thread on Reddit where people share what they've done for bookings so you can get inspiration, they have tons of guides for each type of
Point currency and the hottest destinations (Japan and Maldives to name two).

There are sweet spots with airlines that have distance based award charts but the availability is limited and for the top destinations, is often gone the day it comes out about 330 days out.

I would suggest to just start researching "best point options from the US to X". It'll give you ideas, but most of them are pipe dreams, Reddit will then give you more context as to the feasibility of said plan. The daily question thread and FAQ will answer most of what you want to know getting started.

The actual transferring of points to airlines is super easy, the work is in finding the availability.

Happy to answer questions if you have them.

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this big time. totally sucks.

Kreg17 said:

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Do you have destinations / regions in mind?

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Currently would be round trip flights originating in Texas - to Madrid, London, or Tokyo

I used seats.aero last year for flights to Europe. It was only $10/month and worthwhile. I tried a few others, forget their names but I found that many of their searches brought up either expired or not available award travel flights.

Being able to search Major Airport to/from Europe with 90 day windows was great.

Ultimately, I booked business class seats on Lufthansa (A380 service) from Denver to Zurich (via Munich) using AirCanada miles. Return was Amsterdam to DFW via AA using Alaska miles.

So did you just book a different airline /airplane to Denver to catch your outbound ?

I farm Amex points and then look for cheap European or Asian award flights, especially if there's an Amex transfer bonus (e.g. I got a 30% points promo on British Airways last year).

I don't fly business class. I'm able to take my family of 4 round trip to Europe or Asia about every 12-18 months.

Amex.point.me is a great website for Amex platinum users.

Esteban du Plantier said:

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I farm Amex points and then look for cheap European or Asian award flights, especially if there's an Amex transfer bonus (e.g. I got a 30% points promo on British Airways last year).

I don't fly business class. I'm able to take my family of 4 round trip to Europe or Asia about every 12-18 months.

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What's your process for finding cheap award flights?

lazuras_dc said:

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Esteban du Plantier said:

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I farm Amex points and then look for cheap European or Asian award flights, especially if there's an Amex transfer bonus (e.g. I got a 30% points promo on British Airways last year).

I don't fly business class. I'm able to take my family of 4 round trip to Europe or Asia about every 12-18 months.

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What's your process for finding cheap award flights?

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There are tools/addins for chrome where you can include award travel in Google flights.

But I've always just had an idea of roughly where I want to go and roughly when and then started manually shopping.

For example, 2024 we were taking a river boat cruise on the Rhine and I wanted to build a trip several days before and after. I wanted to fly into or out of Paris and then a different country for the other flight.

I made a grid of the various cheap award flights into and out of Europe and eventually got an itinerary for my family of 4 for about 170,000 points. At 4 points per dollar spent at restaurants and grocery and 5x on hotels and flights, a little over $40,000 in Amex spending got us that set of flights.

I'm sure there are better/more efficient ways these days

PointsYeah has a nice "Daydream" function where you can search very broadly. Input several departure airport locations and your destination can literally be "Europe". It'll pull in a ton of options based on your dates and desired class of flights.

My last trip we flew AC from IAH - YYZ - VIE in Premium Econ & Lufthansa Business class from DRS - FRA - IAH.

lazuras_dc said:

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So did you just book a different airline /airplane to Denver to catch your outbound ?

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I live in Denver but on the return trip, we just booked a normal flight from DFW to DEN.

Generally speaking, the more flexibility you have with your travel dates plus locations the better options/deals you'll have.

My initial goal was just to get to/from somewhere in Europe in business class; everything else was a bonus. Our goal was to spend most of our time in Switzerland, which we did but flying back we were flexible hence the departure through Amsterdam. We ended up spending a couple of days there just because the flights worked better.

Plenty of sites, as others have mentioned.

A lot of the points pros use seats.aero as one of the tools. I'd get the paid version and set up a bunch of alerts for routes and some general searches as well. It's not as pretty as point.me or some of the others, but it's much more customizable and powerful. It does, however, have a learning curve.

I'm pretty deep into the points game, having booked over 200 business-class flights for our family over the past couple of years. We travel internationally about every other month, sometimes bringing extended family or friends.

Paying the experts is a great way to learn how to do it yourself, as they can be super helpful and answer questions, assuming it's over Zoom where you can ask questions. However, paying them to handle the bookings can be tricky for all sides since it's often very time-sensitive. Great flights can disappear quickly, sometimes while you wait for points to transfer. Other flights might show up in searches, only to disappear when you go to book.

My two go-to search tools are Seats.aero for broader searches (DFW to Europe, wider dates, etc.) and Award Tool (very specific searches, searches to less common airports).

There are some great Facebook groups that talk about the "hobby" - Daily Drop, 10X Travel, and tons more. There are also great newsletters with deals and strategies. I'm also happy to answer any questions.

tmtxco said:

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I'm pretty deep into the points game, having booked over 200 business-class flights for our family over the past couple of years. We travel internationally about every other month, sometimes bringing extended family or friends.

Paying the experts is a great way to learn how to do it yourself, as they can be super helpful and answer questions, assuming it's over Zoom where you can ask questions. However, paying them to handle the bookings can be tricky for all sides since it's often very time-sensitive. Great flights can disappear quickly, sometimes while you wait for points to transfer. Other flights might show up in searches, only to disappear when you go to book.

My two go-to search tools are Seats.aero for broader searches (DFW to Europe, wider dates, etc.) and Award Tool (very specific searches, searches to less common airports).

There are some great Facebook groups that talk about the "hobby" - Daily Drop, 10X Travel, and tons more. There are also great newsletters with deals and strategies. I'm also happy to answer any questions.

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Out of curiosity, are you spending millions on credit cards a year? How do you accumulate enough points to buy hundreds of business flights? It's easily millions of points.

I'm assuming DFW to Europe you have booked a ton of Air France business?

Esteban du Plantier said:

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tmtxco said:

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I'm pretty deep into the points game, having booked over 200 business-class flights for our family over the past couple of years. We travel internationally about every other month, sometimes bringing extended family or friends.

Paying the experts is a great way to learn how to do it yourself, as they can be super helpful and answer questions, assuming it's over Zoom where you can ask questions. However, paying them to handle the bookings can be tricky for all sides since it's often very time-sensitive. Great flights can disappear quickly, sometimes while you wait for points to transfer. Other flights might show up in searches, only to disappear when you go to book.

My two go-to search tools are Seats.aero for broader searches (DFW to Europe, wider dates, etc.) and Award Tool (very specific searches, searches to less common airports).

There are some great Facebook groups that talk about the "hobby" - Daily Drop, 10X Travel, and tons more. There are also great newsletters with deals and strategies. I'm also happy to answer any questions.

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Out of curiosity, are you spending millions on credit cards a year? How do you accumulate enough points to buy hundreds of business flights? It's easily millions of points.

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A combination of high spending on personal cards and several of my companies, as well as by using specific cards that earn higher-than-normal rates.

A few examples...

• Google/Microsoft/Meta Ads earn 4 points per dollar on AmEx Business Gold
• Any flights (I seldom use points on domestic flights) booked directly with the airline earn 5x/dollar on AmEx Platinum
• Dining earns 4x/dollar on AmEx Gold
• Office Depot and similar earn 5x/dollar (up to $25k/year/card) on Chase Ink Business Cash
• GoDaddy
• We use Rakuten for all of our online shopping (and in-store pickup) and have Rakuten set to pay out in AmEx MR
• If you also want points, you can even pay income taxes for less than a 2% charge, which can math out if you are getting 2 points per dollar or trying to earn a credit card sign-up bonus
• Anything that doesn't earn a bonus such as the above goes on a Capital One Venture X or Venture X Business card, serving as a base to ensure I get at least 2 points per dollar.

Large, efficient spending helps us rack up points. However, anyone can apply these types of strategies. My late 70-year-old parents still accumulate over 500k points/year with their limited retirement spending + one or two card signups per year.

HeritageAg said:

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I'm assuming DFW to Europe you have booked a ton of Air France business?

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We just got back from France last month, traveling over on Lufthansa (booked via Air Canada using AmEx points) and returning on Air France (booked on Air France).

We usually travel as a family of four, sometimes 6 with my parents. Getting 4 - 6 business class tickets at a good rate requires planning out in advance, sometimes 6-12 months. It can also require "repositioning," where we buy a cheap cash flight to another airport where there's a significantly better deal (eg. 60k points out of ATL or JFK vs 100k+ out of DFW).