Loyalty DOES Matter
Travel isn't cheap and we are not rich.
One big way we have learned to save money is through the loyalty programs that all airlines and hotels offer. In this series of posts, I'll go over the different loyalty programs that we use, why and how we've benefited from them.
Instead of jumping around and trying to use every program out there, we have focused on one budget option and one “business’ option. By focusing this way we can leverage our loyalty and find the best deals.
We are able to use one loyalty account for all travel and I tend to book travel for us so to pool the points into one account. Using the points like this is the preferred way for family trips but if someone needs to use points for a personal trip we don’t have to fight over them.
We use 4 loyalty programs, 2 airlines programs and 2 hotel from major hotel chains.
While are in no way experts on these programs but this is what we have learned from utilizing them over the years and hopefully what we do know will be helpful for those of you out there who are learning just like we did.
Delta is by far my favorite airline.
I have always had great crew members, on time flights, and clean planes. With Delta you can earn points through travel, Lyft, Hertz, Instacart and Starbucks.
There are 4 levels to Delta’s loyalty program and with each level the benefits increase.
- Silver
- Gold
- Platinum
- Diamond
At the base level Silver you do get priority boarding and one free checked bag. A perk many don’t know about is that if you book the tickets for your group of up to 8 people, they all receive one free checked bag as well. You are allowed to request complimentary upgrades but until you reach Gold this is really hard to get.
"Airport" by Samrat Mondal is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0
Another great way to earn points is to have a Delta Credit Card. I have a Gold card that we only use for flights and I earn 3 points per dollar spent. SkyMiles are great to have, and you can utilize them in a variety of ways. Two great ways to utilize a smaller amount of points that people don’t talk about is using your points to discount the cost of your tickets and upgrading your coach class seat to comfort plus.
These are just our favorites and are our opinions only. No matter which loyalty program you choose our recommendation is to join one that fits you! You want to be able to earn points and use that to help you
travel.
Tiff
Hi, I'm Tiff and I wrote this! Learn more about myself, my family and our hopes for this blog on our Meet the Team page!
