Hi All,

Quick newbie question here:

I am currently in the middle of working towards meeting my minimum spends. As the points come in, I thought I should start to shift my time to learning how to actually book the award travel. Can you recommend the best resources for me to learn the tips and tricks of booking on points?

While the many award booking services seem convenient, I would like to save the money and learn the booking side of things for myself.

Thanks again for your kindness and support. I look forward to hearing your thoughts!

What airline(s)?

I would start by googling "how to book a (delta, united, BA, etc) award flight". You'll get hundreds of results from info on the actual airlines' websites to the numerous blog posts that have been written about booking award travel.

Did you sign up for your cards using a particular blogger's affiliate links? i.e. did you follow the link for the credit card application directly after reading about it on a blog?

If so, suggest you pose this question to that blogger. I, for one, would be interested to hear the response.

do what lots of folks do....ask for help in this forum.....

Well I'm brand new to this place, and not an expert. But rather than just tell you to go look elsewhere, I'm happy to share my thoughts with you.

1. Look at the airports that are near your hotel, and what airlines service them. This is seldom talked about, but don't try to earn delta points if delta doesn't fly out of your home airport. Not a huge problem if you live near a major airport.

2. Pick 1 or more credit cards, and put all your spending on them. Utility bills, small purchases, whatever you can.

3. Ask lots of questions. I can pretty much guarantee that any question you have has already been asked, but that's actually to the detriment of newbies like you and me. I can search for hours and I find great answers to questions I don't have. Info overload. So, if you don't find your answer in 5 mins, ask the question. You'll get some crankpots telling you that question has been answered, and how easily they can find it, but ask anyway if YOU can't find the answer.

I would suggest digging into individual sub-forums and reading the first 1-2 pages of posts that you think may be relevant. Thats pretty much what I do everyday.

Also a lot of bloggers post on how to start with points like a notice. Google can help you find something on that. Boardingarea.com is a good generic one with multiple bloggers.

You should focus your question a bit. For general stuff there are lots of guides/blogger sites. Milevalue is pretty good resource for looking up booking info.

Perhaps you have someplace you are saving up for. You should ask about that in relation to the CC you are meeting the minimum spend for.

I think you first have to figure out what you really want to do with those miles/points you are accumulating. Do you want (or have the time/inclination) to travel domestically or internationally? If the latter, where do you want to do in the next couple of years?

What cabin do you want? Happy in Coach, which also means your miles will go further and allow you more trips, or looking for front-of-the-plane experiences, whether or not you could afford them in real life?!

I use my miles to fly domestically to save money but the fun is First and Business internationally! I spent some time on FlyerTalk, lots of
time on Milepoint, and the read at least three blogs each day - Gary's viewfromthewing.com, Brian's thepointsguy.com and Lucky's One Mile At A Time. Daraius' MillionMileSecrets.com is also a good resource. I believe FrugalTraveler is good for those less interested in Business and First Class internationally.

But again, I think your first order of business is deciding why you accumulated all those miles! Good luck and happy trails.

Tip #1: avoid questions that are too general. Like this one. Your question is impossible to answer, but here are my thoughts anyway.

1. If this is a simple itinerary, you don't need award booking services. Go to a corresponding website and see what you can find. Be flexible. Always check one-way redemptions first and see where it takes you. That applies even to Delta that does not allow 1-way redemption for half the miles. BTW, when it comes to Delta do not get discouraged when you can't find anything at first; their calendar is broken.

Did I mention that you must be flexible?

2. Use the airline rules (especially stopover and open jaw) to your advantage. Learn the tricks. For example, never book US-Europe-US, instead book: Departure (NA, Mexico or Carribean) - US (real deaprture) - Europe - US (real destination) - Destination (NA, Mexico or Carribean). You can book 3 RTs with 2 awards if you're doing it right.

3. Getting direct award flights can be difficult or outright impossible. If you live near a small airport it will drive you nuts. Learn to be creative and book flights from major hubs. To get to those hubs use budget airlines, Amtrak or drive. Sometimes, it ain't 100% free.

3a. To get to a major hub, check budget carriers, such as Southwest, Frontier, and Jet Blue. Southwest and Frontier currently have excellent credit card sign up bonuses.

4. Do your homework and don't be afraid to ask specific questions in the right forum. Don't mind "snappers" either; some people won't feel content unless they put somebody else down.

Good luck!

I wrote a beginners guide to United/Star Alliance and another for Avios/Oneworld. Many bloggers have similar guides that, as suggested above, I recommend googling for.

Here is the specific question:

Using United miles (from Ultimate Rewards), what is the best way to book the following: CMH � Alesund � Reykjavik � CMH?

Dates are completely flexible. No date preferences/requirements. [It would also be nice to receive the United free one-way to use at the end of the trip, a month later].

I�m assuming layovers in Newark and Oslo will be required. How can I utilize United�s partners when booking on their website?

Thanks again!

One of the difficulties with getting your basic information from FlyerTalk is that there are so many details that you don't get the big picture. I suggest you get a hold of one or two good books - just go to Amazon and search for frequent flyer or something like that. You will find quite a few listings. You can read reviews of these books on the Amazon site and buy one or two of them.

I think that allows you get the forest first and fill it in with the trees. With FT you can definitely "lose the forest for the trees".

Not sure I understand what the question is. Did you go to United.com? I found lots of availability for August (just had to check out where Aalesund is). Again search by OW. CMH-AES, AES-KEF, etc.

I also did a search on united for Nov and Dec and found lots of saver award availability in economy.