AW: MM win!

hoffse · April 2015

So I think I've mentioned before that H is a dual citizen with Belgium. H's dad immigrated to the US in his late-20's and all of his family is still over in Europe.

Included in that family is H's 94-year-old grandmother (Mamina). We've been hoping to get to Belgium soon so that H can have a last visit with Mamina before she's gone. She's in great health, her mind is still perfect, but you know how these things are.

In preparations for this, we sought out the advice of some of the folks on this board and started working cards for points. We managed to hit the sign-up bonuses for a couple cards, and today I redeemed them for two round-trip flights!

Believe it or not, we managed to snag two reward seats over the week of Christmas at the low-level redemption rate on United. I was shocked that there was any availability at that rate during that time, but there they were... exactly the flights we wanted. We are flying direct one way and then we have a short layover on the way back. It's like the United gods wanted us to be able to see her! And since we're going over Christmas week, we'll only miss 2 days of work. It couldn't have been any more perfect.

We're going to fly into Frankfurt to spend the first few days visiting some German Christmas markets, and then we're going to spend 4 days in Belgium visiting Mamina. Total out of pocket cost for both flights: $171 in taxes/fees!

We are so excited that we're going to have a chance to visit with her, and we are THRILLED that the points thing worked so well for us. Thanks to the travel/points hackers on this board who gave us help! You guys saved us over $3K today, and H is so so happy to be able to see Mamina one more time.

Xstatic3333 · April 2015

That's amazing! Great work @hoffse! That's wonderful that he'll get to see her again. Can I ask which cards you used?

simplyelise · April 2015

That's fantastic! So cool about not missing too much work also. I know you've said before that your H's firm is pretty demanding on billable hours, etc, so it sounds like you're saving on that account too!

short+sassy · April 2015

That is fantastic news! What a great trip and even better the flights are almost free.

jessica490 · April 2015

Great find! You will have a great time!

AprilZ81 · April 2015

That is awesome!!!!

hoffse · April 2015

Xstatic3333 said:
That's amazing! Great work @hoffse! That's wonderful that he'll get to see her again. Can I ask which cards you used?

We did the Chase sapphire and ink cards. We fly out of Atlanta, which is a Delta hub, so that's why we didn't go with an airline-specific card. If we lived closer to a United hub, I would probably have a United card. Delta points are pretty worthless - people call them skypesos for a reason!

The nice thing about the Chase cards is that the points do transfer 1:1 to a bunch of partners, and one of those partners is United. And if one of their travel partners doesn't have a flight you want, you can just book directly through Chase to get on any airline you want. We figured being able to book Delta on Chase points was worth having that card. We figured the points transfer would be a bonus if it ever happened to work out (but we weren't really expecting it to).

Well it just so happens that United flies direct from Atlanta to Frankfurt. It's one of the very few direct international flights from ATL that isn't on Delta. So for our itinerary, transferring the points to United directly made all sorts of sense. It literally doubled the value of our points.

The points transferred from Chase to United in under a minute, and I was able to use them immediately. I was pretty impressed by how seamless the whole thing was!

hoffse · April 2015

simplyelise said:
That's fantastic! So cool about not missing too much work also. I know you've said before that your H's firm is pretty demanding on billable hours, etc, so it sounds like you're saving on that account too!

Yes! that was one reason why we chose Christmas. His billable year runs from December to November, so he'll technically be in his second year of practice during that trip, and he'll have an entire year to make up any hours that need to be made up. Besides, most of his practice group just didn't show up that week this past year - everybody was gone visiting family - so he shouldn't be missing much anyway. Win-win!

Xstatic3333 · April 2015

hoffse said:

Xstatic3333 said:
That's amazing! Great work @hoffse! That's wonderful that he'll get to see her again. Can I ask which cards you used?
We did the Chase sapphire and ink cards. We fly out of Atlanta, which is a Delta hub, so that's why we didn't go with an airline-specific card. If we lived closer to a United hub, I would probably have a United card. Delta points are pretty worthless - people call them skypesos for a reason!

The nice thing about the Chase cards is that the points do transfer 1:1 to a bunch of partners, and one of those partners is United. And if one of their travel partners doesn't have a flight you want, you can just book directly through Chase to get on any airline you want. We figured being able to book Delta on Chase points was worth having that card. We figured the points transfer would be a bonus if it ever happened to work out (but we weren't really expecting it to).

Well it just so happens that United flies direct from Atlanta to Frankfurt. It's one of the very few direct international flights from ATL that isn't on Delta. So for our itinerary, transferring the points to United directly made all sorts of sense. It literally doubled the value of our points.

The points transferred from Chase to United in under a minute, and I was able to use them immediately. I was pretty impressed by how seamless the whole thing was!

I just Googled it-very cool that use can use the points with Southwest as well! It also is a better sign up bonus than most of the airline cards. Well done!

Now, off to go beat back my pesky travel bug until the e-fund is restocked...

hoffse · April 2015

Xstatic3333 said:

Xstatic3333 said:
That's amazing! Great work @hoffse! That's wonderful that he'll get to see her again. Can I ask which cards you used?
We did the Chase sapphire and ink cards. We fly out of Atlanta, which is a Delta hub, so that's why we didn't go with an airline-specific card. If we lived closer to a United hub, I would probably have a United card. Delta points are pretty worthless - people call them skypesos for a reason!

The nice thing about the Chase cards is that the points do transfer 1:1 to a bunch of partners, and one of those partners is United. And if one of their travel partners doesn't have a flight you want, you can just book directly through Chase to get on any airline you want. We figured being able to book Delta on Chase points was worth having that card. We figured the points transfer would be a bonus if it ever happened to work out (but we weren't really expecting it to).

Well it just so happens that United flies direct from Atlanta to Frankfurt. It's one of the very few direct international flights from ATL that isn't on Delta. So for our itinerary, transferring the points to United directly made all sorts of sense. It literally doubled the value of our points.

The points transferred from Chase to United in under a minute, and I was able to use them immediately. I was pretty impressed by how seamless the whole thing was!

I just Googled it-very cool that use can use the points with Southwest as well! It also is a better sign up bonus than most of the airline cards. Well done!

Now, off to go beat back my pesky travel bug until the e-fund is restocked...

Gah, I'm sorry!

als1982 · April 2015

Love it! Free travel is the best!!

Xstatic3333 · April 2015

hoffse said:

Xstatic3333 said:

Xstatic3333 said:
That's amazing! Great work @hoffse! That's wonderful that he'll get to see her again. Can I ask which cards you used?
We did the Chase sapphire and ink cards. We fly out of Atlanta, which is a Delta hub, so that's why we didn't go with an airline-specific card. If we lived closer to a United hub, I would probably have a United card. Delta points are pretty worthless - people call them skypesos for a reason!

The nice thing about the Chase cards is that the points do transfer 1:1 to a bunch of partners, and one of those partners is United. And if one of their travel partners doesn't have a flight you want, you can just book directly through Chase to get on any airline you want. We figured being able to book Delta on Chase points was worth having that card. We figured the points transfer would be a bonus if it ever happened to work out (but we weren't really expecting it to).

Well it just so happens that United flies direct from Atlanta to Frankfurt. It's one of the very few direct international flights from ATL that isn't on Delta. So for our itinerary, transferring the points to United directly made all sorts of sense. It literally doubled the value of our points.

The points transferred from Chase to United in under a minute, and I was able to use them immediately. I was pretty impressed by how seamless the whole thing was!
I just Googled it-very cool that use can use the points with Southwest as well! It also is a better sign up bonus than most of the airline cards. Well done!

Now, off to go beat back my pesky travel bug until the e-fund is restocked...

Gah, I'm sorry!

It's all good. Can't complain with our health and a roof over my head. I can surf Air BnB on my coffee breaks however :-)

lifeonthehill · April 2015

That is amazing! I am so glad you were able to take advantage of this opportunity!

JoanE2012 · April 2015

Love the deal! And enjoy the Christmas markets! We went on a Christmas Markets river cruise a couple years ago and had a couple stops at some German ones. They markets are truly magical.

ETA - Tip - Bring an empty bag with you! We stuffed a duffel bag inside our suitcase and then filled it with loot from the markets. We had to carry it on back home as we brought home lots of fragile/delicate stuff. But I love that most of our holiday decor in our house is from the markets.

AW: MM win!

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