We Asked 4 Points Pros for Their Best Flight Hack—and They All Said the Same Thing

Flying business class without paying business-class prices sounds like something only the most frequent flyers can pull off. (It's not.) The trick comes down to points, including which ones to earn and what to do with them once they're in your account. We asked four points-and-miles experts for their best piece of advice on making the most of airline rewards. Each independently arrived at the same two-part answer: transfer your points to a frequent flyer program, and stay as flexible as possible.

Don't always book flights through your bank's travel site.

For a points novice, the first decision is which points to earn to begin with. 

"Earning flexible points instead of airline miles or hotel points helps you cast a wider net," Stella Shon, a loyalty expert for Upgraded Points, says. Shon steers newcomers toward points that aren't locked to a single airline. Some of the most common options include Chase Ultimate Rewards, American Express Membership Rewards, Bilt Rewards, Capital One Miles, and Citi ThankYou Rewards.

When you have points with these programs, travelers often book a flight through the program's travel portal. However, to get maximum value, especially for business- and first-class seats, that's usually a mistake.

Through websites like Amex Travel or Capital One Travel, your points are generally worth a flat amount, somewhere around one cent per point (although this exact value can vary). That means a $4,000 business-class seat to Paris might cost you around 400,000 credit card points. But most banks let you move those same points to an airline's frequent flyer program instead—it's called transferring to a partner—and that's where the best deals typically are. 

For instance, move those same bank points to Air France's frequent flyer program, Flying Blue, and that Paris seat can cost as little as 60,000 points, plus taxes and fees.

"Nearly every lie-flat seat I've flown in the last decade was booked by transferring credit card points," Andrew Kunesh, founder of the travel newsletter PNM.now, says. 

Be flexible.

Naturally, airlines don't make it easy. Each expert notes that frequent flyer programs only release a few of these discounted seats per flight. So getting one depends less on how many points you have and more on how flexible you're willing to be. 

Julian Kheel, founder and CEO of the tool Points Path, says the willingness to fly a day earlier or later, add a stop, or start from a different city is worth more than a bigger points balance. One strategy beginners rarely think of: book a cheap flight to a major airport, then begin your award trip from there. It's called a positioning flight, and it can open up seats you couldn't get otherwise.

It's gotten even harder lately, says Kyle Potter, executive editor of the deal site Thrifty Traveler. As more people have learned about points and miles, airlines have gotten stingier about releasing premium seats. Some, he adds, "have clearly blocked their partner airlines from booking altogether," creating redemptions that are "great on paper but impossible in practice."

The fix is to be as flexible as possible. Don't limit yourself to one exact flight. Searching for a lie-flat seat from Dallas to Rome on a specific day might turn up nothing. But if you can leave any day between August 1 and 10, fly out of Chicago instead of Dallas, or land in Paris or Amsterdam and take a train or cheap flight to Rome, your chances go up significantly. 

In addition, seat availability changes by the minute, and Kheel says beginners often search once, see nothing, and give up. He notes that you don't have to keep checking by hand. Some tools like Points Path, point.me, and PointsYeah can send an alert when a premium seat appears.

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