I was very late to the game in planning a trip for our February break. I think the fact that we are taking a March ski trip this year (to Whistler) instead of a February ski trip threw me off a bit and I procrastinated in making a move. And I paid!
I started researching destinations about a month ago and had a few ideas. We are going to Hawaii in December so I did not want to do another beach trip. Also since we are skiing in March, a ski trip was out as well. So with beach and ski destinations out, I considered the following options.
I looked into Paris-flights were about $1700 each-no way! I thought about LA-but I decided I wanted to wait till my kids are a bit older and would maybe like to combine LA with a 2 week trip of the California coast. I considered San Antonio, but decided I would rather go when the weather is a bit warmer. I constantly kept coming back in my head to Vegas despite the hefty price (at least for me) of the flights. But I had points for the hotels in Vegas and I knew we would have enough to do for 5-6 days. Although I did not have nearly enough points ANYWHERE for five flights to Vegas, I did have enough for 2 out of 5 flights on JetBlue. I paid for the other 3 flights with my Barclaycard Arrival Plus World Elite MasterCard. You will soon see why I used this card.
The flights were about $580 each. So with the 2 that I booked on JetBlue TrueBlue points, I saved about $1,200.
Note that I had enough JetBlue TrueBlue points for these 2 flights because I was able to transfer American Express Membership Rewards to our JetBlue TrueBlue family pool. We usually have a lot of American Express Membership Rewards points because Rob’s firm does a lot of advertising. To pay for this advertising, he uses his American Express Business Gold Rewards card and earns 3x American Express Membership Rewards points on these advertising charges.
I was able to transfer these Amex points to JetBlue because JetBlue TrueBlue is an American Express Membership Rewards transfer partner. However, unfortunately, the transfer ratio is not 1:1. At the time of this post, 250 American Express Membership Rewards points equal 200 TrueBlue points.
I transferred 112,500 American Express Memberbship Rewards points (at a fee of $67.50) to JetBlue to yield 90,000 JetBlue TrueBlue points. I then booked 2 of the biggest JetBlue point redemptions that I ever have. Each ticket was 44,600 TrueBlue points. Note that less convenient flight times were less points, but I have 3 kids. I sometimes need to go for what it easy.
As for the $1,800 that I spent for other three tickets, I ultimately redeemed by Barclaycard Arrival Miles and got this charge credited back to my account.
Recall, with the Barclaycard Arrival Plus World Elite MasterCard, if you pay for travel with the card, you can then redeem your miles for a statement credit within 120 days of the charge. When I paid for the tickets, I already had a respectable balance of Barclaycard Arrival miles. I moved almost every charge to this card over the next four months. I also used it for 4 months of camp fees (we pay monthly) and the balance of our tennis club fees (a sizable amount!). With about 3 days to spare, I had enough miles to offset the $1,800 charge. Don’t forget, it is easy to accumulate miles with the Barclaycard because you always earn 2 Barclaycard Arrival miles for every $1 spent.
