Step 3: Acquiring Points and Miles – Staying Organized

3

This is the 3rd post on how to accumulate and spend miles and points effectively. See previous posts for more info:

Step 1: Acquiring Points and Miles – Laying the Foundation
Step 2: Acquiring Points and Miles – Setting Up
Step 3: Acquiring Points and Miles – Staying Organized
Step 4: Acquiring Points and Miles – Accumulating

 

Once you have signed up for more than one program, if you are like me, you do not have time or want to visit each programs website to see what your balances are in each program. Fortunately there are a few sites that will aggregate all your programs into one easy to see webpage. Depending on which site you choose, they help you track miles and points, allow you to see when they expire, pull in reservations and update automatically.

 

Awardwallet.com

The first is Awardwallet. This is the primary online mile/point manager that I personally use. They offer a FREE service that supports a total of 612 loyalty programs – air, hotel, car rental, credit card and others. According to their bio page, they were founded in 2004, have over 179,000 active members and manage over 41.5 billion miles / points.  You can track your balances (plus multiple other people, ie. family), pull in reservations, update balances automatically and login directly to partner sites straight from awardwallet.com.

For a small donation of a minimum $5 you can get expiration information and for a $10 donation you can also get a AwardWallet OneCard which is a credit card sized card that lists up to 30 of your loyalty programs for quick reference. They also have an app available for smartphones and they have great customer support as well. When I emailed them about a program they didn’t track, they responded within 24 hours and added it within a week.

You can use my referral link if you’d like: http://AwardWallet.com/?refCode=bewfovqeqh

Additionally, for being a loyal GlobetrotterHQ.com reader you can get AwardWallet Plus (with mileage expiration) for free as long as you have not had AwardWallet plus in the past. Just enter globetrotterhq as the Coupon Code when registering.

Registration window

 

UsingMiles.com

A second free option to track your miles and points is a site called UsingMiles. I personally have not used them so am pulling the info from their site. 

There are 248 programs available and growing that range from airline, hotel, grocery, online, etc. You can also get email alerts when miles, points or vouchers expire. You can manage your entire family by using their dashboard feature to see an overview of the whole family. Also they have bank-level data encryption security measures to keep your personal information safe and secure according to their site. 

Basic Membership is free but there is a Premier Membership which costs $29.99/year. You will get all the benefits of UsingMiles Basic plus you get alerts when programs or deals are going to expire and special bonus awards from your loyalty programs. Search your loyalty programs for award seat and hotel room availability. More info here: https://www.usingmiles.com/pages/learnmore

 

Tripit.com

A 3rd free option is TripIt. I use them for tracking all my travel plans: hotels, flights, car rentals and train rides. TripIt organizes travel plans into an itinerary that has all of your trip details in one place. Simply forward confirmation emails to plans@tripit.com and TripIt will automatically build an itinerary for your trip that you can access anytime, either online or from a mobile device. It will add maps with driving directions and you can add private notes and share travel plans with friends and family.

Tracking points and reminders are FREE but they have a paid feature called TripIt Pro which you can get free for 30 days and then costs $49/year. Additional features include:

Flight refunds – If your airfare is eligible for a refund, you’ll be the first to know. Mobile alerts – Get mobile alerts or emails about flight delays, cancellations, and gate changes. VIP privileges – Complimentary 1-year memberships to Hertz #1 Club Gold and Regus Gold. VIP car rental and access to 1,200 business lounges worldwide. ($660 value). Alternate flights – Get the best options for alternate flights to your destination, including flight status and open seats. Auto-sharing – Add people like your spouse to your Inner Circle, and they can automatically access all your trip details. More Info: https://www.tripit.com/learnMore

 

Superfly.com

A last option I’ll review is Superfly which allows you to track your balances but also assigns a value to your miles. It will value them versus the cost of buying a cash ticket and the miles you would get. It seems like a decent site but since I don’t like to spread my account info across many platforms, I’ve only tested it with one account. It seems promising but some faq’s are outdated and the site doesn’t seem to have much updating.

 

Summary

I’ve stuck with Awardwallet for a few years now and am very happy with them. I also use TripIt regularly and love it as it keeps my trip data organized. I have also tried TripIt pro but couldn’t justify paying for it since I never received any flight refund notices. It may be useful for heavy business travelers since with a single refund it could pay for itself.

If you have used any of them leave your feedback below in the comments section.

Share.

About Author

3 Comments

  1. Thanks for the overview. I haven’t personally tried out awardwallet yet because of the security concern (however, I see that many, many people use it to track their miles/points, so I may sign up very soon). For now, I am doing the old excel file method. 😉 However, I am getting slightly overwhelmed by keeping track of the hotel/flight/rental car reservations, so I think I will sign up for TripIt.

    • I started out the same way and I would definitely advise to continue unless you truly feel comfortable with Awardwallet. In the end, I am managing over 100 loyalty programs for myself and 3 others so Awardwallet saves me alot of time and I get to see expiration dates. If you decide to sign up, you can use my code and you’ll get a 6 month premium subscription.

Leave A Reply