95 | 5 of the Most Common Mistakes With Travel Rewards in 2022

Show Notes

Are you making mistakes with your travel rewards? Lyn shares the 5 most common travel rewards mistakes she saw in 2022 and offers tips and advice to keep help you avoid them!

Want to get on the fast-track to always fly your family free? Come join us inside the Families Fly Free membership, the BEST way to learn how to fly free using travel rewards...

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What is Families Fly Free?

Want to make more family travel memories without breaking the bank? Longtime travel journalist Lyn Mettler shares her top tips to help families quickly and easily travel for less using rewards points and inspires you with ideas of where to travel on your next vacation.

Do you love to travel and

save money?

Or do you wish you could travel, but

money is holding you back?

You're in the right place.

Welcome to the Families Fly Free

podcast, where I show you

how to fly your family free

forever.

Using my simple Fly Free

Formula.

I'm your host Lyn Mettler.

My family of four has mastered

the art of flying free as simply

as possible since 2015.

And I want to show your family how

to do it too.

Hey there, everyone.

Welcome to the Families Fly

Free podcast.

I am your host, Lyn Mettler.

Before we get into today's topic,

which is all about the most

common mistakes that

I saw in travel rewards

last year, I first

want to go through a couple of

my podcast reviews with you.

I want to start with some really

awesome ones, and then there's one I

just want to clarify.

ITunes doesn't give you an

opportunity to make a response.

And so I just wanted to clarify this

one since I can't reply to it, but

just a couple of great ones.

So thanks to Jamie LHM.

She says

there is plenty of information

on the web for you to muddle

through and do it on your own

with anxiety that you're doing it

wrong the whole time.

I can totally relate to that.

She says that is exactly what kept

me from sitting on the sidelines of

travel hacking for the last few

years. I bit the bullet and

subscribed to Families Fly Free

in January, and after one

big trip across the country for my

family of four, the subscription has

already paid for itself.

There is endless learning with

the information they put out

constantly via podcast,

their classroom app.

She's talking about our different

webinars that we have

and more.

All right, let's hit one

more, which is

talking about

It's titled Awesome Travel Hacking

Tips and Easy to Follow from

Me and Zamboni.

So thanks.

Thanks for that.

So this one says These informative

podcasts are great for money-saving

travel tips, destination info

and strategies to have better family

vacations.

I tried Lyn's program and was

pleasantly surprised on its

simplicity and the wealth of

knowledge I picked up on.

Even for someone like me who has

been at the travel hacking game

for several years.

So thanks for that great review.

And the one that I wanted to

just hit upon here

is this person

had noted in her review

that because she says

Lyn pushes the Southwest companion

fare, which is awesome when you get

it, but go in knowing

that the referral link to credit

cards is how she keeps her

companion pass.

It's nearly impossible for the

average person to continue earning

the 125,000 miles

to maintain the path without

getting points through referrals

or opening new cards.

So I just wanted to address that

because that's all wrong.

But so first

off, I do not earn

my companion pass through

earning referral points by having

my listeners or readers

or whatever sign up through

me. So I do have an affiliate

link where I earn a commission for

those. If you do sign up with a card

through me, I'm always careful to

let you know that so you can make

that choice or not.

Of course we appreciate it, but it's

nothing you ever have to do.

Use our affiliate link.

But I earn my companion pass like

everybody else does.

How I teach it.

And that is not through referral

points. That is certainly an option

that you have. Like if you know

someone or you can get a family

member to sign up for a card through

you, you can earn like on the

Southwest card 20,000 points.

But that is not how I earn mine.

So I earn mine with a combination of

cards which she's talking about.

And I would agree with that, that

you do need to be able to open

a travel card to make

it easy to keep earning the

Southwest Companion Pass.

But because we teach you to have

it for a full two years,

that helps too.

And I just have been looking, you

know, around and hearing people

looking at my account, even the way

it's set up in Southwest.

If you look in your My Account, it

makes it look like you should try

to earn it every year.

I think that's the frame, like

the how they're framing

it for everyone.

So you get in that mindset, Oh, I

need to re-earn it every year.

You don't, like you outsmart them.

The pass is good from the time you

earn it till the end of the

following year, so don't keep trying

to earn your pass every year.

Instead, earn it early in the year

and then have it be good all

the way through the end of the next

year. So it's good for almost two

full years and then you earn it

again by getting your points

as early as you can in

the year that following period.

So that's a big differentiator,

which means you don't have to be

constantly working on earning the

companion pass and you don't have to

be using the Southwest card

all the time either, which isn't a

great card to spend on.

We'll talk about that as a mistake

today. But

so, yes, you do need to be able to

open a card, ideally

at least one, and then we can show

you some other ways to supplement

that. But I promise it's easy to

keep earning the companion pass

over and over again.

Not every single year.

That's not easy.

But every two years, yes, that's

easy. We've got a system for that.

So I just wanted to address, because

that's not how I earn my companion

pass. I earn it just the exact same

way that I'm teaching all of you to

earn it myself.

So I know it works and I'm on

pass number five.

Okay, let's get into

today's topic. Oh, and I should say,

if you want to leave me a review,

that would be awesome.

If you enjoy these podcasts, if you

find them helpful, leaving

a review helps more people find

us. And my goal is to help as many

people as possible learn how to do

this. So you're helping another

family might just take a minute

to even rate the podcast

by clicking the number of stars.

Or if you can just even leave like

a two-sentence review, even

that is helpful.

So wherever you listen to podcasts,

iTunes or elsewhere.

Okay. So thanks for that.

Now let's go ahead and get started

with today's topic.

The five most common travel

rewards mistakes that I saw

in 2022.

Now I've been using and teaching

travel rewards since 2015,

and I do tend to see

the same mistakes over

and over again.

And so my Fly Free

Formula is really

designed to help people avoid

these mistakes that I have now seen

for seven-plus years.

But for today, I wanted to take a

look at some of the most common

mistakes that I specifically saw

people make in 2022.

And there are a couple new ones

that worked their way onto the list

last year. So listen up

now. These are things that, most

of these things I see time and time

again, and it's equally between

people who are brand new to

collecting travel rewards and

frequent flier miles,

as it is with those who've been

travel hacking for a while.

It really is the same stuff, you

guys. It's kind of this whole thing

of you just don't know what

you don't know, and I'm going to try

to fill you in on that today.

So in an effort to help

prevent some of these mistakes from

happening, let's dive

into them now.

If you're planning on joining

Families Fly Free in the near future

to get free travels going

forward for you and your family,

it's also really helpful if you

can avoid making these mistakes

before you join.

Now, for sure, we can help you clean

up any mistakes

that you have made.

But wouldn't it be easier if you

just started out with no mistakes?

It's going to be a much simpler,

cleaner process for you

If you can follow

and avoid making these mistakes from

the get-go.

So the first one I have on

my list is a new one.

And this, the mistake is not

having enough credit or

any credit.

Now, I think we have,

now we have a lot of Dave Ramsey

aficionados and FI,

which is financial independence,

retire early or FIRE.

And we have a lot of those folks who

are listeners who want to learn

about travel rewards.

So if you're one of those folks, you

guys are doing an awesome job

with your finances, you're cutting

expenses,

you're looking to,

you know, fund your travels not

out of pocket, but for free,

which is a great idea.

So you can keep traveling while

you're achieving financial

independence.

You're insuring that you're out of

debt, which is, we love, that's

where we love people to be when they

start into this travel rewards

process.

And you're saving as much as you

possibly can.

But here is the thing.

You do need to have

credit and you need it to be good

credit.

Now, I won't harp on how credit

cards aren't good or bad.

I won't get into an argument with

Dave Ramsey today.

But, you know, it's really is about

how you use them.

They are not good or bad, just what

you're doing with them that's good

or bad. But so many of you have

been taught, and I was one of them,

that credit cards are bad.

And so because of this,

you just don't get any.

And, you know, Dave Ramsey does

teach no credit cards and you don't

want to have credit cards if you're

in debt, trying to get a debt.

But you do need

to have credit cards to function

in this world. So

for sure, it is a great

thing to be able to pay

only cash for things that

you buy. And I know a lot of

budgeting systems

teach cash only.

I'll tell you, my grandmother was

always cash only for everything.

But really to live in today's

day and age, you've got to have

credit.

Even if you don't ever plan to incur

debt. That's not the idea.

Credit does not mean debt.

It means credit, which is good.

So if you ever want to earn

a return on your everyday spending,

the way that we teach it, you do

need to be able to be approved for

a credit card, not a whole bunch of

cards, but just a couple.

We use a couple of select travel

cards to charge our expenses

to, just

our day-to-day expenses, and then we pay those charges right off. And we do this so that we can earn frequent flier miles and travel rewards on our everyday spending. Not things that we weren't buying anyway, things we already have to buy. And then we have money in the bank to cover. And you can't do that. You can't earn frequent flier miles on your everyday spending if you don't have any credit because you can't get a card and banks will not approve you for cards if you have never demonstrated that you're credit-worthy, which makes sense.

So all of that said, I encourage

you to start building some credit

if you don't have any.

So that might be, you've never had a

credit card or it might be it's

been, you know, ten, 15 years

since you had a credit card.

You can go back and listen to my

episode on how to improve your

credit because many of the same

strategies apply, whether you have

bad credit that you're trying to

improve or if you're just trying to

get from no credit to good credit.

But you do need to be able to

demonstrate that you can

consistently charge

something to a card and pay

off that balance over time.

And another thing you need to do is

to build the amount of credit

that is extended to you.

That's probably the most important

factor in your credit score.

You just have to have a good credit

score, which means you have to have

some credit.

And in terms of credit scores, I

recommend high six hundreds

before you start into

travel rewards.

So my quick suggestions again,

go back and listen to that episode

for more details. But if you don't

have any credit or if you've never

had a credit card or it's been a

long time, are number one,

open a card that's easier

for people with low or no credit

to get. Now, you do not want a bunch

of these because you're limited

on the number of cards that you can

get to earn travel rewards

per all these different rules and

regulations that

go with this that we know

and can guide you

about inside Families Fly Free.

Because even if it's an easier card

to get, it's going to count as

one card for you.

But I do recommend getting one

and paying it off regularly.

You don't have to put a bunch of

stuff on a card that's not earning

miles or points or cash back, but

even pick just a couple

of charges every month.

Maybe if it's your Netflix

subscription or it's just some

kind of a recurring

expense that you can easily pay

off.

And one thing another thing I

recommend is not paying

it before the due

date when they tell you your balance

is due.

If you're trying to build credit, so

you want to wait. You want to put

the charge on it.

You want to wait till they say,

okay, you now owe us this amount and

it's due by this date, then you

can pay it because that registers

on your credit report as a charge

that has then been paid off.

If you charge to it, then paid

the next day, which is what I like

to recommend a lot.

When you're actively in travel

rewards, it's not going to help

build your credit.

Most of the folks who are

getting cards for travel rewards do

have good credit, so they don't need

to worry about that.

So if you get one of these cards and

cards like Discover is a good

option, the Apple card

is generally easier to get and that

one does have some cash back

features.

Or you can even start with a secured

card, which is where you pay

the issuer an amount

to start with, and then you draw

against it to demonstrate that you

can, you know, carry its

carry a balance and

pay it down or even

a student card if you're a student

or in college or just very young.

Then after you have this card for a

couple of months and you've paid,

you know, charged and then paid it

off consistently, call or

message the bank or the issuer

and ask them if they will extend

your credit line.

And that's going to start to help

build your credit.

So and then go back and listen to my

other podcast for some other ideas

and start building that credit if

you want to start flying for free.

All right.

Number two, most

common mistake I would see is just

timing your travel card

applications wrong.

Boy, were we inundated

at the end of last year

with people who did not understand

how to time their card applications,

or I should say they thought they

understood, but it turns

out they didn't.

To time their applications to earn

their Southwest Companion Pass

early this year so

that it's good for 2023

and 2024, which is what I was

talking about at the beginning.

It's important that you understand

how to get your points to credit

in the correct year

based on when you're trying to earn

the companion pass.

This is because

a companion pass is earned

by collecting all qualifying

points and it is now 135,000.

So I said 125 in that review

I was reading.

So it's changed now.

This year it's 135,000.

So you have to earn all of those

qualifying points in one

calendar year.

You have from January 1st to

December 31st, and if

you miss that in any way,

you are screwed.

You will. All right.

Now we can

help salvage this for you

and still get you a companion pass

in the right year. But but when I

say you're stuck, what I mean is

you cannot move the points that

those years credit in unless

there's something wrong that they

have done on their end, which

usually is not the case.

So there's really is no moving them.

It's just finding a solution to help

you get the additional points

that you need to go ahead and get

you the companion pass in the

correct year.

So we can salvage it

but it does really complicate

things when we prefer and we want

it to be easy for you, as easy

as possible. So if you can

time it right, it is an amazing

thing to do because your pass

is good for almost two full

years at a time, which is help but

helps make things so simple.

But it is very tricky to

do this and truly like as

much as I saw into last year, I

do not recommend trying to do it

without our help and I say

our help because I wouldn't even

know where else to tell you

to go for help. No one else offers

personal help on

these types of things.

Like I said, you could try emailing

someone or commenting and hoping

that you get an answer, but it's

certainly not going to be an

in-depth answer.

They're not going to look through.

Okay, what cards did you open when,

and open your statement for me and

let's see what happened.

When did these points credit and

what triggered it and or what caused

them not to credit?

We had to do a lot of that.

And so that's what

Families Fly Free does.

It provides that personal support

that nobody else in the travel

rewards space is offering

because there is a need for it.

I mean, I just see it day in and

day out because you really need

more than reading an article or

listening to a podcast about timing

your Southwest Companion Pass points

correctly. You truly need to be able

to ask questions.

You need to check and double-check

that you're doing right.

You need to be able to get on.

We had an emergency webinar for

members in December

to help anyone who was confused or

had made a mistake about what they

needed to do, what their next steps

needed to do.

And of course, we answer

individually as well.

So, so many people mess

this up, again, I can't even tell

you.

I've even seen people this year mess

it up who work for Southwest

and even people who work for Chase.

So and it's Chase cards.

So if these people don't know how to

do it right, you probably

don't either.

So many people like, really think

that they have this down, only

to realize they missed some small

critical detail

and now all their points credit in

the wrong year. So I probably should

have made that my number one

most common mistake I

saw last year, because that was

definitely the big one.

All right. And that is but that is a

common one year after year for

sure.

All right. Number three is

paying too many points

for your flights, for your hotels,

for anything you're trying to book

in travel rewards.

So this is just a mistake I

see just out there

constantly.

So you've heard me say it before,

but I'm going to say it again,

particularly if we have new folks to

the podcast. Welcome.

You're going to hear a lot of my

key takeaways of how I

teach flying for free.

So most travel rewards

people focus on earning

points only, but

half of learning how to fly for free

to a lot of places and

to be able to bring everyone with

you that you want is learning how

to pay fewer points for

every flight or even hotel stay.

Yes, you do have to collect the

points. That's an important part of

the equation.

But then you've got to know the best

strategies for redeeming them.

And everyone else out there seems to

miss this other half.

And we are really, really good

at both sides of the equation.

So for Southwest, for example,

to pay fewer points per flight,

this includes things like booking

on a Tuesday or Wednesday when

flights tend to be lower or during

when they have a sale,

even knowing what's a good sale and

what isn't, because they have a lot

of sales, most of which aren't good.

Understanding how to rebook

a flight on Southwest if the price

goes down after you

booked it and understanding you need

to have that flight booked in points

to really make the most of that.

And always booking Southwest

in points and how to do that, even

if you don't have any Southwest

points yet, maybe you're brand new

to this. Maybe you've never flown

Southwest or you just never set up

a frequent flier account with them

to earn points.

We can show you how to start

with points and then always have

points.

Kay, who I interviewed

in my last episode, she

talked about like never even really

considering that there could be

a better day to fly than another.

They just knew they were flying.

They wanted to fly in these

particular days because that's

what they needed to do for a

particular trip.

And so they really never considered

checking to see if they could save

by just moving their flight by a

day or two.

And she was amazed at how much she

could save by doing that.

So it's even just getting out of the

mindset of like, no, the spring

break is from, you know,

Saturday to Saturday, so that's

when we need to fly.

No, you need to look at

what days are the cheapest to fly

and try your best to work your

vacation around that.

I even recommend starting with

flights before you get to

hotels and then book your hotels

based on when the flights are cheap.

Now for Europe, which we also

teach how to fly free to Europe, not

just Southwest in the U.S.

and the Caribbean. Southwest does

not fly to Europe.

So you have to do other ways.

So the way we teach it, it just

really includes understanding

the simple process that we've mapped

out to help you find

the cheapest flight that fits your

criteria. And your criteria, it

could be, I want a nonstop flight

or I want to go through London, or

it could be I want to fly in

business class, or

it could be I want a morning

flight instead of a night flight.

Whatever your criteria is, there

is an easy way to check for the

cheapest option available.

We have just three places at the

moment that we recommend checking

to see which has the best price

and miles and points.

And it's really as simple

as that. And we don't get into

alliances and,

you know, moving points between

different things are looking for

award seats and all of this.

Another example I was just talking

with a member yesterday who was

asking about the United excursion

list perk. So probably everyone

else in the world is going to tell

you this is a fantastic thing and it

is cool in that it lets you

basically make a free stopover

like of a couple of nights, even

if you want, or several days as part

of your fare price booked

in miles. So like if I

was flying from New York to Rome,

I could do a stopover for a couple

of nights in London, for example.

And it's still going to be the same

cost of the flight to go from

New York to Rome.

So if you have some United miles

sitting around,

that could be a good thing to do.

But when we were looking at this for

a member, her miles

price to do this for this for her

choice of criteria

was really, really high.

It was a lot of miles.

And so when we really looked

at it, we

had a way that she could do it with

fewer points, still accomplish

that stopover, but do it

in a much simpler way.

So United miles

weren't even needed in that

scenario. So just be careful that,

like maybe sometimes the United

Excursion perk does end up being

cheaper in miles and points, but you

want to make sure that it is

before you do that

and that there's not a simpler way

to do it, you know, with fewer

points. So

there's just lots of ways that you

need to make sure that you're paying

the fewest possible points.

And even with hotels, we have a

system that's similar to Europe

where we show you check these three

places for the different

points or miles price for a

particular hotel booking and pick

the one that's the best deal that

works for you.

All right. Number four is putting

your everyday spending on

the wrong card.

And this is where I think

a lot of the other folks in travel

rewards get you because

they're just recommending

travel credit cards willy-nilly,

as I like to say.

And you don't need all these cards

and not all of them are good for

your strategy and you really

only need one, maximum two,

cards for your everyday spending and

still be able to accomplish

all of your goals simply.

So. I talk a lot about flying

Southwest, obviously, and so

people come to me and they're super

proud that they're putting all their

spending on their Southwest card and

that they've accrued a bunch of

Southwest points.

Now that totally seems like a

good thing to do, but it's not

actually.

So here at Families Fly Free, we

advise choosing a flexible

travel card to put your spending

on instead.

Not an airline card, but you need to

choose the right card

for your situation and you need

to get that card in

the correct order.

And there's no way for me to know

that or make a recommendation about

that generally to

the whole world on a podcast or

an article or video

without me taking a look at your

personal situation

and your travel goals.

How many people are traveling with

you? What points do you have

already? What cards do you have

already when you're buying them?

All of those things need to factor

into the correct, everyday spending

card.

Here's why we don't like airline

cards.

Quick review. I know I've talked

about this a lot, but they only

earn a mile or point

good in that particular system.

You can't use them anywhere else and

they tend to not earn very many

points per dollar on categories

of spending that you're going to be

spending on the most.

Aside from making purchases direct

with the airline, which you should

not be doing besides maybe baggage

or early boarding, something like

that. So there's really no benefit

to putting your

everyday spending on an airline

card. If you put it on a flexible

card, you're earning points that you

can use in multiple ways with

different hotels, different

airlines.

And you have an opportunity

typically to earn more points per

dollar in categories of

spending that you will be spending

on as you travel.

So things to consider when choosing

the best possible everyday

spending card for you and your

family include what

categories of spending do you spend

the most on?

Do you spend a lot on gas, do you

spend a lot on groceries?

Do you spend a lot on travel

and dining?

Those are some of the more common

categories that we see out there.

What are your favorite airlines and

hotel chains and do they

play well with this particular

travel reward system or card system?

Where do you already have a lot of

points? And it would make sense to

get a card that plays well with

those points and other

considerations. So we

do right now, like

the Chase Sapphire Preferred card

and the Capital One Venture

X cards.

But cards change,

perks change, annual

fees change.

And so in a couple months, we might

change our recommendation. We used

to really like Chase Sapphire

Reserve card. We don't recommend

that one anymore.

Who knows what great new card

or perk, whatever will be coming

down the pike. So you can certainly

use other systems as well.

Like Amex or Citi thank you points,

those are also flexible point

systems.

They're not our favorites, but that

might be a better fit for you based

on the various considerations

that we talked about.

Okay.

Number five is my last one,

and that is getting

too many cards.

This is another one you've probably

heard me talk about a lot, but

I am just passionate about this

topic because I think this is where

so many people get into trouble.

So we started

off at the beginning of the episode

with people who've never had any

cards right, who had no credit.

But on the other end of the spectrum

are the people that have 20, 30

and 40 cards.

And yes, I have talked with plenty

of people who do actually

have that many cards.

So if you enjoy that and you

can keep track of it all, more

power to you.

But for most of us

who end up with too many cards,

it's because we got sucked into

an offer or many offers

because they were ending.

They had a deadline and it was a

great deal that we saw that got

in our email and it wasn't a

good fit for us.

It wasn't part of a strategy at

all.

So I promise for most of you,

if you end up north of ten cards

and again, I like to keep it to

three maximum four,

you or your spouse

or whoever your traveling companion

is or anyone else who's going with

you is going to get confused.

They're going to get overwhelmed.

And as a result, you're going to

quit travel rewards.

This is why we all give up on most

things. It gets too hard

and we get overwhelmed.

So let's not do that.

Let's intentionally

keep it simple and it can

all be done with three cards

if and if you want to add one here

or there to bolster hotel points

or give you a quick boost to points

to Europe, great.

But have a strategy.

Make sure it fits

and we can help you with all that

inside of Families Fly Free and make

sure that the next card

that you want to get is a fit for

you. And, you know, we have people

who do like to have ten cards and

that's fine, but you can do it

without that. It's just as

simple as that.

Now you won't hear me, you

know, on this podcast or in the

membership, ever talk more about

more than a handful of cards.

I am not

selling you every deal out there,

whether or not it's good for you,

because how would I know?

I know nothing about your situation

or what cards you have or where you

want to travel or how many points

you need.

And I totally got sucked into this

when I first started with

travel rewards.

I love getting an American card

because it had a good bonus, and

the article I was reading said it

was a good value and it was deal

was ending.

We got these points.

They weren't enough for my

whole family to go anywhere, on

American and so we had to really

figure out, okay, what

the heck do we do with these points?

And so we were able to have we

learned a little bit about the

American system and how to stretch

them a little bit, which I can't

even do anymore.

But at the time, you could.

And we were able to get at least my

husband and I on a trip to

California to use

these miles that

we got.

But it really sidetracked us from

our main strategy.

It in no way played into

what I was already doing.

We had to figure out how to use

these things. And we really could

have accomplished that same trip,

probably with the whole family if we

just focused on Southwest instead

and using my current strategy.

So please, please, please

have a strategy and make it a

simple strategy.

Unless you just like juggling 100

balls in the air.

I do not.

If you don't want to have to create

your own strategy, let us

create it for you and

guarantee your success inside

Families Fly Free.

You might even be able to save

as much as $14,000

like my family did in 2022.

You in?

If you're ready to fly your family

free forever, I invite

you to join my Families Fly Free

membership.

You'll learn how to stop paying for

airfare throughout the U.S.,

Caribbean and Europe so you can

make those priceless family

travel memories before your

kids or even your grandkids

leave home for good.

And you'll learn it using my simple,

proven formula that's helped

hundreds of families.

Plus, it's risk-free.

You either get your investment in

the membership back in free travel,

or I give you your money back.

You can get more information at

Families Fly Free dot com

slash join.