7 Habits Of Highly Effective Travel Hacking Couples

by Marvin and Josephine Abisia

Traveling with a partner? Use these tips to maximize your mileage earning and
redemption potential for two.

1. Apply For Individual Accounts As Much As Possible

Each spouse should apply for his or her own individual mileage accounts, as well as for credit
card accounts.

By signing up for your own individual accounts, a couple can double their earning potential
since each person will earn the miles and point bonuses for card applications, expenses, and
miles flown.

With just this one simple habit, a couple can conceivably amass up to a million miles and points
in a single year spread across multiple programs. In fact, this is the exact strategy we used to
build up our travel hacking "war chest" in 2010 before we set out to become full time travelers a
year later in 2011.

2. Take Advantage of The Authorized User Feature

Nearly every credit card application offers you the option to add an authorized user at no extra
charge—yet many people never take advantage of it. Chase Sapphire Preferred now offers a
5,000 point bonus for applicants who opt-in to add a second card user. The bonus is credited
once the authorized user makes a single purchase of any amount.

Even without such bonuses couples must ALWAYS take advantage of the authorized user
option. Equipping your spouse with their own card attached to your account makes it all the
more easier and faster to hit the spending targets so you can earn your bonuses.

That said, there are some cards whose perks can be shared with your spouse. For example, the
American Express Platinum gives you (and a partner) access to over 600 VIP airport lounges
worldwide. And each additional card added onto the account is extended the same benefit! The
best strategy with these types of cards is for each person to apply for the signup bonus, and
then cancel one of the accounts upon receiving the bonus points (since you can both enjoy the
perks with only a single card).

Bonus: If you’re both being responsible with your spending and paying your balances on time,
the authorized user tactic can help bolster each person’s credit score.

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3. Team Up On Hitting Target Spending For Cards and Stays For Elite
Status in Hotel Loyalty Programs

Most effective travel hacking couples each apply for their own account and opt-in to add an
authorized user. When handling day-to-day chores, most couples know that the best way to get
the job done is to divide and conquer the tasks. Not so with travel hacking.

The previous two habits involve signing up for individual accounts and opting in to add an
authorized user to the accounts. To take full advantage of those two tactics, it’s imperative that
you team up and make a concerted effort to help each other hit the spending targets on one
account at a time.

So if you both apply for and are approved for the Chase Sapphire Preferred card, you will each
receive your primary account holder’s card, and the card for the authorized user. Decide which
account you will focus on first, then start chipping away at that target spend. As soon as you hit
the target, whip out the cards for your spouse’s account then lather, rinse, and repeat.

When it comes to earning elite status in hotel loyalty programs, it’s the stays that get you
there. Again, don't divide and conquer here…choose one person to start with and book every
stay under their account until they become elite. Once you have that status, you can then work
on getting the other person status as well.

4. Know When Not To Use Miles or Points

As exciting as it is to score free hotel nights at hotels and to fly for nothing more than airport
taxes, the most effective travel hacking couples know when to use cash instead of valuable
points.

In the hotel game, this tactic can come in handy if you don’t have quite enough points available
for the length of stay you want. The ability to spread the cost of the room between cash and
some of your points balance helps you stretch your points out longer. Moreover, if you’re
looking to minimize your points usage to save them for a future use at a higher quality property
then cash and points is a great option.

This can even help you if you're really close to attaining hotel elite status based on the number
of stays, and you don't mind ponying up some cash to get there so that you can use your
points to book nice upgrades once you have the elite status!

On the airline side of things, it just makes more sense to use cash when you are flying short-
distance routes. You can often find great prices on flights of 3 hours or less (especially using
low-cost carriers such as those found on SkyScanner.net). It’s better to save those hard-earned
miles for longer distance flights that would cost you ten times more if you paid cash.

5. Keep Miles and Points Accounts Organized

Imagine having anywhere from 6 to 8 different types of currency from different countries that
you eventually intend to spend as you travel through those countries. Now double the amounts
you have since you’re a couple. That’s a lot of currency!

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You wouldn’t just stuff them all in one pouch and sort them when it’s time. In all likelihood, you
would sort them and keep them organized for when it’s time to use them. Miles and points are
exactly like that. Each airline and hotel program can be considered a “currency” to be traded for
flights and rooms when needed.

Smart travel hacking couples make it a habit to keep things organized, by using something as
simple as a spreadsheet or a purpose-built tool like AwardWallet.com. Keeping things organized
this way enables you to size up your miles and points balances at a glance so that you can
effectively redeem or plan for future redemptions by topping up your accounts as needed.

The “Add Users” feature of this incredible app allows one person to act as "Head of Household"
in managing the entire family's set of reward accounts. You can even set miles and points
goals for each account, and Award Wallet will display at a glance the total number of miles and
points you have across all accounts, and a graphical representation of how close you are to your
target number of points for each account.

6. Keep Points Alive Before They Expire

Nothing is worse than diligently collecting hundreds of thousands of miles and points, only to
find out that some of them have expired before you’ve had a chance to use them. Yes…it is an
unfortunate fact that most miles and points do have a shelf life.

Make it a habit to monitor your miles and points accounts at least quarterly to make sure you
don’t have some balances that are about to expire. Award Wallet provides expiration alerts for
premium users if you’d rather let them take care of the due diligence of monitoring your
accounts.

If you have any miles or points that are about to expire, it’s easy to reset their expiration date.
Any activity on the account, whether it be a redemption or an earning activity…even for a single
point…will reset the clock and magically revive most accounts.

7. Spend The Points. Really!

We can get so caught up in collecting and building up the balances of our rewards programs
that we often forget that the whole point of these points (no pun intended) is to spend them!

The previous habit was about keeping your points alive before they expire. But an even more
challenging aspect of miles and points is that they also lose their value over time.

Hotels and airlines periodically revise their redemption rates, and only rarely inform you in
advance that the first class ticket you were thinking of pulling the trigger on for 60,000 miles
will suddenly cost you 70,000 miles. Good luck topping off that 10,000 mile shortfall when you
most need it.

Of all the seven habits, this one is the most important. You’ll spend time and energy building up
your balances. Don’t find yourselves spending additional time, energy, or worse…money,
because you failed to spend your miles and points in a timely manner.

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Use them or lose them!

Marvin and Josephine Abisia are full-time adventurers who have been
globetrotting since 2011. They've travelled over 140,000 miles and visited
26 countries, and continue to embody the mantra of "Transform Your Life
Through Travel and Adventure". Their writing has appeared on The Art Of
Non-Conformity Blog, Unconventional Guides, and Lifehack. You're as
likely to find them relaxing with some caviar and Dom at 35,000 feet in a
first class cabin as you are to see them at a street food stall enjoying
noodles and tea somewhere in Asia. Connect with them and find out more
about their globetrotting lifestyle at http://intrepidmotion.com.