Holy moly, what a week!
This is probably the most insane points-filled news week I’ve seen in a long time.
I’ll bucket it into 3 key components. You have Alaska Airlines going crazy (good) at their investor day, Hyatt continuing to make points people unhappy, and 7 new transfer bonuses!
Table of Contents
Alaska’s big announcements
Alaska Air Group held an investor day last week and announced a lot of cool new benefits coming out in the next few months. Alaska Air also updated how one can earn status this month.
I am a big fan of the Alaska Atmos points ecosystem. Some great sweet spots include domestic economy flights on AA or Alaska for as low as 4.5k points and minimal fees each way, the ability to book STARLUX business class for as low as 75k points, or booking business class to Europe starting at 45-55k points each way. However, the only program that transfers to Alaska right now is Bilt. That will change soon.
Quick hits on this week’s updates.
Alaska Atmos debit card coming out in 2027. Register interest with the link and get 20% off a future fight coupon
Coming soon: Lie-flat seats on 737s for select transcon routes and elevated Suites on 787s and A330s, starting in 2028. Also new lounges in Honolulu and Seattle (Alaska Air PR)
Eligible Bank of America cards (don’t know which ones yet) will be able to transfer into Atmos rewards (Alaska Air PR, Doctor of Credit)
Atmos Community, which provides additional rewards based on the community you choose (Alaska Air, One Mile at a Time)
Choose how to earn status in 2027 on Alaska, either by distance traveled, by how much you spend, or by segment (Alaska Air)
Hyatt, whyyyy?
The good, the bad, and the ugly.
Let’s start with the good. There is a new Hyatt 4Q promo where you can earn 3k bonus points for every 3 nights completed between September 29 through December 15. You can earn up to 36k bonus points. Register here. Hyatt also changed their new hotels promo where you now can book a earn 2x points rate (so you can earn an extra 5x points per dollar spent) instead of the prior 500 bonus points per night promo. (OMAAT with details)
Ok, now let’s do the bad. The bad is as of October 1, your Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Ink Preferred card will now transfer to Hyatt at a 4:3 rate. So you need 33% more Chase points to book the same hotel. The only workaround is to have the Chase Sapphire Reserve or Business Reserve card to maintain the old transfer rate of 1:1.
The ugly. Bilt is also a Hyatt transfer partner and currently has a 1:1 transfer rate…until January 1, 2027. Then the rate will drop to 4:3, just like with Chase. This is true even if you have the $495/year annual fee Bilt Palladium. Don’t worry, I’m sure Bilt will let you redeem your made up Bilt cash to get a better rate a few times throughout the year (but likely with maximum transfer limits).
Transfer bonuses galore
It’s hard to predict what airline program will get a transfer bonus from a credit card, but the start of a new month often brings new ones. and October 1 brings seven new transfer bonuses!!!
Rove is really rocking it right now. If you haven’t signed up for this newer shopping & travel portal program, you can get 1,500 miles to start with my referral (vs. public offer of 500-1,000 miles). You do need 2,000 miles to transfer out to partners though. You can also learn more about the program here.
Amex → Aeromexico: 20% bonus through 10/30
Amex → Air France/KLM: 25% bonus through 10/31
Capital One → British Airways: 20% bonus through 10/31
Citi → Qatar: 15-35% bonus through 10/31. This bonus is from Qatar’s end. <50k points transferred get 15% bonus, 50-100k points transfer get 25% bonus, 100k+ transfer get 35% bonus
Rove → Air France/KLM: 40% bonus through 10/31
Rove → Qatar: 15-35% bonus through 10/31. This bonus is from Qatar’s end. <50k points transferred get 15% bonus, 50-100k points transfer get 25% bonus, 100k+ transfer get 35% bonus
Rove → Japan Airlines: 50% bonus through 10/31
Other news to highlight
Register now: Hilton card holders can get 10k points if they stay 3+ nights by January 3, 2027 (Hilton)
Register now: Earn 4x Wyndham points on multiple stays, up to 15k points for members, 20k for Insiders, and 25k for Premier Cardmembers (Wyndham)
Targeted: Chase x United card spending offers, register now (Chase x United site)
Targeted: Save up to 50% off on Amazon by using a certain amount of Amex points to pay at checkout (Doctor of Credit)
Targeted: Save up to 40% off on Amazon by using a certain amount of Citi points to pay at checkout (Doctor of Credit)
Nearly all the IHG credit cards were just refreshed including higher annual fees, higher limit for free night certificates, and coupons (Frequent Miler)
Waldorf Astoria and Conrad Tulum Riviera Maya are now all-inclusive resorts and will become adults-only in January (The Points Guy)
Interesting: point.me launches a white label loyalty redemption platform meant for financial institutions, fintechs, and loyalty programs to be able to add an award travel search tool (point.me PR)
Check your Amex offers, some great new deals this month including $50 off $200 with Frontier or $60 off $400 with JetBlue, extra points on Marriott cards (Frequent Miler)
Amex Business Gold now adds UPS as eligible merchant for $20/month flexible business credit (Danny Deal Guru)
Deal of the week
My premium members got a similar deal last week, but there’s still good availability! Availability seems to be rolling out 1 day at a time next year as well. Cathay Pacific has a lot of business class award availability throughout North America to/from Hong Kong. I couldn’t find much connecting availability from Hong Kong to other popular destinations in Asia like Bali, Bangkok, Beijing, etc. but YMMV.