Recap Week ending 4/19/26

I wanted to highlight something different this time and provide a glimpse into how I am keeping up with all the points & miles news. Plus there’s a nice new Amex offer that just got added that can make booking an AF/KLM award more palatable. (Spend $2,000+ on AF/KLM get $400 back).

Happy Monday, and hope you have a nice week!

It seems like every day there is something new within the points & miles news. It’s even hard for me to keep up sometimes. But I try to highlight what’s important every week!

For me, I am constantly reading across various sources including blogs, forums, Facebook groups, group chats, social media, and also emails I’ll get directly from airlines & hotels. If something catches my eye for the week, I’ll write it down. I also subscribe to other newsletters as well.

Blogs
I’ll start with Milesfeed. It summarizes headlines of a lot of different blogs in one place. Here are some others I check pretty much every day as well.

• Doctor of Credit - details on card bonuses, bank bonuses, other relevant tips
• Frequent Miler - details on all things award travel & credit cards
• Loyalty Lobby - a lot of updates on loyalty programs and related promos
• Live and Let’s Fly - general travel, loyalty programs, and airline & hotel reviews
• Miles to Memories - all things award travel + reviews
• Military Money Manual - Points, miles, and personal finance catered towards military members.
• One Mile at a Time - travel news with a touch of award travel mixed in, airline & hotel reviews, credit card updates. All around great resource
• Seal the Deal Travels - Review-focused but sometimes publishes great thought pieces and research on various programs and values
• The Points Guy - credit card focused and gets a lot of good inside scoops and all around award travel focused blog.
• Thrifty Traveler - credit card and award travel-related news + insights and thought pieces on award travel
• View from the Wing - general travel-related news and entertaining posts from around the world with a touch of award travel mixed in

Forums
• FlyerTalk - Discussion for anything travel related
• US Card Forum - Chinese forum for all things travel, credit cards, loyalty programs, etc.
• Reddit has a few subreddits. 1) AwardTravel, 2) Churning, 3) Amex, 4) Delta, 5) United Airlines, 6) American, 7) Alaska Airlines, 8) Bilt Rewards, 9) Hyatt, 10) Marriott, 11) Hilton, 12) VentureXShoppingBonus and I’m sure some other smaller ones as well.

Facebook Groups
Every group has a bit of a different twist around how they present info, discussion focus, rules, and overall vibe. Find one (or many) that work for your tastes.

• 10x Travel
• Award Travel 101
• Danny Deal Guru
• Frequent Miler
• Points Talk Squad (formerly Travel Mom Squad)
• Travel on Points

Newsletters
Daily Drop - little tidbits around points & miles and travel-related news
Miles Earn and Burn - churning focused with credit card and MS-focused updates
Smart with Points - UK focused award travel and churning

Podcasts
I am not a big podcast person but I do listen to these when I get a chance.
• Frequent Miler on the Air (YouTube link)
• Let’s Get to the Points (YouTube link)
• Milenomics Podcast (website link)

Some credit card issuers (like Amex, Chase, Citi, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and US Bank) will have coupons attached to your credit card. However, you have to manually activate them. Most of these offers are probably not relevant to your spending, but occasionally there will be some useful ones. These offers can also be stacked with additional discounts such as using a shopping cashback portal such as Rakuten, AAdvantage Shopping, Capital One Offers or Shopping, or Rove. Always be checking, it will save you money.

Tip: American Express also has a quirk where you can only see 100 offers at a time, even if there are more offers. You could be missing out on good offers. So you have to manually add a bunch of Amex offers, log off and log back in, and then view other offers that may be hidden.

American Express tonight, and over the last few weeks has been adding offers that can help save you money on future travel. If you plan on booking hotels across certain programs, airfare or awards, or cruises, then it is worthwhile to check out your Amex offers. A new one that popped up overnight was spend $2,000+ get $400 back through Air France/KLM. This should also be applicable to the ever-increasing award fees that just went up overnight again as well…

There’s also a spend $200+ at Hilton hotels get $60 back, a $1,200+ at Turkish to get $200 back, and also spend $700+ at Leading Hotels of the World hotels for 15k Amex points along with a bunch more.

Save time adding offers. I used to manually add every American Express offer to my card. However, I paid $140 for a program that has a Chrome Extension (also on Firefox and has iPhone and Android apps) called Cardpointers+ that helps me add all my offers. My affiliate link has a 50% off discount right now for the annual or lifetime plan. Check it out, it is one of the few things I actually paid. There’s other features as well that I don’t use including an app that lets you track your cards (and 5/24 status) and also if you’re out shopping, will tell you which card to use at the store you’re at to make sure you earn the most points and/or combine with a credit card offer.

The Straight is open, now it’s closed, now it’s open again. Wait it’s closed. Well gas prices are up and are staying up. Keeping it airline-related, obviously this has led to a lot of negative impacts including all the major US carriers raising bag fees. Airlines are also cancelling flights to preserve fuel. And of course flights are also cancelled for safety reasons as well.

Here is the FlightRadar24 Gulf Airline Recovery Index. Emirates still leads the pack with still under 80% of flights operating vs. pre-war.

The Middle Eastern airlines are offering easier ways to earn or maintain your status as well. For residents of select countries (US isn’t included but many Asian countries are), Etihad lets you fast track to Etihad Gold with a round-trip business class flight or Silver with an economy flight. (Details on Etihad). Might be a good time to try for an Emirates status challenge (Status Matcher site) if you can find a deal. Emirates elite members get access to booking first class awards. Qatar is offering 2x Qpoints for travel booked by April 21 and travel by June 15. Qpoints help you with Qatar status.

There are some short-term deals as travel demand in the region has likely plummeted. NYC to Maldives business class for ~$3,300 this summer for example.

In the US, the airlines are raising their baggage fees. Sadly, The Wall Street Journal indicated when several airlines raised their bag fees back in 2018 and 2024, they didn’t lower them afterwards. Airfare prices are also up and airlines are trimming schedules here as well.

Fly Aer Lingus business class from Boston or Philly to Dublin, Ireland or Boston/New York to Shannon, Ireland. Dates also available for this summer season! The best way to find availability is using Alaska or AA’s award calendar search. Costs start at 45k points one way (Alaska) to 60k points (British Airways)

How to book
Aer Lingus/ British Airways: 50k or 60k + $150 in tax/fees. $55 change/cancel fee
Transfer partners: Amex, Bilt, Capital One, Chase, and Wells Fargo directly, or Citi, and Rove indirectly through other Avios partners

Alaska: 45k + $18-57 in tax/fees. $12 nonrefundable partner booking fee (unless you have the fancy Alaska Atmos card)
Transfer partners: Bilt

American: 57.5k + $6-45 in tax/fees. Free changes/cancellations
Transfer partners: Citi

Dates w/2+ seats

BOS-DUB
July: 15, 20, 21, 24, 26, 27, 29, 30
August: 1, 3-8

DUB-BOS
July: 10, 30
August: 5-8

BOS-SNN
July: 7, 12, 19-21, 23, 26, 28, 30
August: 2, 3, 9-13, 17, 24, 30, 31
September: 1, 5, 6

SNN-BOS
July: 10, 13, 20, 22, 24, 27, 28, 31
August: 5-7, 10, 12, 14, 16, 24, 26-28, 31
September: 2-7

JFK-SNN
June: 19, 24, 28, 29
July: 2-4, 5-7, 9, 21

SNN-JFK
June: 16, 18, 19, 23, 24, 29, 30
July: 1-3, 6, 8, 9, 13, 20, 22, 27, 28, 31
August: 12, 14, 24, 26-28, 31
September: 3

PHL-DUB
July: 20, 21, 26-28
August: 1, 3-5, 8

DUB-PHL
August: 8

Need help finding deals? (affiliate link)
Check out seats.aero, a search engine for all things award travel. View award availability for flights for the next 60 days for free. Subscribing unlocks a full year of availability and helps you get the edge over others. You can also set alerts, get access to an invite-only Discord community, and find hotel award availability.

Help support my free newsletter through my affiliate links.

💸 Earn extra cashback or Amex or Bilt points when you shop online at your favorite stores using the Rakuten shopping portal. It’s free to join, and new members get $50 (or 5k points) after spending $50. To learn more about Rakuten, check out my post here.

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About Find Flights for Me.

I started the idea of Find Flights for Me back in 2023 to help educate and inspire people to use their credit card points more effectively, with a focus on using points to fly business and first class flights.

When I’m not working on Wall Street or searching for flight deals, you can find me planning for my upcoming wedding, enjoying local restaurants, helping my parents book their next trip, traveling internationally, or visiting friends/family in NYC, Philadelphia, or DC.