Chase Card Points for Travel Worth It?

I don't have a Chase credit card, but I found the price inflation to be true using other points programs - whether trying to book hotels or rental cars. I stopped playing most of these credit card points games and just focused on getting the best price.

Just another example of why I’ve migrated mostly to a credit card issuing cash rebates rather than accumulating points that may or may not be fully utilized as advertising promotes.

There are quite a few “Chase Cards” out there and they each have just a little different program from each other. I was going to reserve through Chase rewards once and found that they were not always seeing the same fares I was. With my card, I can either have a direct cash rebate or purchase through Chase rewards with points being worth 150% vs, the cash value.

Make sure you understand how the program works for your specific card. I find the travel insurance offerings on mine to be excellent.

Be aware, many of those "points" experts recommend cards that pay the biggest commission to them .

I use points and miles but stay away from generic bank travel cards. I have specific airline and hotel chain cards. The sign up bonuses are the key.

I book directly with the airline or hotel. Booking through a card company is rarely a good thing.

The best value for Chase Points is transferring to partners. For example, i have the Chase Sapphire Reserve and transfer my points to United or Southwest.

Yes, normally if you book through the Chase portal, it will cost you more. It's always best to shop around and try and get the best deal. Normally with hotels, it is always cheaper to directly book with the Hotel. The good thing with the portal though is you can use points if that hotel/airline is not a transfer partner.

Be aware, many of those "points" experts recommend cards that pay the biggest commission to them .

THIS.

There has been an explosion of scammers who present themselves as "travel bloggers" - who in fact, share virtually no information about actual travel - and whose sole purpose is to get people to sign up for credit cards through their affiliate links. They are almost universally dishonest, focusing exclusively on things that make them the most money, and either ignoring or glossing over inconvenient truths about better deals anyone can find elsewhere, real costs, and limitations that make their so-called "deals" difficult or impossible to achieve for most people in the real world. The blogger mentioned above is a typical example of one of these shills.

If you hard work at it, it is indeed possible to get value out of credit card points loyalty programs (I have) but it takes a lot more effort than these bloggers would have you believe, and that is a space filled with deception, dishonestly and a lot of charlatans. If you see one of these websites with lots of links to sign up for credit cards, you've found one of the offenders. Be very, very skeptical of anything you read on one of those sites.

I use a Capital One card that gives me double miles. And I can use them for restaurants, rooms, travel, airfares, etc.

I can make my own flight arrangements--and usually get one round trip yearly to Europe.

Points Guy actually has some good articles/points when it comes to reward booking and how to take advantage of specific cards, deals, etc.

Yes, he does have links to sign up on cards and does get commission for those, but that can be said for most online ads/links/sponsors. Cant fault a guy for trying to make something for himself. It's up to the consumer on how to process this information and make decisions that are best for them.

actually has some good articles/points when it comes to reward booking and how to take advantage of specific cards, deals, etc...

He also regularly tells people that the best deals for cards are to use his own links (which pay him high commissions) when there are much better deals for the exact same products publicly available elsewhere which are easily found.

That's not just self-promotion, that's misleading and it's simply dishonest. The lack of integrity speaks volumes. Caveat emptor.

The Points Guy sold his website to a corporation a few months to a year ago.

So I got that same Chase preferred Sapphire card. I got the 50,000 points for signing up, plus used to pay and deposit on several trips in the works, so got even more points. I have only had it for a couple of months and I called the other day to find out more. They have sooo many partners you can use the points for. I asked about the price difference between using their portal or another website. The agent said yes, another website might show a cheaper price, but using the CC portal the points have more value.
I went ahead and used some of the points for a hotel night for an upcoming stay in SF. The CC agent booked it for me. Now, I have a totally free hotel night in SF. Just for using their credit card. Seems like an awesome deal to me.
When I got the email confirming my booking, it showed Expedia was used for booking. It was less than 10 dollars more than another website I had checked.

Chase points (UR) are great but best used when transferred to a travel partner. I have flown from the USA to Europe twice (with two flights in Europe, too) now on Chase rewards points and merely paid the taxes for the flights (around $100 each time). For Europe, in my experience at least, transferring to United has always been the best option as United allows for a "free" stopover (cost = 0 additional points, just taxes).

A round trip ticket from the USA to Europe costs 60,000 Chase UR points (30,000 each way). Therefore, with the free stopover, you could fly from the USA to two cities in Europe and back all for 60,000 points + taxes. That's a great deal if you have enough points and it far outweighs using the points buying nights at hotels or on regular plane fares, as the cost of those combined flights is far more valuable than those other options.

I personally don't have chase credit card but I think all the trusted credit card have a lesser price than these new ones.

I agree with Robert. We fly out of our small airport Tulsa ok. We don’t get wonderful good deals like others on west or east coast. We only have united, delta or American to fly to Europe. So in 2015 went to Europe and decided we will try to go every years. Went on United, so we got chase united explore card. We charge everything we can and pay off every month. Get united club passes. Extra points for restaurant, hotels, buying united airlines tickets. There are several apps with United to rack up more points. One I use regularly is mileage xplus. Also mileage shopping and mileage dining. So far we have flown two or three times with points. Points do not expire if you use your credit card. Not sure yet if we can earn enough points every year to Europe.? Just depends if the mileage requirements and taxes are reasonable. We have not had any issues. Hope it stays that way. Good luck deciding on deciding which way you go.

I have a Chase Sapphire reserve that serves me quiet well. I travel a lot and with the triple points for travel and dining, it adds up quickly. Expedia is the agent for hotel bookings so the rates are competitive, Sunday is a good day to check rates. If you fly British Airlines, the chase visa is accepted for a 10% discount on travel if you are a member of BA executive club (CHASEBA10).

I have a couple of Chase cards and have used the UR points extensively.

As most users have pointed out, the points accumulated are best used by transferring 1:1 to airline or, hotel partners onto their membership program. Utilizing the UR travel portal for booking, I've not found any great deals thus I book directly through the respective airline or, hotels; utilizing Google Flights to search and bookmark fares. As a rule, I very nearly never book through a 3rd party platform or, aggregator (Expedia, Travelocity, Bookings.com, etc..), as booking directly will provide me the reassurance that my reservation will be accommodated and not bumped.

As for which cards, I have the CSR and Freedom Unlimited. The CSR I use for all travel and meal expenses (3x earnings), while the Unlimited (1.5x) I use for everything else. Points accumulated on the Unlimited I move over to the CSR monthly, stacking the points. The Chase partners (United, Southwest, British Air, Jet Blue, Hyatt, Marriott, IHG, etc...) are greater than any other travel card program and work very well for my travel needs.

I don't use my Chase Sapphire Visa to book anything via the chase website. This card gives double points for travel purchases, but I have noticed that it didn't treat my VRBO reservation as a travel purchase, so it won't give me double points for that. Interestingly, it does treat any HomeAway reservation as a travel purchase, but they are owned by the same parent company and the same properties appear on both websites. I was told this is an issue with VRBO, and not with Chase.