I have made 19 trips to Europe since 2001 and have only purchased 2 tickets, getting the others using air miles on my Amex card. I was fortunate that I owned my own business and was able to earn miles for a lot of business expenses. What I like about Amex is the value of points earned. Your points are transferable to various airlines and often during the year some airline partners offer bonuses if you transfer miles to their programs. Last September my flight from Miami to Rome on Iberia cost 47,000 points. Most times, my tickets have been in the 50-70,000 point range. But you must get the tickets as early as possible to get best price, fit your schedule and shortest flights. In February of this year, I transferred 60,000 miles to my Delta Sky Miles account and redeemed them for a November flight from Miami to Palermo on their partner Alitalia. The cost of the ticket was $86 in taxes and fees. Had I transferred the miles directly to Alitalia, I would have used the same number of points but the taxes and fees would have been closer to $300.
With credit cards such as CapitalOne, Chase, BofA, you'll receive a credit to your card balance. If you were to purchase a ticket for $800, you would use 80,000 points. But there are advantages as well. You can apply them to any airline, there are no tax and fee charges, have greater flight availability and even use the points toward other travel expenses such as hotels and rental cars. The points are out there but you've got to learn how to maximize their value. It's a game and the airlines are out to screw you so be careful. A few years ago, Delta offered a 20% bonus for transferring miles from Amex to Delta. Shortly thereafter, they changed their redemption and seat availability so the point value nose dived.
