Troubling Facts About Unused Airline Miles Credit Card Rewards

Posted on October 19, 2011 by Guest at 7:38 am

The following guest post is by Craig Ford. Craig blogs at Help Me Travel Cheap where he helps newbies turn credit card sign up bonuses into free travel.

Folks like to talk about earning credit card travel rewards, but sometimes they eat their words when it comes to redeeming travel rewards.

Dave Ramsey says, “75% of airline miles “rewarded” are never redeemed” (Total Money Makeover page 90). Unfortunately, there is no proof or documentation for us to decide if this is true or not.

However, if it is true, it is troubling.

It’s troubling because people are effectively wasting 75% of their reward earning potential!

Why aren’t consumers using their credit card rewards?

Deals We Like states that “Nearly 60 percent of consumers will not have enough rewards for a spring getaway.” So perhaps people are not using their rewards because they are still in the accumulation earning phase.

However, a second detail from Deals We Like states, “Almost one-third of consumers (29 percent) will have to settle for a “stay-cation” instead as they indicated blackout dates would prevent them from using credit card rewards for a spring trip.”

Consumers aren’t using mileage rewards because they simply cannot find a good way to use them.

What Important Lessons Can We Learn From Unused Airline Mileage Balances?

People are earning points and miles with programs they don’t really understand. If you are going to collect miles (and yes, they can be good), you’ll first need to educate yourself. You need to know that 1-3 months is often not sufficient enough time to book an award ticket using miles. Sure, it can be done, but to consistently expect to book flights with miles a month out is unrealistic. If you don’t know this, you’ll likely be one of the 60 percent that feel disappointed.
Your credit card rewards earnings must be focused. There is no point in starting to collect miles for a flight if you’re not going to finish the process to get enough miles to fly. When awards start at 25,000 miles, then 20,000 is effectively as good as 0 miles. Sometimes we have multiple cards in our wallets and don’t know which to use. The problem is that we earn several partial points and rewards. Don’t start something you don’t intend to finish.
Most people are not willing to put in the effort necessary to use their awards. This benefits those of us who use our rewards because there is less competition, but I’d rather see you get on the free flight for which you’ve been saving miles. Award bookings do require time to find the best booking that meets your needs. If you get stuck, there are people on the web who can help you with your award booking. Don’t just let your miles expire.
Choose your credit card wisely. Having unused miles means you probably made a mistake when selecting the card. If you’re not willing to put in the time necessary to book your free flight, then you should stick with cash back credit cards. I love air miles, but I know they’re not for everyone. Another option would be to use a points related credit card program that allows you to buy flights using points. One such program is the Ultimate Rewards program. The Chase Sapphire Preferred (with a 50,000 point bonus) is a great way to kick start your way to (or get everything you need) for a free flight. You can use those points for up to $625 worth of travel without blackout dates and the work of an award ticket.
People neglect to see the real value in flyer miles. If you use frequent flyer miles to book international business class seats, you can get over a 5% back value per point. While cash back and points systems cannot really be stretched beyond their 1-2% value, you can stretch air miles if you book more expensive flights using miles.

In the end, I think consumers need to be educated and aware. You need to properly research your card before earning airline miles.

I’m a big fan of airline miles, but I can tell you that certain programs are junk. Just like currencies, not all frequent flyer miles are the same. A guy who has 1,000 Yen doesn’t have as much as someone with 1,000 US dollars. If you’re going to collect miles and points, be sure you do it with a program that has a solid reputation for both ease of earning and ease of redeeming.

Airline miles credit cards can be a great way to earn credit card rewards, as long as you’re willing to endure a little work during the redemption process. Otherwise, don’t let your rewards melt away. Take advantage of a points based card or a cash back card.

Ipad 2 vs. Kindle Fire (Things you should know before purchasing and a tablet)

Posted on October 10, 2011 by Guest at 12:35 pm

This post was written by a good friend of mine who happens to have fantastic insight on everything tech/gadget related

I recently drove my daughter to the University of Washington for her freshman year. Everything seemed to be in order—she had a new account with Wells Fargo, she had a new phone, her books, and a cozy room to share with someone who seemed sane enough. I drove home no more concerned for my daughter than I naturally should be.

Two days later, though, she called in near hysteria. Apparently, she had spilled coffee on her laptop, and hadn’t been able to revive it. When I said I’d buy her a replacement, she asked if she could also get a tablet of some sort, and said that most of her friends could accomplish more on both a social and academic level with said gadgets. For the time being, I’m replacing just the computer. Then I’ll gift her with a tablet for Christmas…but which one?

As someone who takes pride in being frugal, my gut response is to buy her an older, still well functioning Kindle Keyboard. I could solve her technological problems with just a single Ben Franklin. But not so fast: if she wanted an ad-free model that provided Wi-Fi service, we’re looking at steeper prices (somewhere between $169 and $189). That’s nearing the Kindle Fire price range. If the Fire or iPad2 can provide her with more tools for academic success, as well as for social connectivity (hey, I want my daughter to be happy, too), then maybe it is worth checking out. After all, “frugal” doesn’t just mean “cheap.” It means “cost-effective” and “resourceful.”

The new Kindle Fire is dazzling for the eye that’s accustomed to the austere, black-and-white mode of the original. It operates using the Amazon Silk browser, which means the server can process demands on both a local level, and also on the Elastic Compute Cloud. If you want to free up some space by keeping a minimal amount of books on your Kindle, you can store the rest of your data in the Cloud. However, the internal memory of the Kindle Fire weighs in at a mere 8GB, and only 6GB are usable. There is no expansion slot to help remedy this.

The iPad2, on the other hand, comes with 16GB of internal memory, with variants of 32 and 64GB should you want the upgrade. This device also operates on a cloud system called—predictably—iCloud. This is a very important factor to my daughter, who’ll be saving a lot of information on the tablet, including movies (she’s a film studies major).

There are iPads capable of operating on a 4G service, but those are much more expensive, and some compromises need to be made if I’m going to spend more money. The iPad2 is a tad heavier, but it’s also a bit sleeker. Also, she’ll want to have a working camera on her tablet, which is a feature you won’t find on the Kindle Fire. I, for one, would forego the extra expense for this, but I must keep in mind that this is an investment for my daughter, not for me. And so being frugal isn’t just about what’s cost-effective, but also about what’s durable, lasting, and appropriate for her. By the way: the iPad2’s camera? It’s capable of 720p HD video.

It’s true that the iPad2 starts at $499.99, which makes it $300 more expensive than the Kindle Fire. And it’s true that I’d leap on a Kindle model were this a purchase for myself. But the iPad2 seems more flexible, more dynamic, and more likely to thrill my daughter at Christmas. I’m all for saving money now, but I get the feeling that the Amazon Kindle ‘s cheaper price is more an apology than a bargain, and that my investment will save me more in the long run. The iPad2, therefore, is the smartest and the most cost-effective choice, the buying it will allow me to maintain a sense of frugality. Besides, as an informed consumer, I understand that time, alone, will reduce the hit on my wallet—the holidays bring deals every year, making patience as much a virtue as frugality is.

For the latest coupons and promotional deals from Amazon, check out the Frugal Dad Amazon Coupons page.

Make Or Save Money By Reusing Old Clothes

Posted on September 19, 2011 by Guest at 7:48 am

The following is a guest post from Mr. SB from One Cent At A Time. A blog for personal betterment. Get his new posts directly in your email account or e-readers by subscribing to his RSS feed.

If you buy used clothing from thrift stores and consignment shops, your clothes are bound to (eventually) become unusable. Whether you are a two-person household or six, you probably have a pile of clothes that even someone in Somalia would not want to wear in normal circumstances.

Planning to donate these “prized” possession to Goodwill or the Salvation Army? Think twice – you don’t want to draw undue wrath (often silently, you won’t even be able to tell by looking at their faces) from the people who collect your donations.

If you are planning to be lazy and simply put old clothes in the trash, wait a bit and read through the rest of this post. There are tons of ways to reuse and repurpose old clothes to pinch every penny out of the purchase price. Sometimes you can make a little profit, too.

My dad is a retired steel worker with good artistic skills. He is very talented at making appliqués. See the two representative pictures of the appliqué work he creates out of used clothes (it’s an authentic Indian art). Now that he’s getting a few orders, he sources his clothes from local tailors.

Many Uses for Your Used Clothes

Make patches. Add colorful patches to your jeans. Add an extra pocket to the inside of your coat.

Make gloves for yard work. You don’t ever need to buy your garden gloves. Simply cut the sleeves off your sweatshirts. Old socks also have high potential as gloves during their last stages of life.

Use as cleaning cloths. You must have heard it a thousand times already; every frugal writer writes about this. So, treat this as a reminder!

Be a home fashion designer. Make fabric accessories. Make headbands, hair ties, bracelets, necklaces or belts. You can be super innovative and build a little pouch, or a bunch of little pouches and use as Christmas gifts. Oh yes, Christmas is just around the corner!

Sit on it. Yes, sit on it. Amazed? Don’t you sit on beanbags? Replace beans with old clothes – simple!

Make shopping bags. Go green, get rid of plastic, and adapt your old shirts or skirts as brand new reusable shopping bags.

Quilt your way. If you love sewing, try your hand at quilting. Old bed covers and sheets are perfect raw materials for this particular work of art.

If they are soft, they make good soft toys. Soft clothing, especially your old linens and silks, makes an excellent ingredient for soft toy stuffing. There’s a small charitable center in Miami where I donate some of the soft clothes in return for a free soft toy.

Book Cover. You can immortalize the jeans you wore on your first date by making it the cover of your scrapbook or journal.

Make pillows and cushions. You and your dog both love nice, fluffy cushions. Whether it’s on the floor or behind your back on the sofa, used clothes are very frugal and practical ingredients for cushions.

Shock absorber. If moving is in the cards and you have a pile to clear before you move, hold off! You can used the clothes to make shock absorbing cushions around the fragile items.

Make ropes. Cut small strips, then tie them together to make a nice rope. These could be very useful for your garden and garage, where tying things up helps get things straightened (plants) or organized (bunch of papers).

Dust off your car. No matter how often your car is cleaned, wipe it with a white cloth – it’s bound to be black by time you are done with only one side of the car. When you have too many used clothes to throw away, stop using the car wash and use your clothes, one or two pieces per day, to clean up the car.

Make winter accessories. Old sweaters can be a good source for new scarves, hats and mittens.

Make your pet beautiful. This Christmas, make your puppy a fashionable yuppie! You can cut, trim, or burn old clothes to fit your little pet. Your pet would love the odor of your body from the ‘new dress’. (Seriously, their nostril sense is many times more powerful than ours).

At last, a little trick, which I have seen people doing: Put the clothes near the trash bin, but not directly inside it. Leave it overnight and there’s a high chance the clothes will vanish before dawn. Your clothes would have found their destiny on their own!

Did I say that these are the greenest ways of dealing with your old clothes? Do every little bit possible to help Mother Nature lose its glory a little slower than it is losing today.

If you like what you made out of used clothes, make it a hobby or a small side business, just as my dad did. This is where making a profit out of used clothes comes into play

Up to 80% Off Your Next Meal Out?

Posted on August 25, 2011 by Guest at 2:35 pm

A lot of us have signed up for daily emails from Groupon or LivingSocial where the discounts/deals sometimes make us waver back and for between ‘should I’ or ‘should I not’. Restaurant.com is currently offering a deal on 80% off of restaurant specific gift certificates.

It’s worth focusing on what this means in terms of ‘is this a frugal choice?” All indicators point to this being a good offer to buy because it allows for a somewhat expensive meal, if you’re taking you’re family, or the ability to spend a little extra if you’re having a date night. And spending a little extra would not come close to what you would spend without the deal.

Here’s an example:

You decide to buy a gift certificate to Restaurant A for a “$100 for $35″. That is, you’re spending $35 to get $100 towards that restaurant. In order to use $100, however, you have to plan on spending a minimum of $35 for your purchase. (also, this does not include tip or couple with any other promotion). So, you can’t use this gift certificate on different occasions, it must be used all at once. There is also a $2-5 service fee as well. In all, you’re spending, at most, $55 (a very generous tip) on a $100 meal that could make a special frugal anniversary dinner or a rare night out with the entire family.

It seems daunting, but it really is a good deal. Each place is different and Restaurant.com does a great job of putting the fine print directly under the deals, which is a good move on their behalf.

You might be wondering, too, “But is this really frugal?” Of course, I’d say, because you are getting way more for what you paid and there are a lot of options to choose from. Frugal choices come in different forms and in the wave of the coupon craze, there’s always going to be a deal worth thinking about.

Explore away and see if there are any places you’ve wanted to eat that has an awesome deal just for you.

Save 80% on most Restaurant Gift Certificates. Use code TASTY at checkout now thru 8/31/11.

How Spending $8 on Netflix a Month Can Make You and Your Kids Happy

Posted on August 23, 2011 by Guest at 11:06 am

Here’s a different/thoughtful take on how Netflix can be a cheaper source of entertainment for your family written by a fellow frugal dad trying to condense his family’s budget:

If you’re like me, downtime can look 3 ways: with the kids, with the wife or by myself. I appreciate them all equally, too. There’s been a bit of a buzz surrounding Netflix’s recent price change and I’m maybe going out on a limb here to say it’s a pretty good deal if you’re willing to stick with the stream only option, considering all the complaining about the prices. Here’s why this is a good and frugal choice:

For nearly double the price, you can have the availability of DVDs, but you should ask yourself, “Do I/we need this?” The beautiful thing about Netflix is that they always try hard to bring old and new content to their streaming section, making it good for all of the above downtimes.

Chances are, too, you may have a video game console of some type: Wii, Xbox or PS3. All of these allow you to stream Netflix to your TV (Xbox is the only console that makes you pay for their online services, Xbox Live). Added to that, perhaps, even the best of all, is you can add the free Netflix App to your Android or iPhones (or iTouch). If you have a laptop or computer, multiple items can be streamed at a time, another bonus for times when no choice can be made on what to watch and the quietness is sometimes welcoming.

Good so far? I think so.

This service pays for itself quickly each month. It’s often difficult to justify a trip to the movies more than once every 3 months with the entire family, with the average price of a movie outing at nearly $50 for a family of 4 just to get seats. And that’s not even the IMAX option, mind you. Or 3D, for that matter.

If you’re still uncertain, there’s a great website, streamingsoon.com, that updates all the new (and best!) streaming movies. This is good for making it easy to update your queue with research that’s already been done for you.

Netflix is making a case for itself by way of offering a lot newer movies and cartoons and some classics you can share with your kids. Sure, they’ll roll their eyes at Duck Tails and Tom & Jerry, but for $8/month it’s surely worth the risk (with the possibility of the reward that they’ll like it).

Last thing to point out is that while Netflix discounts/specials are seldom, there is always a chance to get free months here and there when you have other families and friends sign up for a free trial using you as a reference, so your $96/year could look more like $72/year. Not a bad deal, I’d say.

Feel free to use the following links below to try Netflix for free:

Try Netflix for FREE! Get unlimited movies instantly streaming right to your TV.

Frugal Dad

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