Road Warrior Pandemic Credit Card Points Strategies

This past year, many of us have more points than ever as we have had and few opportunities to spend them. Travel is starting to come back and there are amazing deals for points and purchases. Therefore, the dilemma is: do I spend my points or do I take the advantage of lower than usual airfares and save my points for later?

I say use points first and here is why:

• It is very easy to find great options on miles right now, but it will be quite difficult once travel restarts. This is because it will take some time for airlines to increase capacity again and there’s a lot of pent up demand. 
• With the exception of Alitalia Airlines MilleMiglia, all other airlines frequent flyer programs awards are refundable. Even the refund penalties are waived. Flexible tickets are a must in the current travel climate.  If you are not sure how the value of miles vs. dollars stack up, compare the cost to the refundable airfare.
• The value of points in all loyalty programs are moving in one direction: Devaluation. Programs devaluing their points happens almost every day. Southwest was just the latest example of overnight devaluation with no notice or reason, since their awards were already pegged to ticket prices. With the exception of certain short term promotional discounts, points gaining value is almost unheard of. Unlike money in your account or other investments, points do not accrue any interest. So don't let them sit in your account for too long. Miles are not a good investment.
• Not only are points not a good investment, they are not a safe one either.  Loyalty programs are completely unregulated, and airlines and credit card companies are working hard to keep it that way (see Frequent Flyer Bill of Rights).  When you agree to sign up for a loyalty program, you also agree somewhere in fine print that you do not actually own the points and that the airlines or credit card companies reserve the right to freeze or take away your points at any time, for any reason they see fit.  Also, if an airline faces bankruptcy, their miles lose value as well.  As an example, Thai Airways and Malaysia Air frequent flyer numbers are not doing any mileage redemptions right now.

Even if you are not ready to travel, there are some great point redemption opportunities which did not exist before the pandemic.

• For the past 6 months, Chase Sapphire Reserve has been allowing you to redeem points to cover groceries and dining with the same 50 percent bonus normally reserved for travel redemptions. Sapphire Reserve and Citi Prestige both allow you to redeem your points for cash statement credit at a penny per point. While there are many other opportunities, I would only consider those giving you penny per point value or higher.
• Credit card companies are aware that people are probably not spending much on travel right now, which means you have to pay attention to category shifts that are applicable to your card. That way, you’ll be able to maximize your miles or points for other equally important things in your life. 
• I am generally not a fan of co-branded credit cards, especially not for Road Warriors.  If you have a Bonvoy Brilliant, Delta SkyMiles AmEx or Citi AAdvantage card, you don't have many options that get good value for your points unless you are traveling. 
• I would use this opportunity to reevaluate your card strategy.  The arrival of amenity super cards (Citi Prestige, Chase Sapphire and Amex Platinum) completely changed the landscape of reward credit cards and those 3 should be the cards of choice for any Road Warrior for its versatility, range of benefits and return on investment.
• Personally, I can’t wait to travel! Right now is the best time to make plans and secure those low cost, classic or promo award seats that you won't find later. If things don't work out again, you’d be glad you did it with miles as you can simply redeposit them with no fee.