How to Use Airline Shopping Portals to Cash In On Rewards

Introduction to Airline Shopping Portals:

Too many Airline Shopping individuals are unaware that airline shopping portals even exist, much less know how to use them, even though they provide a simple method to earn “extra” miles for every dollar spent. You may earn hundreds or even thousands of airline miles annually without ever setting foot on an aircraft if you know how to use airline shopping sites.

Although several carriers provide their own shopping websites, the most well-known ones are Delta SkyMiles Shopping, American AAdvantage Shopping, United MileagePlus Shopping, and Southwest Rapid Rewards Shopping. Would want to know more? Here’s how shopping portals operate and how you may profit.

Choosing the Right Portal:

Airline shopping platforms are first and foremost completely free to use. Neither creating an account nor becoming a member costs anything.

To earn miles under any particular program, you must, however, have an airline loyalty number. Once more, it is free to register for frequent flyer accounts, and you may do it online. To open a frequent flyer account, all you typically need to provide is your name, home address, phone number, and email address. There, you will select a username and password.

Creating an Account:

Shopping websites just need you to complete one more step before you can make a purchase. You would just need to look for “Kohl’s” in the gateway if you intended to shop at Kohl’s and wanted to earn Southwest Rapid Rewards points on that purchase. Next, you would see a number of exclusive Kohl’s offers together with the amount of points you would receive for your purchase—two points for every dollar, for example.

Simply click “shop now” and wait to be sent to the Kohl’s website in order to accrue more miles on your purchases. And any miles you get from a transaction will be immediately applied to your account.

Understanding the Rewards System:

While it’s reasonable to believe that using shopping portals to earn points or miles requires a credit card, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Just “click through” to partner retailers by logging onto any portal before you shop. You are completely free to use gift cards or a debit card to pay for your purchases.

That being stated, there are several reasons you ought to think about utilizing a credit card whenever you purchase online. Remember first that the points you accrue through shopping portals are given out in addition to the credit card benefits you receive. By utilizing a co-branded Southwest credit card, you might earn more Southwest Rapid Rewards points than you could by buying at Kohl’s through the portal, as shown above.

A host of other consumer safeguards are also provided by credit cards, including extended warranties, purchase protection, and guaranteed returns.

Finding the Best Deals:

You may also “mix and match” your points programs and airline shopping portals, which means you can use any rewards credit card—even one that isn’t connected to that airline—to pay for your purchases through an airline website. While this facilitates using your online purchases to fulfill a minimum spending requirement to receive a sign-up bonus, it’s also useful if you choose to utilize many shopping portals but only have one or two rewards credit cards.

Using Browser Extensions:

If you buy online a lot, you most likely have a few frequent go-to sites. Though there are many, many more, you might be shocked to hear that airline and rewards shopping portals include many of the best stores available, like Kohl’s, Best Buy, Macy’s, Walmart.com, CVS.com, and eBags.com.

In addition, several shopping sites allow you to accrue miles or points for “services” you reserve online. Set up phone service with Verizon or AT&T, for instance, to earn extra points with airline portals. Even placing an online grocery shopping or mattress purchase through Peapod.com might result in more points and miles.

Timing Your Purchases:

You can make sure you are making the most of these airline shopping sites in a number of ways.

Whenever you shop, check the shopping portals.
When you make an online transaction, always click through a gateway. You are wasting miles if you don’t.

Compare shopping portals if your usual stores are on many of them to determine the highest earning rate. Whereas one site might only provide two miles for every dollar spent at a certain retailer, another might provide a better value.

Combining Rewards Programs:

On occasion, airline websites provide exclusive offers wherein you can accumulate even more “bonus” miles after meeting a certain spending requirement. You may further optimize your expenditure by holding off on shopping until a deal arises.