How To Use Chase Ultimate Rewards Points For Domestic Flights

Points earned with Chase travel credit cards can be used to book almost any domestic flight.

Chase Ultimate Rewards® points transfer to over a dozen airline loyalty programs, including United Airlines, Southwest and JetBlue. Even if an airline — like Delta or American Airlines — doesn’t partner with Chase, chances are you can still book its flights through other means.

If you’d rather not bother dealing with frequent flyer programs and blackout dates, you can use Chase points to directly pay for flights booked through the Chase Ultimate Rewards travel portal. Plus, unlike traditional award bookings, you’ll even earn miles on flights booked this way.

Below, CNBC Select details the best ways to save your cash by using Chase points to fly nearly anywhere in the U.S.

There are many Chase credit cards that earn Chase Ultimate Rewards points and have excellent spending bonuses. However, you must have one of the following cards to unlock the ability to transfer your points to one of Chase’s airline or hotel partners:

Once you have one of the aforementioned cards, the rewards earned with the following no-annual-fee cards become transferable to travel partners:

• Aer Lingus AerClub
• Air Canada Aeroplan
• British Airways Executive Club
• Emirates Skywards
• Flying Blue (KLM and Air France)
• Iberia Plus
• JetBlue TrueBlue
• Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer
• Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards
• United MileagePlus
• Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
• IHG One Rewards
• Marriott Bonvoy
• World of Hyatt

Although only three of these carriers are based in the U.S., many of these programs have useful partnerships with U.S.-based airlines. These partnerships allow you to transfer Chase points to one airline loyalty program and use those points to book a flight on a completely different airline.

As you’ll see, this creates the opportunity to book a wide range of flights at excellent prices. Just remember that not every award flight is open to partner bookings — there generally must be “saver” award availability.

Booking United flights with Chase points

You can transfer Chase points directly to United’s MileagePlus loyalty program or book United flights through a Star Alliance partner airline program, such as Air Canada Aeroplan.

United MileagePlus prices its award flights dynamically so you won’t know exactly how much an award will cost until you search for it. The upside of this is that you book any available seat with miles. The problem, however, is that as the flights fill up, the cost for an award increases.

Before you transfer any Chase points to United, it’s a good idea to compare prices against Aeroplan. The program has a distanced-based partner award chart, so you can book United saver awards for a fixed price, which can often save you a chunk of points.

When using Aeroplan you’ll only be able to book United’s saver awards, so you won’t have access to every open seat. But when seats are available, you can save points by booking with Aeroplan. For example, CNBC Select found flights from Chicago to Hawaii that cost 25,000 miles through MileagePlus, but only 22,500 points when booking the exact same flight through Aeroplan.

Booking Delta flights with Chase points

Chase points don’t transfer to Delta SkyMiles, but you can book Delta award flights through Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club. The program has a straightforward distance-based award chart and makes it easy to find and book Delta awards online.

When booking Delta flights with Virgin points, it’s best to book nonstop flights because trips with connections will cost more. If you book an itinerary with a layover, your award won’t be priced based on the total distance, but rather, you’ll pay for the award flight as if you booked each segment separately.

For example, if you were flying from Phoenix to Charlotte via Detroit the total trip distance is 2,171 miles, normally a trip of that length would cost 15,000 points one-way. Instead, you’ll be charged 21,000 points because the Phoenix to Detroit leg costs 12,500 points (1,600+ miles) and the Detroit to Charlotte leg costs 8,500 points (500+ miles).

Booking American and Alaska flights with Chase points

You can use British Airways Avios points to book awards with American Airlines or Alaska Airlines as they are all members of the Oneworld alliance.

British Airways uses a distance-based award chart, so shorter flights cost less and longer flights are more expensive. There is a separate award chart for flights that involve multiple partner airlines, but that will rarely apply to domestic flights. Here’s what you’ll pay for awards with a single partner airline:

Each segment of a trip is priced individually, so awards with connections cost more. 

Although Singapore Airlines and Alaska Airlines aren’t members of the same alliance, they have a partnership that allows members to redeem miles on each other’s flights. There is a zone-based award chart for redeeming Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer miles for Alaska Airlines flights with some potentially great deals. For example, you can book a roundtrip from the West Coast to Hawaii for only 27,000 KrisFlyer miles.

There are limitations to this partnership: you can only book nonstop Alaska Airlines flights and you’ll have to call Singapore Airlines (800-742-3333) to book the tickets. To search for Alaska Airlines awards open to partner bookings, use the American Airlines or British Airways websites.

Booking JetBlue and Southwest flights with Chase points

You can transfer Chase points directly to both JetBlue TrueBlue and Southwest Rapid Rewards. However, neither of the loyalty programs has an award chart for points redemptions. Instead, the cost of an award flight is tied to the cash price of the ticket.

This means you’ll get a relatively consistent value for TrueBlue or Rapid Rewards points and there aren’t any sweet spots to take advantage of. TrueBlue points are typically worth 1.3 to 1.4 cents per point, but if you’re booking JetBlue’s Mint class (i.e. business class) you’ll get closer to 1.1 cents per point in value. Meanwhile, Rapid Rewards points are usually worth 1.3 to 1.5 cents per point.

The advantage of these programs is the simplicity — you can book any open seat as long as you have enough points. The downside is you can often extract more value out of your Chase points with other redemption options. 

As you’ll see below, using your Chase points to book JetBlue or Southwest flights through the Chase Ultimate Rewards travel portal is often a better option, depending on what Chase credit cards you have.

Booking flights through the Chase travel portal

For anyone who doesn’t want to bother with navigating complicated awards charts and obscure award booking restrictions, the Chase travel portal is the easiest way to use your Chase points to book domestic travel.

Booking flights through Ultimate Rewards works just like booking through any other online travel agency like Expedia. The only difference is that you can choose to pay some or all of your travel expenses with your Chase points. When you pay for your ticket with Chase points, you can even earn airline miles on your free flight.

You can redeem Chase points through the travel portal at a fixed value of 1 to 1.5 cents per point based on the Chase card account you are booking through.

If you have more than one Chase card, you can move your points to the card that offers the highest redemption value.

This creates situations where booking through the Chase travel portal may be more lucrative than transferring points directly to an airline, particularly with airlines like JetBlue and Southwest, which both have dynamic award pricing. Just be sure to always double-check that you’re getting the best price when booking with Chase.

Note that certain low-cost airlines, such as Spirit, Frontier, Allegiant, Sun Country and Southwest aren’t available to book online through the Chase travel portal. However, you can book tickets with these airlines with your Chase points over the phone by calling 1-855-233-9462.

Best of all, many of the top travel credit cards earn Chase points, so it’s easy to earn the rewards you need for your next trip.

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