best credit card portals to buy airfare/book hotels

[red259]

Since I am usually using points I don't normally think about using credit card portals for purchasing an airfare or hotel and instead usually just check the lowest rates online and if they match the airline/hotel website I book through there. Should I consider using a portal if I have a CSR and Amex plat? Does going through the portals normally increase the cost? For properties like marriott/Hilton does going through the credit card portals impact benefits I'd get from having status? 

[K-in-Boston]

Treat airfare and hotels differently for this discussion.  You will almost NEVER get elite benefits unless you book directly with a hotel (Amex Travel's Fine Hotels program is of course a slightly different topic).  In fact, you will often get the "Expedia room," complete with a view of the brick wall across the alley.  Different portals will often have slightly different pricing, but for Chase and Amex the pricing is usually exactly or very close to the same.  The key thing for airfare is to evaluate the point conversion and value if you were to transfer MRs and/or URs to the airline (or a partner) and weigh that against the redemption value when booking through a portal.  When booking many airlines (Delta for example), you will still receive full mileage and qualifying segment/dollar credits when purchasing through Chase or Amex.  Amex also offers MR discounts on some Delta flights when paying it in full with MRs.  But the 1.5x of the CSR makes it worth doing unless the value of converted airline miles are worth significantly more than 1.5cpp.

[UpperNwGuy]

I agree with K-in-Boston that it is always better to deal directly with the hotel rather than book through a credit card travel portal.  I also agree that airfare can sometimes be a better deal through the credit card travel portal, but other times it is better to transfer your MR or UR or TYP to the partner airline and book the ticket using airline miles.  You need to do the cost comparison each time.  Two words of caution, however:

(1) Credit card travel portals sometimes sell bulk fare tickets (also known as consolidator fares) without fully disclosing that fact.

(2) Credit card travel portals sometimes sell basic economy tickets without fully disclosing that fact.

So if you chose to use the travel portal, be very alert and make sure you know what kind of ticket you're buying, and what the limitations are.

[K-in-Boston]

Those are great points.  At least with Delta, it's pretty easy to confirm which fares you're getting, although it would be nice if Amex actually displayed the fare class.  For an example, I just picked a flight from BOS to JFK on a random day, and you can see that the cash price is the same $199.20 on Delta.com, Amex Travel and the Chase Portal.  And this is a G class fare unless redeeming SkyMiles.

So for Amex, it would be 19,920 MRs which isn't very good value at 1 cpp and not worth the mileage/MQM/MQS/MQD premium for a short hop like this (unless it would push you into a new Medallion level, of course). You could transfer 16,000 MRs to SkyMiles and get 1.2 cpp.  (Transfer to SPG first then to Delta for the bonus wouldn't really make much sense here unless you didn't have the CSP/CSR.)  For CSP, it would be 15,936 URs which is about on par with the SkyMiles but you do get the added benefit of earning some minimal mileage as well as the MQM/MQS/MQD.  For CSR it would be 13,280 URs with all of the same benefits as the CSP - and out of all of our options for taking this particular BOS-JFK flight, I think it's the clear winner.

And to convolute things even more, I'm sure there's some way to transfer these points to Flying Blue or Korean Air and get even better redemption value.  

[red259]

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@K-in-Boston wrote:

Treat airfare and hotels differently for this discussion.  You will almost NEVER get elite benefits unless you book directly with a hotel (Amex Travel's Fine Hotels program is of course a slightly different topic).  In fact, you will often get the "Expedia room," complete with a view of the brick wall across the alley.  Different portals will often have slightly different pricing, but for Chase and Amex the pricing is usually exactly or very close to the same.  The key thing for airfare is to evaluate the point conversion and value if you were to transfer MRs and/or URs to the airline (or a partner) and weigh that against the redemption value when booking through a portal.  When booking many airlines (Delta for example), you will still receive full mileage and qualifying segment/dollar credits when purchasing through Chase or Amex.  Amex also offers MR discounts on some Delta flights when paying it in full with MRs.  But the 1.5x of the CSR makes it worth doing unless the value of converted airline miles are worth significantly more than 1.5cpp.

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Yea I'm just talking about straight out buying airline tickets via a portal not using points in any way. The whole not knowing the limitations of the plane tickets could be an issue. I ran a couple of hotels I knew through amex fine hotels and the markups are insane. 

[UpperNwGuy]

If you are simply buying tickets and not using points or miles, buying directly from the airline is almost always better than any portal.

[K-in-Boston]

Sorry, @red259, I completely misunderstood your question.  There would be no upside that I can think of to using a portal for either airfare or hotels.  Had your question actually been about the value of using points in a portal, see my thorough comparison above.  

[Anonymous]

Citi Thank You Portal for hotels I got better price than Expedia when  you consider they are giving you 50 dollar credit per 3 night stay.  As for Expedia room , I have never gotten a bad room booking with Expedia and I find the prices on Expedia to be cheaper than the hotel websites even with the membership rate.  Too many people book with these travel sites to give everyone a bad room.