🌎 Travel + Leisure readers voted on the best 25 islands in the world, with the Maldives coming in first. Want to read the rest from the survey, along with other top destinations around the world? Check that out here.
Good morning, my friends, and welcome back to Daily Drop, your go-to guide for all things points and miles… and cat memes.
We’ve got a fun announcement and some positive points and miles news today, so let’s get to it:
📖 Our new Points and Miles Encyclopedia
As you know, one of our goals here at Daily Drop is to educate you about points and miles concepts.
But even with a daily newsletter, it can be hard to keep track of everything going on, especially when there are hundreds of weird terms being thrown around all the time…
That’s why I’m super psyched to tell you about our new Points and Miles Encyclopedia!
This guide breaks down tons of definitions, abbreviations, and acronyms and even includes some illustrations to help you understand. 👇
Much like our Transfer Partners Cheat Sheet, this is something you can bookmark in your browser and reference whenever you need a quick insight to… basically everything in the points and miles space.
The best part?
Anyone can access this new resource with ease by referring ONE friend to Daily Drop.
We are always trying to refresh this toolkit and add new valuable resources, so it’s something that will continue to give you value over time.
So here’s the bottom line:
Everybody knows ONE person who wants to learn how to travel the world for pennies on the dollar.
Send them your unique referral link below, and it’s a win-win for everyone:
https://newsletter.dailydrop.com/subscribe?ref=PLACEHOLDER
As always, you can track your referrals, rewards, and progress by clicking this link, which is unique to you:
💳 Bilt adds TWO new transfer partners
Okay, now for some other exciting news that broke over the weekend…
Our friends over at Bilt Rewards have done it again. Just months after adding their last transfer partner, they’ve announced TWO new transfer partners: Accor Live Limitless and TAP Air Portugal!
These are two programs that I doubt you’re super familiar with…
Personally, I’m most excited about Accor. Accor is the biggest and best hotel loyalty program you aren’t using right now…
While other programs transfer to Accor at a 2:1 ratio, Bilt is offering an even better 3:2 transfer ratio.
And while that still sounds bad, I’ll tell you why it’s not.
Accor consists of tons of brands you’ve heard of and maybe even stayed at:
If you travel abroad, you’ll notice a TON of brands ranging from super budget to luxury.
Therefore, earning and redeeming Accor points is VERY easy. They have over 50 brands, more than any other loyalty program.
Better yet, their program is super simple: Redeem 2,000 Accor points for a €40 credit toward a hotel stay.
To earn those 2,000 Accor points, you’ll transfer 3,000 Bilt Rewards.
Since 40 Euros is worth roughly $44, your Bilt points are redeemable at a flat rate of 1.5 cents each with Accor.
💳 FYI - the fastest and easiest way to rack up Bilt Rewards is with the Bilt Mastercard®, which has pretty solid earning rates on everyday spend!
Make no mistake about it - that’s excellent value when you can guarantee it with every transaction.
Since Accor has such a wide variety of brands, you can stretch those points far with cheap budget stays at hotels like this one, where I stayed in Indonesia earlier this year:
Or, as most of you probably prefer, you can redeem them for world-class hotels like the famous Fairmont Le Chateau Frontenac in Quebec City.
I spent a week here a few years ago, and it remains one of the most memorable trips of my life!
Anyway, here’s the bottom line:
Accor is a really solid program, especially for international travel. Their flat-rate redemptions take all the headaches out of the points and miles game.
With Bilt’s 3:2 ratio, it’s a transfer partner you can guarantee value out of.
As for TAP Air Portugal, I need to do some more research… but I’ll fill you in on some of their sweet spots later. 😉
🍪 Tasty Travel Tidbits
🇯🇵 Japanese Airline ZipAir has just announced new nonstop flights between Tokyo and Houston beginning in March of next year. Flights are already on sale and are starting at just $333 one-way, which is an excellent deal.
🛳️ Cruise alert: Virgin Voyages is selling cruises for two with Virgin Red points! At a minimum of 140,000 points, it’s far from the best deal we’ve seen. Still, if you’re looking for a cheap way to take a luxury cruise with points, it’s not terrible! As a reminder, you can transfer points to Virgin Atlantic and then onward to Virgin Red after linking your accounts.
✈️ Wow!!! United just dropped a press release where they announced some SUPER exciting new routes for next year. The lineup includes places like Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, Nuuk, Greenland, Dakar, Senegal, and more. Way to go, United!!
That’s all for today, folks! I hope you enjoyed this week’s first newsletter - it’s always nice to kick off the week with a bang.
Take care, and be sure to tune in tomorrow for even more travel fun times.
Ciao ✌️
