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Tricks to Getting the Best Airline Tickets
Most people don't want to say it, but it is so true that there are 'classes' when it comes to buying airline tickets. One Fortune 500 executive who will remain anonymous was quoted, 'Oh, I don't fly cattle class.' It was a little rude to the 'cattle class' airline ticket buyers at the table around him, but he had some good advice to share.
For those of you who don't get it, this executive was referring to the coach airline tickets so many of us buy or are forced to buy because our company won't even consider first class for the rest of the staff (other than the executives). If you haven't sat in first class before, the moment that you do you will realize that there really is a 'class' system in place today as it was hundreds of years ago, and that is exactly why first class is still the best way to fly no matter what. Those in first class get first dibs on all kinds of things and personal treatment. Some airlines have a team of flight attendants working just for the first class, waiting on your seeming every whim. The free cocktails are usually the biggest pull for first class. There is really no commuting experience quite like hanging out in a nice comfy chair, watching a movie, drinking free cocktails that are brought to you, and napping with a pillow and a blanket all the way home.
For those of us who do all we can to rack up our frequent flier miles so we can get free upgrades and sometimes first class seats, it pays to figure out all kinds of ways to rack up those miles. If you're cheap and trying to get the best airline tickets or if you just like to get pampered in first class, some major credit and debit cards have struck agreements to create airline miles programs.
That particular executive stated that he used his frequent flier miles constantly to upgrade all of his flights earned on both his airline ticket purchases for work, his business corporate credit card, and his personal spending. He saved all his miles and flew his family around on vacations. It wasn't that his company was paying for the first class flights all the time, but it was that he had to make the trips so often that he had saved the miles to do so.
The first step is to figure out how you can rearrange your spending to get on those cards. Some people have been so clever as to go to the post office and buy money orders over and over with their cards, but tricks like that are often against terms and conditions of the cardholders agreement. So the easiest way to change the odds of your actually getting enough miles to redeem for an airline ticket or otherwise is to make all your expenses be paid on a credit or debit card - preferably a debit card with a miles program. This will change your whole household into a miles making machine with your whole family thinking about which airline tickets to get next.