Rebuilding Our Points Balances

Hey everyone, it’s been a minute since the last write up.  Last time I had just finished booking Japan for my family, and I was reminiscing on the journey it had been to get to those point redemptions.  If you’re new to the blog you can check out my Japan on Points series where I talked about how I was planning to use points for my family’s next trip to Japan, all the way up to what I eventually ended up booking with points.  But now that Japan is booked that means I’m left with pretty low points balances (compared to where I was) and some new found excitement.  The reason I say excitement is simple….it’s because all the points that my wife and I are now earning are all going towards whatever big trip we decide to plan after Japan.

Let the Rebuilding Begin

So, what’s the strategy you may ask.  Overall, I’d say the strategy is staying relatively the same.  Our Chase Ultimate Rewards and American Express Membership Rewards will be saved to go towards our flights, and Hilton Honors points will be saved for our future hotel stays.  Now our Chase and Amex point balances took the biggest hit since the business class flights to Japan cost so many points, 669,000 to be exact.  Last time I checked, we were under 90,000 points combined across the two points ecosystems.  On the Hilton side we’re in a slightly better place.  Since we’re only staying in a Hilton branded hotel (the Conrad Tokyo) the first half of our Japan trip, I was able to save a good amount of our points.  The balance has already been growing because I’ve been putting all of our spend on my Surpass card trying to get Diamond status back before we go to Japan.  The other thing I’ve been doing has been to put some spend on my Marriott Boundless card here and there so that I can have some points in my Marriott account.  This will hopefully give us options the next time we book a big trip, in the event that I can’t find a Hilton property for us to stay at.

Chasing Diamond

Now you might be asking, why am I trying to get Diamond status before our trip to Japan.  First let me preface that we aren’t buying anything that we weren’t already planning on buying just to get Diamond status.  I never buy stuff for the sake of buying it just to get brand status or hit a sign-up bonus.  I encourage anyone reading this to use their credit cards responsibly and what works for me may not be ideal for you and your individual situation.  Now on the Hilton Surpass card you can earn Diamond status by spending $40,000 on your card in a calendar year.  I know, $40,000 is a lot of money, but this year has been an anomaly for us with the birth of our daughter and fixing/buying things for our home.  On top of that, I’m able to put my work expenses on my personal cards and get reimbursed.   All that to say, this isn’t a normal year of spend for us. 

After we were able to get all of our stuff for Japan booked, I realized how close we were to that $40,000 threshold.  So, I decided to shift our spend solely to my Surpass card, just until we hit the threshold for Diamond status, and I’m happy to say we were able to achieve this.  Why the big push for Diamond status?  Prior to the introduction of Diamond Reserve, Diamond status was the highest status you could earn with Hilton.  Now for those that have the Hilton Aspire card, you automatically get Diamond status, but for me I’ve been able to earn Diamond status in different ways in the past.  The reason I am trying to get it back before Japan is to increase the likelihood that we get a room upgrade at the Conrad in Tokyo.  Last time I had Diamond status my wife and I were on our honeymoon in Europe and we got upgraded in every hotel that we stayed in.  I’ve found that I’ve received upgrades more when we’re outside of the US.  In the US the upgrade part of Diamond status is kind of a joke in my opinion.  The second reason I want to get Diamond status back is because it gets you access to the Executive Lounge (if the hotel you’re staying at has one).  We’ve been able to use the Executive Lounge in Japan and Europe before.  It’s a nice addition when you want a quick snack or drink before going out into the city.  Diamond status also increases your points multipliers when you pay out of pocket at Hilton properties.  A basic member earns 10 points per dollar.  When I was a Gold member I would earn 18 points per dollar, but now that I’m Diamond status again, I’ll earn 20 points per dollar.  This 20 points per dollar is on top of the 12 points per dollar that my Surpass card gives me for spend at Hilton.  Lastly, earning Diamond status for the remainder of this year and all of next year means that I can continue working towards the goal of earning Lifetime Diamond status (I’ll discuss that in another post).

Sticking to What Works

Anyways, back to the points earning.  Now that we’ve gotten Hilton Diamond status back I have already begun shifting our weekly spend back onto different cards.  Mainly, I’ve started using my American Express Gold card again to ensure that our flexible points currencies are growing.  As I mentioned above, my strategy is to use flexible point currencies for our flights.  We have a bit of time before we plan to book a big international trip again, but the past few years we’ve been fortunate enough to take one international trip per year.  So, I guess when I look at it that way, we don’t have that much time to rebuild our point balances haha.  At the same time, if we must pay for parts of our trip that’s ok too.  The goal for me has been to find ways to elevate the travel that we do without exponentially increasing the cost of the travel, not necessarily eliminate all the cost.  If we’re able to do a trip completely free that’s great, but I’m not mad if we have to pay for part of it. 

I’m honestly curious how my points strategy for my family will change as we have to pay for more things for my daughter, for our home, and just life in general as things continue to get more expensive.  The goal is to have what I like to call a funnel that can capture different types of spending that my family does.  From there we bank all the points and put them towards our travel and create memorable experiences for our family!