The simple system I use to afford big trips without giving up our other savings goals
Today's post has been kindly written by Mairi, or you may know her from Instagram as @moneywithmaz. Mairi's goal is to help you save smarter, not harder, and Avios form a big part of her travel strategy, along with another gloriously simple method of saving.
(She's also extremely close to getting to 1,000 followers, can you help get her over the line?!)
I have two passions in life - travel and money. I love planning our next adventure as much as I love seeing our savings grow. Unfortunately, making room for both isn’t always easy. But it is doable.
We’re a couple with full-time jobs, a mortgage and all the usual bills to pay. But in the past two years we’ve been from Boston and Maine to the Bahamas, San Diego and Las Vegas. We also got married and bought and fully renovated our forever home.
We’re already planning our next big trip to the Canadian Rockies, and in the meantime, we’re saving for an extension, which is another huge (and scary!) financial goal.
So where’s our secret pot of money, you may ask?! Well, there isn’t one. This is all down to a simple budget, with the help of some Avios points!
First off is my super easy way that I budget for travel each year - no fancy spreadsheet required. I start by thinking about how much I’d like to spend on trips over the year, and divide that by 12 to figure out how much I’d need to put away each month.
Then I ask myself honestly - does that number fit comfortably alongside our other savings goals? I know myself too well, and I would absolutely spend all my savings on holidays if given the opportunity! Asking myself this really helps me find balance and be realistic about what we can actually afford to save, without compromising too much on our other priorities.
Once I’ve got my number, I set up a monthly standing order to transfer that amount into its own savings account, and call the account “Holidays”, so I KNOW what I’m giving up if I dip into it for anything else. I actually do this for all of my big savings goals. Having a separate account for each goal means I can easily see how much we have earmarked at any time, so we know exactly how much we have to spend on our trips.
Then comes the leg up - Avios points. They’re how I turn a pretty average annual holiday budget into long haul trips I couldn’t justify otherwise. I’ve saved literally thousands of pounds on flights over the past few years, and the key is earning as many points as possible without spending any more money than I need to.
There are three main ways I earn Avios points. The first is the obvious one, although not where I get most of my points from, and that’s my credit cards. I have two Avios-earning credit cards. I have the free British Airways American Express credit card and I also have the free Barclaycard Avios credit card.
My husband and I put all of our everyday spending on the American Express card, unless the retailer doesn’t accept Amex, in which case we use the Barclaycard, which is a Mastercard. There are direct debits set up on both cards, so that the balance is automatically cleared every month and we’re not charged any interest. Points just aren’t worth it if you have to pay interest! We actually tend to review and clear our balances down weekly, which helps us stay on top of our spending.
Once we hit £15k annual spend on my Amex, we earn a companion voucher (basically a 2-for-1 on reward flights). Then we switch all of our everyday spending to my husband’s Amex, and aim to receive two companion vouchers a year.
I also have the Barclays Premier Current Account which I believe is the only current account in the UK where you can earn Avios. The account itself is free but I pay £12 a month to opt in to Avios rewards, which gets me 1,500 points each month (great value!), as well as a free cabin upgrade voucher on my anniversary each year - I’m about to get my first upgrade voucher this month and I’m very excited! As this is a Premier account, it does have eligibility criteria which have to be met to be able to open one.
And last but not least, I earn points using the Avios shopping portal at every opportunity. This is usually where I earn most of my points each month. It’s basically a cashback app, but instead of cash, I get Avios points.
I recently earned a massive 14,000 points for spending £1,400 on a week’s hotel stay booked through Avios hotels. They typically offer 10 points for every £1 spent, whereas my credit cards only get me 1 point per £1 spent, so the portal can be very rewarding! There are loads of well-known brands with varying earning offers - some of my regulars are Argos, Dunelm and Lookfantastic. Where possible I’ll combine spending through the portal with using my Avios-earning credit card to pay, which means I earn from both.
And it’s not just shopping and hotels. When my pet insurance renewal came through, I used Avios shopping to open Compare the Market, saved myself £100 by shopping around for insurance, and got 1,000 bonus points for the privilege.
Earning points is only one side of the coin. I also make sure we’re getting maximum value when it comes to spending them. When people think about spending Avios points, they probably think of those lie-flat seats in business class, but we focus on quantity over quality. We actually only ever book economy flights because although you can get better value per point in business class, you still have to spend significantly more points. Booking economy saves us tens of thousands of points per journey, and means lower taxes and fees too.
I also typically only book flights if I have a voucher to use, meaning I get even more value from the points I’m spending.
To get the most bang for our buck, we often book open jaw flights. For example we flew into San Diego and back from Las Vegas, which meant we got the opportunity to visit two amazing cities instead of one. If we’re doing a multi-centre trip, we either hire a car and make it a road trip or take a short flight in between the two locations which is usually pretty cheap.
So that’s my strategy. Set an achievable budget, stick to it, and then use Avios points to make my money go further.
One tip I’d give anyone interested in getting into Avios is fix your finances first. Travel perks can be amazing, but they’re only worth it if you’re not stuck paying credit card interest, buying things you don’t need just to hit a spend target, or dipping into savings you’ve got earmarked for something else.
I love looking back at all the incredible trips I’ve taken over the past few years. From camping in Acadia National Park in Maine, to swimming with pigs in the Bahamas, we’ve had some insane experiences. But being able to look back on those memories without feeling any guilt or anxiety about the money we spent on them? That’s priceless.
Mairi - @moneywithmaz
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