Discover How We Flew from Los Angeles to Denpasar, Bali for Only $12 Each!

A few months before we started planning our travels to South East Asia, we dove into the world of credit cards & their rewards programs. We quickly discovered that this was an incredible way to optimize our finances. Specifically utilizing Capital One’s point system and miles reward program.

Our journey began with the Venture Credit Card from Capital One. Treating it like a debit card, we strategically put all our daily expenses on it, paying it off weekly or bi-weekly. This approach helped us swiftly reach the $4,000 spend minimum within the first 3 months, unlocking the promised 75,000 bonus points.

Thus achieving our goal of earning bonus points to redeem for travel rewards. 

Through implementing this strategy, we not only earned bonus points but we also were continuously earning points every time we made a purchase. For most purchases through the Venture Card you earn 2x points for every $1 purchase. 

Pro Tip #1: Treat your credit card like a debit card, ensuring you never spend more than you can pay off immediately.

Not stopping there, we maximized our rewards by sharing referral codes with friends and family. With the Venture card, each referral earned us an additional 25,000 bonus miles, capped at 50,000 miles. Through this, we accumulated a total of 125,000 bonus points.

Pro Tip #2: Leverage referral bonuses by sharing your code for additional miles.

As our points grew and we had maxed out on bonus rewards, we transitioned to the Venture X Capital One Credit Card, unlocking a new realm of bonus rewards and travel perks. Following the same strategy, we earned an extra 75,000 bonus points. Plus points earned from our daily purchases. 

Pro Tip #3: Consider upgrading to the Venture X for more rewards and perks.

With bonus points accumulated from both Venture and Venture X cards, we streamlined by transferring all the miles we had earned to our Venture X account. Whether to keep both cards open is your choice, but the key is to pay off your balance regularly. In our case, since our plan was to continue using the Venture X card in the future in order to use our Priority Pass which is included with the card, (more on priority pass in the next few paragraphs), we transferred all of our miles to our Venture X account. 

And here’s where it all starts paying off!

By redeeming points for miles, we scored big. Transferring our miles to Singapore Airlines, we discovered the power of redeeming miles instead of booking directly. This approach cut the flight points cost in half, offering substantial savings and making our miles stretch further.

Pro Tip #4: Capitalize on Capital One’s Miles Transfer Partners for maximum value.

Let’s dig into it. This is how we were able to fly all the way from LA to Bali for only $24 USD total one way (for two people!) 

Instead of just redeeming your points through cash rewards, Amazon purchases or a  flight directly through  capital one travel, we recommend transfering the points you’ve earned into miles via Capital One’s Miles Transfer Partners. 

Which airline you choose to transfer your miles to will obviously depend on where you plan on traveling to next. But luckily, Capital One has quite a large selection to choose from. 

In our case, we did our research and found that Singapore Airlines offered the best redemption options for our flight to Bali. We transferred our miles over to Singapore Airlines – where we were then directed to create a free flyer account with them. 

From there the search for flights began! 

Pro Tip #5: Redeem miles for flights to maximize savings, typically 50% more value.

Our LAX to Bali flight was secured for only 42,000 miles, equivalent to $420 USD if you break down the dollar value of the points. For both of us, the total cost was just 84,000 miles plus $24 USD in fees.

The key to this is when searching for flights, search using the “redeem miles” option versus searching in dollar amounts. This will unlock the extensive savings explained above. What we found with this strategy was that by utilizing the “redeeming miles” it brings the value of the ticket down by half the cost. Allowing you to only redeem the necessary miles required. Another HUGE savings! 

For example: when we searched for our flights from LAX to Bali a one-way ticket for 1 passenger was going to be roughly $800 USD. But when searching for the same exact flight in miles, it only cost us 42,000 miles to redeem. 100 points equals $1 thus $420 each, splitting the cost of the ticket almost in half. 

When it was all said and done, for both of us to fly from LAX to Bali on one-way tickets, it cost us only 84,000 in miles plus $24.00 USD in fees. TOTAL. 

And it doesn’t stop there…

Before leaving on our trip, we signed up for a Priority Pass membership. This membership offers access to hundreds of airport lounges worldwide and is included with the Venture X Credit Card.

Signing up for Priority Pass provided access to airport lounges worldwide, saving us hundreds of dollars on food and drinks during layovers. This perk alone justified the Venture X’s annual fee of $395. There was no cap on how many lounge visits we could have in one day so during long layovers we were able to get access for both breakfast and dinner. All of the lounges we visited offered a large variety of free food and beverages, alcoholic and non-alcoholic. 

Priority Pass also offers a mobile app allowing you to easily search the airport you’re in for available lounges in your terminal. The venture x card also allowed guests to enter the lounge with you , thus we only needed to sign up for one card to both enjoy this perk

Pro Tip #6: Unlock additional perks with Priority Pass, included with the Venture X Credit Card.

In total, by leveraging credit card points, transferring them into flight miles, and strategically redeeming them, we saved over $1600 just on our LAX to Bali flight alone and continued to reap the benefits throughout our South East Asia travels.

We leveraged credit card points redeeming them for miles all throughout South East Asia. We used points to fly from Bali to Phuket, Thailand. Then again from Hanoi, Vietnam back to Bali. And once more on our flight home from Bali to LAX, California. 

We saved thousands of dollars just on this trip alone! Making our dreams of exploring South East Asia a reality without going into debt. 

Our hope is that by sharing these credit card hacks you might also be able to save thousands of dollars in travel and make your money work for you. 

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