The Site: Points.com
- It’s FREE to join and everyone receives bonus miles or points for signing up at Points.com *
- Track your reward point balances all in one location online
- Trade on Global Points Exchange (GPX), which allows you to set up your own point trades. You post what you are willing to trade, and what you want in return. Wait and see if anyone wants to trade with you (similiar to a free classified)
- Book Hotels. Use your reward program points to book hotels. Book reservations at the famous Jumeirah properties (Dubai) with the Points.com rewards program
- Swap Points. Exchange reward miles and points from one program to another
- Points.com Online Mall allows you to earn points for some reward programs, just for shopping: DISTANCIA, Frontier Airlines EarlyReturns®, Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles, Midwest Airlines. Midwest Miles, Priority Club® Rewards are currently participating
- Redeem your points for gift certificates to your favorite stores and restaurants
- Buy points. Purchase more points to help you reach reward level. (Tip: Check to see if you can earn points by upgrading to a Points.com Gold Member before you buy points, it may be less expensive)
- Optional Upgrade to Gold Membership. $4.95 month. Get more bonus points to the reward program of your choice upon joining (amount varies). Get discounts of up to 50% on travel and dining benefits.
Points.com travel partners:
- Aeroplan®
- Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan
- American Airlines AAdvantage®
- Asia Miles™
- BMI
- British Airways Executive Club
- Delta SkyMiles®
- DISTANCIA
- Frontier Airlines EarlyReturns®
- Hawaiian Airlines® HawaiianMiles®
- JetBlue TrueBlue
- Icelandair Award Points
- Lufthansa Miles & More®
- Midwest Airlines Midwest Miles
- Scandinavian Airlines EuroBonus
- US Airways® Dividend Miles®
- Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
- Amtrak Guest Rewards Program
- Choice Hotels
- CruisePoints
- Jumeirah Hotels & Resorts – Sirius Rewards Program
- Marriott
- Priority Club® Rewards
- ReserveAmerica
- Starwood Preferred Guest®
- Trident Hotels, India-Trident Privilege Programme
- Wyndham Rewards
Do you belong to any of those hotel reward programs? If so, Click here to sign up at Points.com, add them to a free Points.com account to keep track of your balances and swap points between programs.
The Good: Points.com is a lifesaver in many ways. Do you have 3, 5, or even 10 different “reward program” memberships that you can barely keep track of? Points.com allows you to enter in all (or most) of your reward program details in one place. They will update your balances at least every 2 weeks, so you do not need to log into separate accounts to check balances. You can easily view your point balances and swap between programs. We now feel like we can toss out our bulky reward cards and just store our information electronically on Points.com. Reward points can be very valuable. Everywhere you shop now, you are bombarded with requests to “join” and earn points. It is hard to remember what points you have, and where, and Points.com really helps you solve that problem. We also like the “What Can I Get for my Points and Miles” feature. After joining, on your home page you will find a little widget that allows you to plug in the number of points that you have. The widget will pull up a list of all the things that that you can redeem your points for, with quick links. The GPX is awesome. You can post trades that you would like to do for free and see if anyone bites. Great way to get rid of Delta SkyMiles points if you don’t want them (read more below). Be aware that GPX trading is different than swapping! “Swapping” points and miles does not cost money, for the programs that allow it. Swapping only costs you points.
The Bad: We are very disappointed that you cannot transfer Delta SkyMiles points to other programs (at least not for free). This is not really a problem with Points.com, but rather Delta SkyMiles is strict about their rewards program and won’t allow Points.com to transfer their points to other programs. Oh…but if you want to transfer points into Delta SkyMiles, you are more than welcome to do so! There is one way that you may be able to trade Delta SkyMiles points: Set up a free trade request on Points.com new GPX. It is really easy. If another Points.com member wants your Delta SkyMiles points, you may be able to work out a trade. The other party will need to give you miles from another program and pay a transfer fee of $30.00 + $0.01 per Delta mile. It is a shame that Delta SkyMiles does not get with the program here and allow free swapping. Points.com would be much more useful, because Delta SkyMiles are so popular. On another note, we had a difficult time with the sign up process on Points.com. Our tester was instantly directed to start entering in her reward program membership numbers upon joining. She entered in the correct number over and over again, only to be told “OOPS…someone else has that account number, if you need help call custumer service“….. Who wants to call “Customer Service”? Not us. This happened with 2 different reward programs, and we were positive that the numbers were correct. We recommend that you enter your reward program numbers after you have finished joining (ie. click on the link that says “I will enter program information later”). Ugh…broken links. You cannot navigate away from the “OOPS” page without erasing all of your information and clicking “enter information later” button. How utterly convenient. It took us a while to figure that out. Finally, we are left declaring “Where did our points go?” Sometimes swapping points makes sense, like if you know that you will never use the points sitting in a certain reward program, you might as well swap them into another program that you will use. Swapping 5000 Hawaiian Airlines miles into our AAdvantage account cost us a whopping 4341 points! That left us with only 659 new points in our AAdvantage account. Points and Miles are like a form of currrency. Beware that the “currency exchange” may be expensive on Points.com, and we cannot understand why.
Do not swap points until you are positive you want to make the swap! As warned on Points.com, “Do NOT click Swap Now unless you are completely sure you want to make the Swap you tested. If you click “Swap Now” the Swap you set up will take place and we cannot reverse it“. No reversals are possible.
The Fees*: All reward programs participating in GPX charge a fee when you transfer points and miles to another member of that program. The fee varies: some charge a flat fee plus a cost-per-mile/point; others charge only a flat fee that’s based on a range of points and miles. These fees are the same as the Transfer or Share fees charged by the individual reward programs. You will receive the traded points and miles within 72 hours of the completion of the trade. Limited Time Offer: $6.95 Points.com GPX processing fee waived on all trades.
*Based solely on research done by TravelSiteCritic.com, and may be inaccurate of subject to change.
The Deals:
Earn Free Points and/or Miles when you Register at Points.com
US Airways offers loyal customers a world of ways to earn more miles with Points.com
Fly on American Airlines & earn rewards w- Points.com’s free account
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You Rate It:
Points.com Reviews ,
I was skeptical when joining points.com, particularly regarding how the fees worked, but this site seemed like it could be of some use consolidating points from infrequently used reward programs. Their new website is an improvement but it still has a ways to go.
Be aware that you need to understand your reward programs and the related fees as there is all kinds of crazy stuff in the trade list. For example, I needed a couple of AirTran credits, which are $39/credit through AirTran rewards. There were trades listed where the costs would be $50-$80 per credit.
I was able to get 2 credits for $50 but it is still pending so I’m wondering just how long it will take until I actually see the points in my AirTran rewards.
Nowhere on the Points.com website does it mention that many airlines won’t let you swap (in addition to Delta, mentioned in the review). The web site implies you can swap between all airlines. Big problem for me, since I closed an Amex credit card that had 100,000 reward points and transfered to Delta, thinking that within Points.com I could swap into airlines I needed. Rippoff! I also have miles in American Airlines that I was planning to move into Alaska Air — nope! Even though they are partner airlines! These may be the fault of the airlines, but Points.com keeps it a secret until you try it.