I recently booked my first reward tickets from points acquired using Chase credit cards. I transferred 80,000 Ultimate Rewards Points to my United MileagePlus account and then booked two one way economy tickets from Bali to Indianapolis for 80k points plus $82.52 USD in fees. Some airlines (looking at you Qantas) charge much more in taxes, fees and fuel surcharges and end up ruining the deal.
I could have used these points to get $800 USD cash back, but when you look at the prices of flights from DPS (Bali) to IND on Google Flights, you see I am getting a much better deal. If I book the return flights for the same amount, I will have gotten two return flights for $1,765.00 USD. Right now that would cost over $3,100 to buy the tickets with cash. When you book business and first class tickets using points you end up getting an even better value compared to cash.
One caveat to this redemption is that to transfer points from Chase to one of their partners is that you must have a premium card like the Sapphire Preferred Card. There are other options, especially if you need a business card, but this is the best to start with, since it has no annual fee the first year.
The points you earn with your other cards, like the Freedom can easily be moved over to your Sapphire account. When logged into your Chase account you will see your Ultimate Rewards Points on the left under your credit card info and balance. When you click on them you will be taken to the Ultimate Rewards page where you can transfer your points between cards, spend your points on travel directly, or transfer you points to several transfer partners such as United, Southwest, Singapore Airlines, British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, KLM, Korean Air, and several hotel rewards programs.
Travel booking through the Chase page is available without a premium card, but it is not a very good value compared to transferring to a partner. It might actually be better to just get cash back and then buy a ticket. If you do not want to keep your card longer than one year, you can transfer your points to someone else in your household who has a premium card and then use them with a transfer partner.
When planning your trip, it is a good idea to figure out which airline has the best redemptions and see what is available before transferring your points. Once they have gone, there is no getting them back into your Chase account from an airline or hotel reward program. If you find a redemption you like, then transfer the points quickly and get that thing booked. Since many airline points expire, it is not a good idea to transfer them without having an idea when you will spend them. Chase and Bank of America points do not expire, which makes them great places to hoard points.
When I first attempted transferring points to United through Chase's website, the request seemed to go through fine, but I waited days without seeing them show up on the receiving end. After several days and phone calls I realized they had gone back to Chase. When I requested they be transferred over the phone, they showed up immediately and I was able to book my flights.
United seems to have the best redemption value for flying from this part of the world to the USA (40k plus $41 one way). Singapore Airlines seems to be pretty good as well, but the fees were a little bit higher and the flights I saw were wait list flights. Southwest and British airways seem to have some pretty good short haul redemptions from what I have read. The only other redemptions on travel I have done are with Bank of America's Travel card, which just gave me money back after I purchased tickets with the card so you get exactly 1 cent per point. Maybe I will be redeeming some Qantas points sometime soon.
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