Ministry Miles
Jet Fueling Christian Ministry with miles & certificates for travel via train, plane, rental cars, & otherwise while also sharing options for hotels & other travel arrangements
How Can Points Be Acquired?
Points can be acquired from credit cards or by points purchases, whether you acquire them yourself or a donor to your ministry acquires them and then puts them in your hands to use as you deem fit.
How Can Points Be Used?
Points can be used for train travel (especially in the US), plane travel, rental cars, rental vans, hotels, and many activities related to personal travel & ministry travel. Even if you're staying with locals, the cost of flights, whether for a short-term mission trip, going to Israel or another location for study or for a pilgrimage, going back to the US for furlough or support raising, or going to a new place long term, can be large portion of your expenses. In some cases, a single credit card sign-up bonus that you acquire or that a donor acquires can mostly or entirely cover very expensive flights or stays for over a month.
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While some of the best options for points acquisitions are via credit cards, there are plenty of options to purchase points at a solid rate as well if you buy them while on some of their best sales, such as certain options during "Daily Getaways" & otherwise. While most of the points that I have are from credit cards, I've purchased thousands of dollars worth of points when excellent sales were going. In some cases, points redemption values can be for more than 20 times the price of the points purchase.
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With credit cards, for instance, a 150k Hilton Honors sign-up bonus (after meeting initial spend requirements) from a single credit card can cover over a month at a hotel in Bali, Indonesia for a missionary based elsewhere in Indonesia to have an extended break to rest and recoup near the beach. Below I've listed an example where just about half of that sign-up bonus is used for a 19-night stay.
Image Courtesy Hilton.com
Likewise, missionaries going somewhere short-term, such as someone exploring what location to plant an orphanage or church next, might use something like those if they wouldn't be staying with someone in the area already.
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With flights, again, a single credit card bonus, such as a 150k Amex Membership Reward sign-up bonus available with the Amex Platinum via a referral link at the time of this writing (10/4/22), (especially if combined with a 40% transfer bonus from Amex to British Airways, where 150k Amex MR could yield 210k British Airways Avios), could get a small team of 7 based out of Miami from there to San Salvador, round trip, for only 126k Avios with plenty of points to spare where the cash surcharge would be only a fraction of the cost of the ticket if paid entirely in cash.
Image Courtesy BritishAirways.com
Here's how that would have added up if paying strictly with cash:
Image Courtesy https://www.google.com/travel/flights/
Likewise, missionaries going somewhere short-term, such as someone exploring what location to plant an orphanage or church next, might use something like those if they wouldn't be staying with someone in the area already.
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The Problem with Points Being Received by Ministries from Donors
For those who don't know, while some non-profits benefit from the gift of miles from donors, it can be difficult for ministries to have that available in the typical donor style available with miles currencies. For instance, certain non-profits, especially those engaged in any proselytization, are systematically excluded from participating in those gifts.
In this site & with associated links I cover how to acquire & make points useful for you if you are rejected from direct transfers of points to your ministry in the formal way that other big non-profits receive points/miles donations. I also am not aware of any cases where a gift of points is tax-deductible & am not a CPA and any discussion of taxes is my unprofessional opinion.
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If you have a donor available, here is the information that will sometimes be needed, depending on the airline, for the person or people whose flights are being booked.