One of the benefits of the IHG Rewards Premier card is that cardholders get $50, yearly, in United TravelBank cash. The money is divided into two $25 deposits on January 1st and July 1st.
TravelBank Cash that is received as part of this benefit and deposited between January 1 and June 30 will expire on July 15 of the same calendar year, regardless of deposit date. Deposits made between July 1 and December 31 will expire on January 15 of the following calendar year, regardless of deposit date.
The catch is that the money expires if you don’t use it in the six-month time frame, so you can’t keep adding to your balance to save for an expensive ticket.
However there’s a small window where you can stack both credits and use the full $50 for a single ticket. We’re in that time right now, so if you didn’t use the $25 from the latter part of 2022, you can save $50 on a United ticket until January 15th.
I used my travel bank funds to help pay for a United flight later this year. I’ll give bonus points if you can guess where the additional $100 in my TravelBank came from.
I prefer to use points for flights, but it doesn’t make sense when you can significantly reduce the cash price of the ticket.
If you didn’t know, TravelBank cash can only be used to pay for flights operated by United and United Express and certain subscription products. It can not be used to pay for the taxes on an award ticket or flights on partner airlines. When using TravelBank as a partial payment, the only option to pay the remainder is with a credit card.
You only have a few days before the 2022 TravelBank cash from the IHG Premier expires, so now is a good time to look if you have any United flights on the horizon.
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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary
3 comments
Unused flight credit from amex platinum or similar card.
Bingo!
My TravelBank credit has yet to flow despite my linking my accounts when the benefit was first announced. I haven’t flown United for years, so this isn’t an A item for me. But I went to the United site this afternoon and had a hard time finding TravelBank. Maybe others have had trouble getting it together — or have never heard it it. Maybe a basic post?