We all online shop. It’s a fact of living in the 21st century, so you might as well get more than just your purchases! As I’ve said before, shopping portals are a great way to earn extra miles on the things you already buy online. From that previous post:

Shopping portals are a great way to earn extra points on things you’re already buying online, and most rewards programs have some sort of portal. If you have a rewards account, the chances are they also have a shopping portal.

Normally when you go to buy something online, you go directly to that website, pay for what you want, and earn miles at the base rate (the points you earn just by using your credit card). Shopping portals act like a sort of middle man, rewarding you with extra points for using them as an intermediary.

I really like using an aggregator like EV Reward to find the best options for maximizing my points per purchase. Here’s an example from L.L. Bean:

And here’s an example from jet.com:

Both clearly lay out the points you’ll get per dollar when purchasing through that respective portal. Let’s say you spend $50 at L.L. Bean and use the Hilton portal and $50 at jet.com and use the jetBlue portal, you’ve just earned 150 Hilton points and 250 jetBlue miles, all for buying things you were already planning on!

NOTE:  you must register for each shopping portal individually and you must do so before you start shopping through it. 

Portals are a great way to boost your points count and a great way to keep your points from expiring. So far this year, I’ve earned the following points from online purchases made through portals:

• American Airlines:  70
• Amtrak:  1,365
• United Airlines:  124

NOTE:  The United Airlines MileagePlus X portal is also detailed in this post–very lucrative if you have the United card by Chase.

As you can see, I try to maximize my points earning around Amtrak, as that’s the easiest and most efficient way to get home to my family. 1,365 points is roughly ~25% of a roundtrip ticket from NYC to Boston on the Northeast regional, which is great for “free” points.

I would also suggest registering for portals now, as it’s holiday shopping season! I know you’ll be buy gifts for friends and family, so why not make off with a few extra points while you’re at it?