How To Use Chase Ultimate Rewards Travel Portal

"Think of it as Chase’s version of an online travel agency, like Orbitz or Expedia." - Chase's system IS Expedia, isn't it? I guess you have the benefit of dealing with their customer service, which I've found to be pretty good, rather than Expedia's, though.

I have only booked through the CTP once, but I have searched it enough to have noticed that it generally seems like a good deal if you are looking to redeem points for an economy flight booking, but a terrible deal if you're looking for a premium flight booking.

Chase’s travel portal is literally the worst out of all the major CC portals. Atrocious customer service with zero knowledge. I spent countless hours on the phone with them trying to make a simple change. Never again…

Chase's travel portal is Expedia. They are terrible. I used this once and will neverld never use them again. See Facebook group 'expedia victims' for info on just how bad they are. Chase really needs to ditch Expedia and go back to the agency they used to use.

I'm surprised that the $50 annual bonus for using the CSP on the Chase travel portal isn't mentioned in the article. This is the only reason I used it during our 5 week trip to Europe in the fall. I checked their rates compared to Hotels.com and found them comparable for the most part, so I didn't use them the rest of the trip.

I’ve used the travel portal for both flight and hotel. Have had to cancel flights and hotel bookings. Haven’t had a problem. The only issue is the limited amount of flights per certain itineraries: whereas going to an airline directly will give me some 10-15 choices, Chase only gives me 2-3.

I've had nothing but trouble with Chase air booking, incomplete flight availability, high pricing and lousy phone support. I'm firmly in the never use again for air.

Ive used expedia plenty of times in the past few years never had a problem with them. That said i use them for BnBs are small local places in cities that dont have the big status earning chains. Never had an issue, of course there is a big reddit or FB page because when you get that big the law of large numbers means 1% bad experiences is a lot of people, no differnt than any other hotel, airline, etc.

The catch with using the portal to book flights is that it usually provides only a small subset of the available flights on the route, presumably only those which are offering commissionable fares. You can get many more options booking via Expedia's own website directly.

I agree! I've called them twice and each time, I had trouble understanding the off-shore agent and the prices I had to pay in addition to using up my 170,000 points was close to what I could find paying all cash online. How is this a deal?

I canceled my CSR because of the Chase travel portal! 1.5cents/pt towards flights is theoretically a good easy way to use your points and my experience was that the prices were only a little higher or the same as buying direct. BUT if there is a change or a problem (common in the era of Covid) it is very painful dealing with their OTA agents, and they missed notifications. I just paid United $50 to reissue a Chase ticket as a United ticket after a flight change just so I wouldn't have to deal with Chase's agents anymore.

i dont think it is expedia anymore

I had a lot of trouble with their phone support. I originally booked an award itinerary in the portal. Everything went fine; then, the airline started changing their schedules and I needed to re-schedule. For the first re-schedule, the phone agent was not very experienced. I had to ask for a Manager and it took over an hour to fix. Second re-scheduling, the same thing; it was painful. The third re-scheduling, my last flight was changed to depart before the previous arrived. They could not fix that without me having an overnight stop. I had to cancel the itinerary a I booked a different airline elsewhere. It was extremely frustrating.

Sapphire Preferred also offers a 10% annual bonus on spending, so you could be earning 5.1 points per dollar on travel. Usually, if I'm booking a pretty simple flight itinerary (domestic and non-stop, or 1-stop) I'll book through Chase whereas if my itinerary is more complex I'd book directly with the airline and use AmEx Plat or Citi Prestige.

The chase Ultimate rewards website has completely changed in the last few days. Limited filters, limited options for rooms, cant "favorite" a hotel. Just on Friday I could select "breakfast and dinner" from the left hand filters column. Now that's gone. I called Chase several times over the last 3 days and their customer service is horrible. They just repeat rote phrases and don't have any clue about what I'm trying to tell them. The hotel section screen shot you have is how the portal should. Its completely limited now. Chase has to be better than this.

The flight choices are limited on the portal however, check airlines' websites for all available flights. I then call Chase with the desired flight numbers and have them book. They will search for the flights and book. This works in most cases as they can access most flights. On rare occasions, when they cannot access, the desired flight may appear the next day. Patience, persistence and insistence is required with the customer service reps (who are less capable than the previous provider).

Hi - I hate the new Chase UR Travel Portal! I used to be able to book a hotel in Europe (or the Caribbean) using Chase Ultimate Reward points and specify that I needed a kitchen or kitchenette – either in a hotel or a “Vacation Rental”. Now you can’t book a Vacation Rental – it’s not an option - and you can’t specify that you want the room to include a kitchenette.
These options are available on Expedia but not on the Chase UR Travel Portal.

Is anyone able to tell me if Chase Business Promo class is an actual Business class ticket? It has a weird comment when you get to the 'confirm booking' page that "carry-on" luggage fee applies. It's a flight to Europe and I have never had to pay for a carry-on on transatlantic business class flight

Hi Lucky,

Can I ask for a comment? I just booked $10,000 worth of ticket in Chase Travel and when I clicked on the transaction in my chase credit card apps, it shows a reward of 30,000 pts (3pts/dollar). Does the additional 2pts get rewarded during statement time?

Best
SJC

Many people have learned the hard way that the Chase Travel Portal is a total rip-off. You may earn extra CUR points for booking through the portal, but these come at a cost. 1) You do not earn loyalty points for hotels and rent cars booked through Chase. 2) The prices for hotels and rent cars are consistently higher than booking directly with the hotel or rental company. 3) You do not receive discounted pricing for being members of AAA, AARP, or any other organization. 4) I bought an international ticket from Chase. We had to cancel due to an ebola outbreak in Uganda. Even though the confirmation indicated that the ticket was refundable, Chase would only give me a travel credit. But it gets worse. The credit was only good for 6 months, and I must use the entire amount on one booking, with no residual value. Since we were not planning any international travel in the next few months, it would be very difficult to spend $1,300 on a single domestic flight. Had we booked directly with United, we would have received a refund. Even if United did issue a credit, it would be good for at least a year, and it could be used to make multiple bookings. Also, Chase would not allow me to use the travel credit on their website. When we decided to try again for Uganda, I had to deal with a call center in India, where they kept passing me to different people with varying levels of English proficiency. When we finally got around to selecting flights, they told me that the flights I wanted were not available. I was literally on their website viewing flights, and they were clearly available. From viewing the United site, I could even verify that these flights are nearly empty! I will never again use Chase travel for cash bookings. Even when using CUR points, you are much better off transferring the points to an airline and dealing directly with the airline. On international travel, I can routinely score yields of 3-4 cents per point, which is much better than the 1.25 cents offered by Chase with the Sapphire Preferred card.

Are you not concerned that the Prestige does not offer any travel insurance?

I had to cancel my united flights booked with chasetravel yesterday and i called up 10 different numbers but finally a person answered on 888 . 429 . 41 05 who cancelled within 5 minutes and i got my credit back today . I am super happy with chase travel portal and chase travel customer service .

James