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Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

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Re: Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

#111

Post by khafra »

Beijinger wrote: post #88
misterbwong wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edit: not sure if your comment was meant for me or timqin. Leaving it up just for general awareness General tips: - Never carry a balance, ever. If you do, forget about playing this game because it'll cost you more than you gain. Pay off your CC debt first. - There are many blogs/sites that push "their" link over ones that pay more to the user because they get paid a hefty affiliate fee. Be wary. - Have a goal in min…

Thanks, great info. I never accrued points wiht my CC. Is it really worth it compared to 1-2% cash back? I just collected by flying. You have to ask yourself: What do I want to achieve? 1. Fly free with points 2. Have gold status and access to the lounge, more luggage, faster check-in 1 is hard. It basically makes only sense if you really fly a lot and your company pays for it. 2 is easier, IF you chose the right air…

Flying free is a high aspiration; are there easier goals in that direction? Like substantially discounted flights, or business class flights for the price of economy?

Re: Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

#112

Post by Beijinger »

khafra wrote: post #111
Beijinger wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, great info. I never accrued points wiht my CC. Is it really worth it compared to 1-2% cash back? I just collected by flying. You have to ask yourself: What do I want to achieve? 1. Fly free with points 2. Have gold status and access to the lounge, more luggage, faster check-in 1 is hard. It basically makes only sense if you really fly a lot and your company pays for it. 2 is easier, IF you chose the right air…

Flying free is a high aspiration; are there easier goals in that direction? Like substantially discounted flights, or business class flights for the price of economy?

Check out flyertalk. This can't be answered here.

There are airlines where you could fly for free, including paying ticket taxes with points (e.g. Aeroflot), there are airlines that are okay, for example Turkish. I once flew extremely cheap with TK from Europe to Colombia. This being said, the ticket prices change tremendously if you switch to "buy with points" at TK. Terrible experience with points: Lufthansa. Lufthansa is also pretty good with "this flight earned you 0 points.

You really have to do your research. If you have a lot of international business class flights paid by your employer, it becomes easier.

You have to sort everything out. What do you want to achieve? How? Where do you earn points? Remember, even if you fly most with airline X, it may, depending on your situation, makes sense to collect points with airline Y, as long as they are in the same alliance.

Aeroflot was great. Since they are kind of closed now, I collect SkyTeam with Delta, but I am not sure if this is the best option. But Delta is a really good airline.

This as a last bonus to get you rolling: https://statusmatcher.com/

Got Latam and TK Gold via status match (and then flew a lot of cause)

Re: Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

#116

Post by dc_rog »

This is not shade because I like this space, but how did you decide YC/venture path was right for Roame? I see many bootstrapped builders in travel (or have a lower margin business around content/affiliate revenue) and would love to know why you chose to raise venture capital or if you could share your thoughts around this topic.

Re: Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

#118

Post by timqin »

khafra wrote: post #111
Beijinger wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, great info. I never accrued points wiht my CC. Is it really worth it compared to 1-2% cash back? I just collected by flying. You have to ask yourself: What do I want to achieve? 1. Fly free with points 2. Have gold status and access to the lounge, more luggage, faster check-in 1 is hard. It basically makes only sense if you really fly a lot and your company pays for it. 2 is easier, IF you chose the right air…

Flying free is a high aspiration; are there easier goals in that direction? Like substantially discounted flights, or business class flights for the price of economy?

Definitely possible. There are a lot of mispricings for cash fare flights

Re: Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

#119

Post by timqin »

dc_rog wrote: post #116

This is not shade because I like this space, but how did you decide YC/venture path was right for Roame? I see many bootstrapped builders in travel (or have a lower margin business around content/affiliate revenue) and would love to know why you chose to raise venture capital or if you could share your thoughts around this topic.

None taken! We're focused on speed and providing the best travel product to our users so they can save time/money. Like PG says, only raise money if it will accelerate your growth.

Re: Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

#120

Post by timr »

timqin wrote: post #106
timr wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Airlines, especially US airlines are making billions of dollars a year by selling points to credit card companies. So in theory, they actually want as many people in the world of points as possible because they a consistent high margin revenue from credit card companies. They want to sell as many points as possible, for as much as they can, and redeem them for as little as they can. (And in the middle, they want yo…

Yes, but it's a push and pull. Short term vs. long-term. If you devalue your points too much and make them too hard to redeem, then consumers won't want your miles. Also, if airlines get too greedy with their points/miles, US government will step in to try and regulate and airlines certainly do not want that. ( https://thepointsguy.com/news/congressional-investigation-ai... )

I grant your point that there's an (intangible) limit to how much airlines can devalue their private currencies before people stop using them and/or they get regulated out of existence. It's just that this might come a good bit later than you can maintain a reasonable business providing transparency into their ecosystems.

I don't mean to be argumentative; this is a hard question. I only bring it up because you're probably going to hear it from investors. I assume you have an answer that you don't want to say publicly, which I respect.

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