One of the places that Britons have cut back on their expenditures is travel. When budgets are tight, giving up holidays is one way that people cope financially. But, you can use credit cards to earn airline miles and trade them in on plane tickets once you have enough of them.

Here are 3 advantages of airmile credit cards:

1. Maxing out the airmiles by choosing a card for a specific airline.

Airline sponsored credit cards let you focus your accumulation of miles on one carrier. If the airline has a hub in your city, this type of card may be a good choice. Airline-specific cards give you the most control over the routes and destinations.

2. Flexibility should you choose to use “points” in other ways.

If you choose a bank-sponsored card, rather than an airline specific card, you can accumulate points toward plane tickets and you will have the flexibility of choosing an airline. In many cases, the minimum mileage required to earn plane tickets is lower.

3. Other perks are available too.

Sometimes airmiles cards come with competitive interest rates and some come with 0% balance transfer offers. Sometimes you can use store-branded cards, like Tesco’s, to rapidly accumulate points (which can be traded for airmiles) by shopping in their stores.

There are plenty of credit cards offering airmiles, and the fine print differs among them, so be sure to compare credit cards before signing up.