Search Results for: brex

  1. Do this now: Register for Choice’s promotion for triple points on stays through March 31.
  2. Capital One acquired Brex. The action items:

    – Get a Brex account if you qualify and you’re banned by Capital One
    – Finish off those Brex plays, they’re likely short for the world

    Brex likes venture funded technology companies apropos of nothing.
  3. The Chase IHG Premier card has an increased bonus of 175,000 points after $5,000 spend in three months, and an extra 10,000 points and $100 statement credit after $20,000 spend in the first year.

    This card will likely be available via referrals on Monday, so probably wait until then to make a friend’s day or get an even bigger bonus in two-player mode. If you don’t have a churning friend yet, George at TBB makes a good one.
  4. The American Express Marriott Bonvoy Business card has a sign-up bonus of three 50,000 point night certificates after $6,000 spend in six months. The sign-up bonus isn’t great, but American Express cobranded business cards have a special place in a churners wallet because reasons.

    This one is available via referrals, so use one.
  5. Kroger has a 4x fuel points sale on third party gift cards excluding gas cards and Amazon for today only. Sometimes Friday only coupons stack in unexpected ways, always be probing.

Have a nice weekend friends!

Hot tip: Today is a great day to spot a Marcus / Kroger churner in the wild.
(Thanks to Fish for the photo)

No doubt you’ve heard from dozens or hundreds of sources about Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse, and while it looks like all deposits will be available and accessible, we can still learn something here.

First, let’s talk about some of the relevant ripple effects that we’ve seen over the weekend:

Next, we can project a bit about what will happen in our game based on these datapoints:

  • Bank bonuses will become more important from a risk avoidance perspective for high net-worth individuals and businesses in case the next failure doesn’t have assets to cover beyond FDIC limits and the Fed’s new emergency fund doesn’t come through
  • Banks will be more willing to offer bonuses in the short to medium term to win new high net-worth customers
  • Credit card companies sign-up bonuses will probably go down because banks will want to increase their banking bottom line in the short term
  • Big banks will offer more credit card incentives for deposit holders to keep them locked into the ecosystem (like BoA’s Premium Rewards program) – JPMC is a notable exception to this though
  • FinTechs will be less rewarding as competition lags and the need to diversify banking partner risk increases
  • Businesses and characters that need loans to continue may find themselves in a rough spot because long term financing prospects look hard and expensive

Blah, blah, blah, how about something immediately actionable poindexter MEAB? Fine, let’s get back to basics: Office Depot/OfficeMax has $15 back on $300 or more in Mastercard gift cards through Saturday. These are Metabank Pathward gift cards, so as always, have a liquidation plan in place (unlike Silicon Valley Bank, amirite?)

An excerpt from the Silicon Valley Bank rate hedging playbook.

Introduction

In what has become an annual MEAB tradition for three years in a row (and trust me, if I do something three years in a row it’s a Ron Burgundy style “kind of a big deal”), it’s time for another installment of Travel Hacking as Told by GIFs, but without Ron Burgundy.

Previous versions:

As a certain prolific human wrecking ball and worlds fastest beta tester likes to tell me, LFG!

The GIFs

Getting ready for the MEAB 2022 Travel Hacking as told by GIFs post.

We started the year with most American Express business cards offering bonuses of up to $200 per card or 20,000 Membership Rewards per card, up to 99 times. Yes, it was a huge bonus, but we had to prepare for a bunch of small talk and impatiently waiting while a phone rep adds 99 variations of your name to your account.

Pictured: 99 AU cards with your name on them (go ahead and count, I’ll wait).

Mastercardgiftcard.com turned out to be a great way to hit minimum spend American Express cards for a chunk of the year, at least until they started charging cash advances, illustrated here.

The silent response when MEAB geeked out with the Monty Hall problem applied to flights.

Chase drops the bonus for pay yourself back categories from 50% to 25% on the Chase Sapphire Reserve (probably) due to massive abuse and gaming.

After Southwest’s epic meltdown, we get to see their operations staff working on their computer crew optimizer in real time.

Plastiq announces that they’re going public via the Colonnade SPAC, and then produces a commercial outlining their 2023 business plans.

When a manufactured spender successfully executes an AmEx triple dip.

American Express tries to convince us that this year’s Q4 referral bonus with +4x on travel and transit spend isn’t lame. We still remember the better 2021 4-for-us and best 2020 3-for-all variants of the offer.

Delta and Starbucks partner up, and mainstream bloggers see yet another 10 page puff piece in their future.

Capital One sees American Express with all the giant 250,000 point sign-up bonuses and decides it’s time to play ball. Then, American Express responds.

Nearside’s 2.2% cashback everywhere debit card announces by email that it’s shutting down.

A few hours later, Nearside emails everyone and says “J/K, J/K, we’re fine”

Then the next day, Nearside announces that no, it’s actually dying.

Kroger’s inner crazy-monologue sends itself a message about wiping out fuel points accounts, and then does it.

We watch as the Unsung Hero Synchrony Rakuten card slowly dies.

Brex decides that it’s going to focus on only large businesses and leaves everyone else high and dry.

Marriotts in Japan welcome their most loyal guests when tourism reopened in October.

Delta announces that they’re getting rid of the CRJ-200s from their fleet, and provides video of the final torture-tube flight.

Travel hackers look for Lubbock on the world map for some reason.

Kroger starts replacing US Bank gift cards with Metabank gift cards.

Southwest’s reservation system stops taking calls due to random equipment failures.

Trying to place orders at Dell looks great, until your order is cancelled after it’s confirmed.

We react to PayPal key going away.

J and F flyers realize what’s going to happen to award space now that Emirates awards can be booked with Air Canada Aeroplan miles.

MEAB prepares for the 2022 Travel Hacking as told by GIFs early in the year to make it easy later, and then face-plants via procrastination as the year moves on.

Thanks for reading friends! Just like Tanya in the White Lotus Season 2, I’m sure only good things are to come at MEAB!

Introduction

Fortunately for everyone here, the MEAB staff worked, uh, let’s just say “tirelessly” over the holiday weekend to count ballots and choose the rightful winner for the first and possibly only annual MEAB Bonvoyed awards. These prestigious awards recognize recent ground-breaking accomplishments in anti-consumer policies in 2022 in all aspects of loyalty and travel, and while only the most insidious contenders were selected, rest assured there are legion runners-up in each category that we’d like to recognize, but we’re simply unable due to space-time continuum constraints (our flux capacitor is spitting out black smoke at 86+ mph).

Note: if you represent one of the following loyalty programs and would like a commemorative plaque for public display, please contact MEAB at your earliest convenience. 

The Awards

Now let’s get to this years winners, the companies that best turned the industry’s “surprise and delight” into “surprise and despise”:

  • In the “Bonvoyed Holiday Recovery” category:

    Southwest Airlines, noted for its distinguished role in the Elliott meltdown for shutting down its phone lines and online chat support after canceling over a third of its flights. Why did they do this? Because who wants to answer all those angry calls anyway? 🎉

  • In the “Bonvoyed Elite Benefit, Foods and Beverages” category:

    Hilton, for upping its elite US food and beverage credit by $3 and raising the price of food and beverages by even more than that to make sure you’re still not getting as much as you used to.🎉

  • In the “Bonvoyed Service, Prisons and Jails” category:

    Hertz for wrongly filing stolen car police reports that lead to dozens of arrested customers, even though the cars were actually in Hertz’s care, or had already been re-rented out to the next victim customer. 🎉

  • In the “Bonvoyed Forum” category:

    Flyertalk for making the site unusable on mobile devices thanks to 80% of the screen being obscured by ads, random scrolling events that are timed for exactly when you’re reading a key sentence, and for serving malware through its content delivery partners for multiple years — a proven track record dating back to at least 2012. 🎉

  • In the “Bonvoyed Program, Marriott Bonvoy” category:

    Marriott Bonvoy for devaluing their currency, removing their award chart, announcing they’re going to again devalue their currency next year, silently devaluing their currency again, and so much more. 🎉

  • In the “Bonvoyed Bank, non-FTX” category:

    Brex for wooing customers to help grow its business, raise it’s valuation, and to help it take on another round of funding… and then casting those pesky customers aside after deciding they’re just getting in the way of fleecing larger VC backed firms. 🎉

Fin

I’d like to thank our non-sponsor, Marriott’s Bonvoy, for not being involved in anything I do for everyone’s betterment. Our other non-sponsor, the defunct Nearside Business debit card couldn’t be reached for unknown reasons. 

Happy Monday friends!

The prestigious MEAB 2022 Bonvoyed Award trophy: a deflated gold balloon representing diminished expectations on top of an unpolished rock representing an unpolished rock.

  1. Oxygen is offering $100 and an iPad to new business accounts for companies shutdown by Brex, but reports are that you should open a support case and forward your shutdown email immediately after approval to ensure you get the bonus. The requirements:

    – Deposit $10,000 within 30 days
    – Make 5 debit card transactions within 60 days
    – Have no prior Oxygen business account
    – Open a support case (MEAB’s requirement)

    You’ll likely have to apply by mobile app too, but do your best to follow the promo link to get to the mobile app. Also, watch out for some terrible grammar when applying before it hits you in the face. (Thanks to SideShowBob233, and thanks to Nuhertz for noting a typo in the bonus)

  2. Two new links for American Express Business Gold cards have surfaced, and in classic AmEx style the bonuses show differently based on: your browser, whether or not you’re incognito, the IP address you’re coming from, the quantity of protein in your lunch, and your operating system. So, vary those up if you’re not seeing the expected bonus:

    – 130,000 Membership Rewards after $20,000 spend in three months
    – 110,000 Membership Rewards after $10,000 spend in three months

    Note that both have lifetime language, but that doesn’t matter. Unlike the recent 250,000 Membership Rewards Business Platinum link that’s been floating around, these aren’t post-targeted links and thus should be completely safe. (Thanks to DoC)

  3. JetBlue has $25 off of one-way non-stop trips and $50 off of round-trips booked by this evening with promo code FALLSALE, but Mint and transatlantic fares are excluded.
  4. There are a few August transfer bonuses:

    – CapitalOne 20% transfer bonus to FlyingBlue
    – CapitalOne 20% transfer bonus to British Airways Avios
    – American Express 20% transfer bonus to Cathay Pacific Asia Miles

I’m not the grammar police, but this sign (also designed by Oxygen) doesn’t mean what they think it means.

  1. Norse Atlantic Airlines has launched new US flights with ~$250 economy roundtrip fares from the US to Oslo, Norway on multiple dates this fall. They currently operate out of FLL, MCO, JFK, and LAX. Obviously this is an amazing deal if you live in or near one of those airports.
  2. A new no-lifetime-language (NLL) link for the no-annual fee American Express Blue Business Cash card with a $750 sign-up bonus after $15,000 in spend within 12 months has surfaced.

    This card also still has a phone in offers for up to 99 employee cards with 5,000 bonus Membership Rewards after $2,000 in spend per card. (Thanks to jackal3000)

  3. Brex has a 25% transfer bonus to Avianca Lifemiles through July 31, which is well timed with the impending shutdown of many Brex accounts on August 15. Best uses of Lifemiles:

    – Award chart anomalies, like JFK-Lisbon in business class for 35,000 miles or JFK-Zurich in coach for 16,500 miles (you can find these in other major North American cities too)
    – Flying to or from Europe in business class and tacking a coach leg onto the end to lower the price
    – Economy flights to or from the Caribbean for 12,500 miles each way
    – Short haul domestic US economy for 7,500 miles each way

  4. The crypto bank Voyager has declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The discharge of debts will probably mean that crypto holdings are locked up for months or years and will be treated like other corporate assets, meaning holders will likely get only a small percentage of their original crypto holdings on the other end. US Dollar holdings at Voyager will likely be returned in full.

    I’d consider this a canary for other weird crypto fintechs and act accordingly, especially given that a recession is imminent or present.

Pictured: Voyager crypto bank’s vault.

Introduction

Brex, a purveyor of business bank accounts, has been a great rewards making machine for both sign-up bonuses and for certain types of manufactured spend; it’s also uniquely suited for churning companies in low-fee incorporation states in order to scale sign-up bonuses, like the current 75,000 points after spending $1,000 (sponsored by TravelBank) bonus. I know many found use with Brex accounts for making your own “direct deposits”, and for fee-free wires too.

Unfortunately, last week a wave of shutdowns came. According to the founder, Brex closed all company accounts for companies that hadn’t received an investment (VC, Angel, crypto, etc.). Based on my data points, they closed:

  • All sole proprietorships
  • All single member LLCs

I haven’t yet heard of a closure for a multi-member LLC, whether or not the company has received an investment, or for an S-corporation or C-corporation. I know first hand of an LLC that definitely never received an investment and didn’t get the axe too. It was also multi-member, which further leads me to believe that business structure is the current criteria for shutdowns. (UPDATE: Data-points have started to roll-in for non-single member LLCs too, but the ratio of single member LLC shutdowns to non is about 10:1. So far, all non-single member LLC shutdowns used the original OMAT 100,000 link, not a later link, so it’s looking like that may be another criteria)

The shutdowns and new policies give us two options to make lemonade with Brex’s lemons:

What to do with Closed Accounts

Relay financial will offer you a $150 sign-up bonus with a $1 or more deposit into a new account, provided you forward your Brex cancelation email [email protected] after opening a new account. I’m going to do this for each business I have that that was impacted.

How to Move Forward with Brex After a Shutdown

So far it seems like a multi-member LLC is going to be eligible for a Brex account, especially if it looks like the company has received an investment. I don’t currently believe Brex is validating investments directly, but in case that changes I’d make sure your company is listed on Crunchbase before opening your new Brex accounts.

Good luck friends!

I was today years old when I learned that charcoal lemonade was a thing, and that people choose to make it. First, gross. Second, maybe offer a glass to Brex when you sign up for your next account to let them know how you care.

  1. You’ve probably heard that Chase Pay Yourself Back (PYB) has been extended through June 30. What you probably haven’t heard, or at least it’s received less attention:

    – Office Supply stores have been added to Ink Cash and Ink Preferred for PYB
    – AirBNB bookings have a limit of three cancelations per year which limits PYB, but all you need for a new AirBNB account is a new email address so there’s that

  2. Bank of America is sending targeted elite qualifying miles offers to Alaska Airlines personal and business cardholders. (I didn’t get one despite holding six Alaska cards). The offer is for 1,000 elite qualifying miles for $5,000 in spend. You can find Alaska tiers and benefits here, and without earning another elite mile in any way, you can reach:

    – MVP with $100,000 in spend
    – MVP Gold with $200,000 in spend
    – MVP Gold 75k with $375,000 in spend
    – MVP Gold 100k with $500,000 in spend

    If you don’t fly Alaska a lot, this probably isn’t worth your time. If you want oneworld status, an AA credit card will get you there with quite a bit less spend and you don’t need to be targeted.

  3. PSA: Brex is closing dormant accounts. I personally use it for 8x on rideshare. I like to churn these accounts too (which requires churning real businesses, which is actually not hard in most states) so if they close one out, I’ll just open another one (or let’s be honest, I’ll probably just open another one anyway).
  4. Friday’s deal for $750 in gift cards for $730.35 and hopefully some extra cash-back or miles through a shopping portal is back at GiftCards.com with new promo codes: SPRINGSALE, SPRINGVISA, and SPRING. The catch? They’re Metabank gift cards so have a liquidation plan.

Happy Monday!

A few simple mods and this churner for making butter turns into a churner for making companies.