Tuesday Quick-Hits

1. Meijer surprises with another 10% back on gift-cards as $5 in rewards for each $50 in gift card purchases, but it’s not like last week’s book-a-last-minute-ticket-to-the-Midwest sort of deal because: it’s not a straight cash discount, you’ll need to buy groceries to redeem, and the rewards expire. What you should know about this one:

• You get the discount back as Meijer rewards to buy groceries
• You can buy a single $500 gift card to max out the deal on an account
• Some gift cards are excluded, but BestBuy isn’t one of them
• You can (and should) have multiple Meijer accounts
• The deal runs through December 11

2. Office Depot / OfficeMax doesn’t surprise with its $15 back on $300 or more in Visa gift cards deal. As with other iterations:

• Link your credit card to Dosh for an extra $10 back per transaction — I use a new Dosh account for each Chase Ink card that I have
• Try and get multiple transactions in a single trip
• Buy the “everywhere” variety of cards for lower fees if you have a liquidation channel

(Thanks to DoC)

3. Arizona friends: How does a credit card with no-annual fee and $2,000 back as a sign-up bonus sound? Zions bank has got it. The catch? You have to spend $50,000 within six months to earn it. Did I look into registering a business in Arizona to take advantage of this? You better believe it. Why do I keep asking questions? No idea.

4. The Point debit card has changed their referral sign-up bonus: Under the new structure you get the annual-fee back after spending $200, which isn’t as high as the bonus was in the early summer, but it’s a lower spending threshold then I’ve ever seen. This card is effectively a 2% cash back debit card through the end of the year (once you get the Visa version in the mail) and it’s easy to game. They also occasionally have boosted earnings at selected retailers.

Under the new program, the referrer gets to a code for a free-suitcase after five referrals, which is possibly the lamest bonus for the referrer that I’ve ever seen. My normal position is that you should use a friend’s referral link rather than one from some rando on the internet, but because your friend isn’t likely to earn a suitcase, the public sign-up offer is lower, and because I don’t want a suitcase, I’m willing to post my referral here in case you want to sign-up: Point debit card $99 back after spending $200.