Category: Bank Bonuses

Today we’re going off the beaten path:

  1. I haven’t written about the Albert debit card prior to today because I genuinely didn’t think that it was going to work out for anyone involved, but it turns out that my spidey-sense was wrong on this one. There are now multiple reports of $500 referral bonuses being paid to both the referrer and referred, and Miles notes via MEAB slack that Albert has CashApp-like boosts for 10-20% back at major retailers that are paying out too.

    The sign-up bonus is only available by referrals — so if you know someone with a $500 referral than it’s probably worth your time to go for it. The terms for the $500 bonus are three consecutive months with $200 in direct deposits (I scheduled these) and three months of $100 in spend on the debit card too (I scheduled these too with a bill pay service). The best public bonus I know of is currently $150.

  2. Virgin Atlantic has announced that Gold Elite members can book any flight for double the saver level at least 60 days in advance, up to eight segments per year. There’s a very specific traveler that this will work well for: If you’ve got a fixed vacation schedule, for example because you’re a teacher or have kids in school, you can still book relatively low cost awards even during peak travel times when normal award space might be non-existent.

    Fortunately Virgin Atlantic status is easy to get (eventually) with the Bank of America Virgin Atlantic credit card because spending $5,000 per month for 12 months on the card will earn you enough tier points for Gold Elite status. But, spending more than $5,000 per month on a single card doesn’t get you tier points any faster so you’re looking at a year to turn this into reality without flying. If you apply for this card I’d suggest getting a few Alaska Airlines cards and some Business Cash Rewards cards at the same time.

    Bank of America IT is rooted in the 1970s, so my hunch is that if you hold multiple Virgin Atlantic cards you’d be able to get the monthly tier point spend limit on each card, but I have no data points to support or reject that hypothesis. UPDATE: Reader Miles has experience with multiple Virgin Atlantic cards and confirms that two cards will allow earning tier points at twice the rate, and you can stack the companion and upgrade certificate from each card too.

Our journey to find today’s obscure news.

  1. Meijer has $50 off of a future purchase on a $500 third party gift card, limit one per MPerks account (or you can ration this down as $5 for every $50 in gift cards purchased). Noteworthy brand exclusions include Apple and Amazon, but BestBuy, Home Depot, and Nike are all included in the promotion.
  2. Staples has $200 Mastercard gift cards available for no-fee, limit five per transaction through Saturday. These are Metabank gift cards, so have a liquidation plan in place. (Thanks to GC Galore)
  3. The Target $40 online + $40 in-store RedCard sign-up bonus is back. If you’re not sure why this is interesting, see Target RedCard Hacks.

    Current datapoints suggest between 7 and 14 days are required between churning these cards. (Thanks to sb18 via MEAB slack)

  4. Simon.com has 50% off of Visa and Mastercard gift card purchase fees with promo code JUN22HOT50. These are also Metabanks. Side note: if Metabanks were in a race with other gift cards, they’d come in third out of three in their age group.
  5. Reader/maestro Larry often says something like: “Never hold a deposit account at a bank that has credit cards that you care about.” Something innocuous on the deposit account side of the business involving know your customer regulations, loss prevention, or fraud concerns can often lead to eyes on your credit card portfolio, and eyes on your credit card portfolio are rarely a good thing.

    With the above in mind, I’d suggest giving a moment of thought to the following item that everyone seems to be talking about: The new American Express Business checking account that has a relatively measly 20,000 Membership Rewards sign-up bonus after a few hoops and allows Platinum card holders to cash-out Membership Rewards at one cent per point.

    You can probably guess that I don’t think you should go for it. American Express cards are too valuable to risk holding a deposit account with their banking division, and Platinum card holders (and others) can always cash-out at a penny per point even without this checking account.

Metabank gift cards are kind of a big deal, third place (out of three) in the 14-17 year old age division.

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.

Remember to take time to reexamine your assumptions from time-to-time; when you’ve got a different toolkit and different experiences, the same deal can go from looking like a boat anchor to looking like a treasure chest. And with that:

  1. I haven’t written about the Axos Bank sign-up bonus for a new brokerage account before because it the grand scheme of bank and brokerage bonuses there are bigger fish to fry. But, yesterday they increased the sign-up bonus from $100 to $150, and that made me revisit their terms and conditions with fresh eyes. This one is interesting because:

    – It requires only $1,000 to trigger the bonus
    – The bonus timeframe is short at 90 days
    – You can churn the sign-up bonus, you just have to have closed your account 91+ days ago to be eligible for another one
    – The bonus appears regularly, so the likelihood of being able to churn this again is high

    The effective APR on this bonus is annualized to 60%, but that’s only for up $1,000 in cash. #slay I guess. (Thanks to DoC for noting the increased bonus)

  2. OnJuno, a favorite cash-back debit card for some of you, has a free $10 for buying $50 or more in crypto today. Valid only for OnJuno users without a current OnJuno crypto wallet. The bonus will arrive by June 7.

    I bought $50.00 USDC and then sold $50.00 USDC a couple of minutes later; there were no transaction fees.

  3. The last day for a 2:1 transfer of Marriott Bonvoy points to Air Canada Aeroplan miles is today (to get exactly 2:1, you’ll need to transfer in 60,000 point increments). If you need Star Alliance award flights, this is probably a higher value redemption of Bonvoy points than you’ll find at any almost any Marriott property. For once, we’re not #bonvoyed by Bonvoy, but only if we act today. Yes, I do see you looking at me with crazy eyes.

    As always, remember that an unredeemed mile is worth exactly nothing until it’s used.

Fresh eyes and crazy eyes don’t have to be different.

Bank of America helps us wrap up the week with a twosome:

  1. BoA has a $500 sign-up bonus for a new business checking account funded with $20,000 and kept in the account for 90 days, though you can hack it by putting $20,000 there on day 30 and keeping it in place for days 31-90. To be eligible, you can’t have had a Bank of America business checking account within the last year.

    The effective APR on this deal is 10% if your money is held for 90 days, or 15% if you hack the bonus, so still probably worth your time.

  2. BoA also has a nice offer on the AirFrance/KLM FlyingBlue credit card. The current offer is 70,000 FlyingBlue points, a $100 statement credit, and 100 FlyingBlue XP (elite credits) after spending $2,000 in 90 days. There’s a $89 annual fee on the card.

    To see the offer do a dummy points or cash booking, though apparently not everyone can make the offer appear with a cash booking. Besides the miles, this sign-up bonus is useful for getting you half way to FlyingBlue Gold status which lets you book Air France La Premiere award tickets. Even better, open one now and second one in a few months to get the whole way to FlyingBlue Gold. (UPDATE: Vicky via MEAB slack let me know that you technically need 280 XP for Gold because your XP resets upon attaining Silver, and unfortunately the sign-up bonus XP points don’t stack. The anniversary XP bonuses do stack however.)

Have a nice weekend!

Pictured: Three AirFrance/KLM FlyingBlue elites
  1. The undisputed and strangest goat of the Miles Earn and Burn Unsung Heroes, the Citi Shop Your Way Rewards card, has a higher sign-up bonus than I’ve ever seen at $225 back after $1,500 in spend. A few notes:

    – You can hold multiple Citi SYWR Mastercards
    – The approval rules for this Citi card are different than other Citi cards
    – The normal Citi limits don’t apply (8/65, 24 month rule, etc)

    I’m likely going to delay dropping below 5/24 by a few more months to get another one of these cards. (Maybe I shouldn’t even be trying to get below 5/24, but here we are.)

  2. CashApp has a 10% back boost for online purchases at Sam’s Club on up to $200 per day for today and tomorrow, and currently Sam’s club is 2x or 3x via the Rakuten portal. This is a good way to get discount Visas, Mastercards, or Disney gift cards. (Thanks to SideShowBob233 for the pointer)
  3. Chase has a $750 sign-up bonus for new business checking account customers after depositing $20,000 for 60 days and making 5 transactions (like 5 Amazon loads of $0.50 each with my business debit card). EDIT: Thanks to RabbMD for correcting the number of transactions required. More notes:

    – You can’t have received a new business checking account bonus from Chase in the last 24 months
    – The business can’t have had a Chase checking account in the last 90 days
    – The account needs to be open for six months (but the $20,000 need only be there for 60 days)

    The effective APR for this offer is 22.5%, so probably worth your time. (Thanks to DoC)

The Citi Shop Your Way Rewards Mastercard if it were a playground.

This blog has a strict focus on travel hacking, churning, and manufactured spend. I’m going to occasionally write about another topic too and today is the test run. Any feedback you have is always appreciated!

  1. Wells Fargo has a $1,500 bonus for opening a new Business Checking Account in-person and parking $5,000 in the account for 60 days. To open:

    – Generate an offer code at this link
    – Print out the emailed offer
    – Make an appointment at this link to open your account
    – Show up to your appointment and make small talk for 30 minutes while the banker fumbles around with the computer

    This will also work with a sole proprietorship using your own social security number in case you don’t already have a business ready to go. (Thanks to Nathan via slack)

  2. Meijer is running a sale for $10 back on $150 or more in Mastercard gift cards through April 16 after clipping the digital offer. There’s a limit of one per account, but that shouldn’t stop you. You have another email address or two right?
  3. Many of you know that I’m a big time avgeek, a private pilot, and that I miss United’s Channel 9 sorely. So it’s easy to understand why my interest was piqued yesterday while flying home on a short final for landing at our destination with an altitude of about 100 feet off the ground when the engines spooled up with a takeoff roar. We started a climb and a banked into a turn rather abruptly.

    After about a minute the captain announced that there was a loss of separation and that air traffic control had told us to go-around. It’s not the first time this happened to me and I had exactly zero stress or anxiety about it, but I did want to channel the old Russian proverb: “trust but verify“. So, I tuned into one of my favorite websites using the inflight internet, Live ATC, and listened to the rest of the uneventful approach and landing. After landing I listened to the archive and indeed our aircraft was told to go-around (now it’s trusted and verified I guess).

    What’s the point of all this? Live ATC is a great resource to figure out what’s really going on with your flight, and it’s fun as an avgeek destination too.

Have a nice Tuesday.

The passenger next to me on yesterday’s flight, probably.

We’ve got a grab-bag for today:

  1. The Bilt credit card is now wide-open for applications, and based on coverage in the space it’s likely paying a big affiliate commission for new applications too. My affiliate relationship-less opinion:

    – Hyatt, AA, and FlyingBlue are great travel partners
    – It’s easy to earn 50,000 points by paying P2 $50,000 per year in rent via a check
    – No annual fee
    – 3x on dining is easy to game
    – The lack of sign-up bonus is lame (I’d expect to get at least $750 out of a sign-up bonus typically)

    If I weren’t shooting to be under 5/24 I’d have gotten this card a long time ago, and I’d expect that I’d already be shutdown too. That said the jury is still out on how quickly Bilt will bring down the axe.

  2. American Express has targeted more accounts for:

    – 20,000 or 30,000 Membership Rewards for enrolling in Pay-over-Time (thanks to sctrader)
    – 90,000 Membership Rewards for a no-lifetime language (NLL) Business Gold card, check for a pop up on your dashboard for other accounts

    (Thanks to sctrader and churnandburn58 for the first reports of each, respectively)

  3. Citi’s banking division is emulating Will Smith by slapping the credit card division in the face after being told it wasn’t good enough: They’ve got retention offers for checking accounts through their automated chat system for between $50 and $200 based on your account type. To enroll:

    – Log into your bank account at citi.com
    – Click “How can we help?”
    – Type “close account”
    – Choose “Checking” in the dialog and hit next

    The bonus comes as a statement credit after you make a purchase with your debit card of at least the offer amount.

Citi’s banking division is sick of playing second fiddle to the credit card division.