Category: Credit Cards

  1. Most of the Chase United cards have increased sign-up bonuses, (some include 10,000 miles extra as long as you add an authorized user card within three months):

    – Explorer: 70,000+10,000 MileagePlus miles after $3,000 spend in three months
    – Quest: 90,000+10,000 MileagePlus miles after $4,000 spend in three months
    – Club: 100,000+10,000 MileagePlus miles after $5,000 spend in three months
    – Business: 100,000+10,000 MileagePlus miles after $5,000 spend in three months
    – Club Business: 100,000+10,000 MileagePlus miles after $5,000 spend in three months

    These are generally available via referrals, so please use a referral link.
  2. US Bank reportedly has a $1,500 business bank account bonus with promo code Q2BUS26, though I couldn’t independently verify it. To qualify:

    – Deposit $25,000 within 30 days
    – Maintain at least $25,000 balance between days 30 and 60
    – Make at least six transactions by day 60 (Six $1 ACHs do nicely)

    If you manage your money perfectly, this is effectively a 72% annualized APR, which is almost 72% more than what Chase business checking will give you. Even if you’re not in US Bank’s footprint you can still do this, just open a different relationship with US Bank first. T&C here.
  3. Alaska companion certificate sharing has tightened for the second time since the Hawaiian merger; now they can only be used when fares are paid for specifically with an Atmos Ascent card.

    I for one am impressed that Alaska’s IT is able to discern. (Thanks to best-qualify-catfood)
  4. Staples stores have fee-free $200 Visa gift cards through Saturday, limit nine per transaction.

    These are Pathward / BlackHawk Network gift cards.

Happy Monday!

Alaska IT’s typeface for the new lounge drink lineup.

  1. Do this now: Check for your targeted United MileagePlay offer. Mine was book and fly a $100+ trip through June 9 and earn 3,000 bonus miles.
  2. Bank of America has credit cards available via the Rakuten shopping portal:

    – Travel Rewards: $150 from Rakuten plus 25,000 points after $1,000 spend in 90 days
    – Customized Cash: $75 from Rakuten plus $200 after $1,000 spend in 90 days

    The business versions of the cards have higher offers than the portal and sign-up bonus put together, so keep your enthusiasm appropriately calibrated. (Thanks to DoC)
  3. JetBlue raised bag fees a couple of days ago. I didn’t mention it because I was sure the list would grow within the week, and indeed it’s happened. So now we’re at:

    – JetBlue increasing checked bag fees
    – United increased checked bag fees

    AA, Alaska, and Delta are sure to come in the next week, but they’ll stagger it for optics. Who says there’s collusion in the industry? This is just about fuel, duh.
  4. The AmaZing Business Visa card has an increased $1,000 sign-up bonus or 100,000 point sign-up bonus depending on the version, but is only available in some states:

    – Arizona
    – California
    – Colorado and New Mexico
    – Nevada
    – Texas
    – Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho

    Underwriting is a manual process, and there isn’t actually a difference between the points card or cash back card other than the extra step to redeem your points for cash back.
  5. Chase Offers has a targeted offer for $100 off of $600+ in travel booked through the end of June, and this offer stacks with Sapphire Reserve $250 Edit hotel credits too.
  6. PayPal offers has a targeted offer for 5% back at GiftCards.com, up to $20 back.
  7. Raley’s, Nob Hill, and Bel Air stars have 15x points on Apple gift cards, some of which convert to Home Depot, through Tuesday.

Have a nice weekend friends!

Recommended enthusiasm base-line calibration setting.

  1. Chase has a new transfer bonuses for the end of April:

    – 20% to Air Canada Aeroplan, making the ratio 1:1.2
    – 70% to IHG, making the ratio 1:1.7

    One of these is a good deal, which one is left as an exercise to the reader.
  2. Capital One has a 30% transfer bonus to Japan Airlines MileageBank through the end of April, which makes the transfer ratio 1:0.975
  3. The Bank of America Alaska Atmos cards have new offers different than the new offers from a few days ago:

    – Summit: 100,000 miles and a 50% flight discount after $6,500 spend in 90 days
    – Ascent: 80,000 miles and a 50% flight discount after $4,000 spend in 120 days
    – Business: 85,000 miles after $5,500 spend in 90 days

    The 50% discount has to be flown between September 8 and November 18 with lots of other asterisks, so cool I guess. (Thanks to Jerry)
  4. Mixed data-points are coming in about Lululemon physical stores implementing new gift card rules to presumably combat American Express Platinum exact value cashouts. The rules:

    – Gift card face values must be in multiples of $50
    – One credit card per gift card purchase
    – One gift card per customer per day

    These aren’t implemented at the register level though, so your success level may be tied to your rizz level. Data points specifying rizz are needed to confirm.
  5. March’s Chase Air India offer for 10% back on $100-$500 in spend has a new, April version. The March warning still applies: The best game for this one is to not fly Air India under any circumstances, ever, which should make your game clear.
  6. Chase Pay Yourself Back has several changes for Q2:

    – Personal: grocery stores, pet stores, veterinaries, annual fee, and select charities
    – Business: select charities

    Businesses don’t need cash-back I guess?
  7. If you like glamping and have a Chase Hyatt card, register for Hyatt’s promotion for 20 points per dollar at Under Canvas and ULUM locations for stays between June 1 and September 8.
  8. American Express is ending two relationships:

    – The Amazon Business card portfolio is moving to US Bank in August
    – They’re ending transfer to Etihad Guest at the end of June

    Reportedly American Express dumped both with the cliche, “It’s not you, it’s me”, because creativity is hard.
  9. AirFrance / KLM FlyingBlue has released its April promo rewards for discounted award travel. US cities include: New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Miami, Detroit, Boston, Atlanta, San Diego, Austin, Orlando, and San Francisco.

    I didn’t see any promo award business class availability in the two cities I checked which is worse than normal.

Happy Thursday!

Fun fact: Thanks to the Lego+Lulu partnership, your $75 can be cashed out for two bricks instead.

  1. The Venmo app has a targeted offer for unlimited triple rewards for the first six months, which means 9% cash back on your top category. A couple of notes:

    – Synchrony will axe you if you cycle this thing, though it may take a few months
    – Categories on this card are weird, but typically weird good not weird bad
    – The targeted offer isn’t at Venmo.com

    Your Venmo account will survive if your card is axed. Oh, and at the risk of taking more flak, the sites that “always show you the best offer” don’t seem to be showing this offer… yet?
  2. The Bank of America personal Alaska Atmos cards have increased sign-up bonuses:

    – Ascent: 85,000 miles after $4,500 spend in 120 days.
    – Summit: 100,000 miles after $6,000 spend in 90 days

    Why no business? I’m not sure, wait for April 1 I guess.
  3. American Express’s Platinum card is removing its semi-annual Saks $50 credit starting on July 1. I don’t know about you, I’m quite happy about this devaluation.
  4. BetMGM credit card junkies should queue up to play the whah-whah trombone, since they won’t be accepting new credit cards in the near future, starting *checks notes* err yesterday, though Apple Pay will continue to be a hole for now. (Thanks to David)

Next time: Analyzing whether the peanut butter omelette is weird good or weird bad.

  1. Do this now: Register for National’s Spring promotion for a free rental day with every two rentals between April 6 and June 7. Promotional free days must be used by the end of the year.
  2. Staples stores have fee-free $200 Mastercard gift cards through Saturday, limit nine per transaction.

    These are Pathward / BlackHawk Network gift cards.
  3. There are multiple reports that Cardless now allows holding three cards. You can’t get the Celtics card anymore, so just make sure you dial back that enthusiasm by 8x, or is it 6x?

Happy Monday!

DIY short and sweet.

I’ve split today’s post up into (1) interesting items, and (2) other, I guess?

  1. Kroger stores have 4x fuel points on third party gift cards other than Amazon and flexible fuel cards, and on fixed value Visa and Mastercard gift cards. Both promotions are running through Tuesday, April 7.

    For reasons no one has been able to discern, fuel points are worth quite a bit more than normal right now.
  2. The American Express Graphite charge card has been released, and American Express’s random number generator for the sign-up bonus is in full swing:

    – $1,500 (or $2,000) sign-up bonus after $50,000 spend in six months
    – $295 annual fee
    – 2% cash back everywhere, (except 5% on AmEx Travel flights and hotels)
    – Cash back is not convertible to Membership Rewards

    If you don’t see the heightened bonus, try VPNs, incognito browsers, mobile, letting the application timeout and reload, or summoning SideShowBob233. This card replaces the infamous Plum card, also a charge card.
  3. Two Incomm gift card sites have fee-free gift cards:

    – VanillaGift.com: No purchase fees on Visas with code VGEASTER26
    – MasterCardGiftCard.com: No purchase fees on Mastercards with code EASTER26

    Clearly this is because of the lack of oil flow through the Strait of Hormuz.
  4. Delta has an award sale to its Asian destinations, but especially Taiwan and Hong Kong, running through today. Economy flights are 30,000-50,000 miles round trip, and in theory there are sale Delta One fares but they’re not exactly widely available so I wasn’t able to verify pricing.

And:

  1. American Express Business Gold and Business Platinum cards will soon have an annual $300 ChatGPT credit. Before you get excited, they’re likely for the two user $600 annual ChatGPT business plan.
  2. Cathay Pacific is devaluing long-haul business class redemptions by 3%-5%.
  3. JetBlue is reportedly shopping around for buyers, despite assuring everyone they weren’t last week. Since United CEO Scott Kirby said just last week that United wasn’t interested in buying JetBlue at all, there’s a good chance that United is currently in advanced discussions with JetBlue (or maybe I’m just cynical about Kirby).
  4. Bilt added Wyndham as a 1:1 transfer partner. In a sea of bad ideas in travel hacking, transferring more than a de minimus number of Bilt points to Wyndham is a shark sized bad-idea.

Happy Thursday friends!

More shark-sized bad ideas.

Alexander Graham Bell apparently invented the phrase “When one door closes another door opens…” which I assume is the only reason anyone’s heard of him.

Well, yesterday a big churning door closed which rendered some back buttons useless, and I’m not sure another door opened despite Mr. Bell’s admonitions to the contrary. You’re not out of luck though, the hallway has multiple doors, so maybe just take a few other probing steps and see what other doors lurk in the hallway.

General cryptic MEAB disclaimer: If you have no idea what I’m talking about, don’t stress, it likely doesn’t affect you.

Happy Thursday!

Next time: Reciting the floosie’s business plans.

  1. The Synchrony Virgin Red Mastercard has an offer for an increased sign-up bonus of 75,000 Virgin points and a $100 statement credit during a ticket booking flow. You don’t have to checkout to see the offer.

    Virgin Red points are ok, but the Synchrony card is more than just Virgin Red points. (Thanks to DDG)
  2. Meijer stores have 7,500 mPerks points with the purchase of $100+ in Visa gift cards through Tuesday, limit one per account. Obviously scale with multiple accounts.
  3. The Chase Sapphire Reserve Business’s travel portal has implemented price matching for hotel rooms including Edit properties. The terms require that you submit a claim within 24 hours of booking and the stay must be more than a day away, oh and that the price difference has to be at least $5.

    Chase Points Boost is a mixed bag at best, but the mix just got better. On the other hand, Edit hotels haven’t been so fortunate.
  4. The Kudos Shopping Portal quietly added a $2.99 fee to cash out your rewards via PayPal. Don’t worry, they’ll waive the fee if you pay them $12 per month though 🙄.
  5. PayPal Offers has 1% back at Giftcards.com on up to $2,000 spend when paying with PayPal through March 31. This stacks with other portal bonuses, however science has yet to discover exactly what Giftcards.com sells.

I guess it’s time for us to go do Wednesday now.

Next up: Learn how to price match garlic bread for savings of $0.01, and that’s per loaf.