Category: Credit Cards

We’ve seen American Express 99 employee card bonus offers for more than a year and a half, and if you’ve taken advantage of a few of these you’ve probably also learned to deal with slow American Express IT systems that weren’t designed for your 600+ card shenanigans. The slow responsiveness seems especially prevalent when asking for a retention offer or to close a card.

But, what if there were a magical phone number that let you skip American Express’s phone tree, enter your card number directly, and then you’d be sent immediately to the retention department with your card information pushed to the rep’s computer? And what if the rep had minty fresh breath?Then you’d be living on Earth in 2023, because there is just that type of number:

866-376-4552

What’s the provenance of this number, you ask? An American Express chat rep gave it to me while his system was hung trying to load a particular card to look for retention offers. He said their systems were faster and better and that seems true based on my experience. I can’t speak to the minty breath though, you’ll just have to take that one on faith.

  1. Meijer stores has a clickable coupon for $10 off of $150 or more in Visa gift cards through Saturday, limit one per MPerks account.

    Meijer stores sell both Metabank Pathward and Sunrise gift cards. I know which one I’d choose for several reasons, but especially out of principle. I’m currently outside of the Meijer footprint though so my choice instead is to stand outside in the cold rain, watching everyone else’s Meijer party inside the warm, comfy house.
  2. There’s a new link for the Barclay AA Aviator card’s 70,000 mile sign-up bonus requiring only a single purchase. For better approval odds, spend a lot on existing Barclays cards and then pay them off. (Thanks to DoC)
  3. There are four new transfer bonuses for July:

    – American Express has a 30% transfer bonus to British Airways Avois through August 31
    – American Express has a 30% transfer bonus to Iberia Avios through August 31
    – Capital One has a 20% transfer bonus to AirFrance/KLM Flying Blue through July 31
    – Chase has a 70% transfer bonus to IHG through July 31
  4. Chase Offers has an easy to game offer for 10% off of Southwest airfare, up to $40 back. The simplest play is to turn this into discount travel funds, but the more lucrative play is to turn this into a statement credit with no effective outstanding charge.
  5. Chase also has targeted offers for spend at gas, grocery, and restaurants on personal credit cards:

    – Hyatt, Southwest, United, Freedom and IHG: 5x up to $1,500 in spend
    – British Airways: 10x up to $1,500 in spend

    Sometimes the Chase website gets confused after a single form submission and incorrectly tells you it can’t find information or you’re not targeted on all subsequent submissions. To avoid that, open a new incognito browser window for each card you check.
  6. The Capital One Shopping portal has a mildly interesting $10 bonus for both the referrer and referred on new shopping portal accounts provided the new account installs the Capital One toolbar and spends $10 through the portal within a month. A few notes:

    – Giftcards.com is on the Capital One Shopping portal
    – Giftcards.com typically has negative cost deals around major holidays
    – In the US, July 4 was a major holiday last time I checked
    – You don’t need to hold a Capital One card to have an account on the portal
    – I recommend creating new Capital One shopping accounts periodically anyway to avoid clawbacks

    Why no, I can’t possibly see how this could go wrong for Capital One, why do you ask?

Pictured: 1. Capital One Shopping portal (road), and 2. manufactured spenders (mud slide)

  1. Do this now: Register for Hyatt promotion for 1,000 bonus points per night up to 10,000 bonus points at Dream Hotels in New York, Nashville, South Beach, and Los Angeles for stays between July 6 and September 15.

    This marks the first time that I’ve ever seen Nashville in the same city lineup as New York, Miami, and Los Angeles. Nice job Nashville marketing team I guesss?
  2. The Citi Shop Your Way Rewards card, now a MEAB Unsung Hero for nearly 2 1/2 years, has a new round of targeted promotions, so far seen only via USPS. This round is 15% back as a statement credit on up to $1,200 in spend at gas, grocery, and restaurants each month for the months of July, August, and September. I Expect that more of these offers will go out via email over the weekend. (Thanks to birt)
  3. The Apple Credit Card has a targeted promotion worth $200 per day in cash back through July 25. You get:

    – 10% back promotion on up to $1,000 in spend at Walgreens and Uber (and less interesting stores like Ace, Exxon Mobile, Nike, T-Mobile, and Panera)
    – 10% back on up to $1,000 in spend at other stores

    If you max this promotion you’ll get $200 * 26 days, or $5,200 for the math challenged. Level two players can earn even more on the payment side. (Thanks to DoC)
  4. GC Galore notes that BestBuy online now sells Amazon electronic gift cards which is useful for leveraging card linked offers from Chase, Bank of America, and American Express.

Why visit New York, Miami, or Los Angeles when Nashville has this tourist attraction?

  1. Giftcards.com’s promotion that was originally 5% back and set to expire on June 17 has risen from the dead. The current zombie variant is 10% back on up to $1,500 in $100 Visa gift cards with promo code SUMMER or YAYSUMMER through tomorrow evening.

    Giftcards.com remains absent from airline portals, but it’s still available via Rakuten and the Capital One Shopping. The Capital One mobile app almost always has the highest rate. These are Pathward gift cards.
  2. Kroger.com has $10 off of $150 or more in Visa and Mastercard gift cards with promo code JUNE2023 through Wednesday evening, but unfortunately the limit is one per account. You will earn fuel points which adds another $10 off or so if you can use the points.

    These are US Bank gift cards.
  3. There are a few offers that combine for a great deal at Staples this week:

    – Fee free $200 Visa gift cards through Saturday, limit eight per transaction
    – A Chase offer for 10% back at Staples up to $220 in spend through July 10

    These are Pathward gift cards. (Thanks to DoC)
  4. The Capital One Venture card has a 100,000 points (effectively $1,000) after $5,000 in spend in three months. Note that you’ll be automatically denied for this card if you have a Venture X personal card, but the jury is still out on the business Venture X.
  5. Meijer MPerks has a promotion for 50,000 MPerks points with the purchase of $250 or more in many third party gift cards (but especially Apple), limit 50,000 points per account.

    Scale this one with multiple MPerks accounts.

The moment the giftcards.com SUMMER deal came back from the dead.

I’ve received nearly a half dozen reports of clawbacks of American Express Membership Rewards regular spend, +5x referral bonus, and sign-up bonus on Tuesday and Wednesday, and I’ve seen corroborating data-points publicly and privately too. This isn’t happening silently, but rather those affected are notified by email with the message:

After careful review, we noticed activity that indicated these points may have been earned or used in a way that doesn’t meet the terms and conditions of the Membership Rewards program or of the promotional offer under which you earned the points.

Based on conversations with AmEx customer service reps, American Express has tagged certain purchases as gift card purchases and reversed the points earned and the some of the bonuses awarded based on that spend, since the AmEx terms and conditions exclude “cash equivalents” from earning. We’ve seen clawbacks on the following types of purchases:

  • Some Speedway purchases that are a near multiples of $505.95, but not all
  • Some Walmart purchases that are a near multiple of $504.90, but not all
  • Some giftcards.com purchases, but not all
  • Some grocery in-person gift card purchases (various chains), but not all

Clawbacks have happened on (at least) Business Gold cards, Business Platinum cards, Blue Business Plus cards, and Personal Gold cards. Other than earning Membership Rewards, bonus categories and card types probably don’t play a factor in whatever’s happening.

There’s some less-bad news too though:

  • It seems that clawbacks have only happened on some cards, even if multiple cards could have been affected
  • It seems that clawbacks are happening specifically on cards in the sign-up bonus period or in a +5x referral period
  • All clawbacks seem to be for late-May or June spend
  • So far it looks like American Express is only targeted cardholders that closed a card in the last month or so (even if it wasn’t the same card)

If you’re working on a sign-up bonus in the near future, I’d try an avoid spending in suspiciously obvious amounts at big-named retailers which seems to help, and be careful about when you close any AmEx card. Good luck!

(Thanks to Tyler, D73, SideShowBob233, Brooke, and Brandon for collaborating with me on this post)

Pictured: AmEx.

  1. Citi ThankYou points has a 15% transfer bonus to Cathay Pacific AsiaMiles through July 22. Sweet spots:

    – JAL award flight availability before most partners can see the award space
    – Trips with up to five (!) stopovers and 2 open-jaws
    – Qatar Q-Suites for 75,000 miles each way
    – East coast to Europe in business class for 50,000 miles each way
  2. The Citi Shop Your Way Rewards Card has been sending targeted offers for online spend through July 14. In my experience online spend is the same as a “card not present” transaction, so it’s easy to hit. Offers:

    -$50 statement credit with $750 spend
    – $30 statement credit with $500 spend
    – 150,000 Shop Your Way Rewards Points with $500 spend
    – 225,000 Shop Your Way Rewards Points with $750 spend

    These stack with other grocery, gas, and restaurant offers that are running concurrently. Also, yes it’s possible to knock some or all of those out online.
  3. Data points have been piling up for months that it’s possible to get unbanned from Citi. The key? Clean up that credit report.

Happy Monday!

Citi’s new “Citi Bits” cereal looks and tastes exactly as bad as you’d expect.

  1. The American Express Delta personal and business cards both have increased offers, but the business ones are the juicier versions and don’t affect 5/24:

    – Business Gold: 70,000 SkyMiles after $3,000 spend in three months
    – Business Platinum: 90,000 SkyMiles after $4,000 spend in three months
    – Business Reserve: 100,000 SkyMiles after $6,000 spend in three months

    Yes, Delta SkyMiles can suck, and yes, they can be great too. Don’t use them for business class out of the US and you’ll probably get decent value, and worst case co-brand cardholders can use pay with miles for a floor of 1 cent per mile.
  2. Staples continues the endless stream of office supply store gift card deals with fee-free $200 Mastercard gift cards starting Sunday and running through Saturday of next week, limit eight per transaction.

    Call me a rebel but I prefer the Mastercards, even if they’re issued by Pathward like these.
  3. There’s a 20% Ultimate Rewards transfer bonus to Air Canada Aeroplan through July 31. Aeroplan is now arguably the best Chase airline transfer partner for international trips even without the bonus, so the 20% is icing on the cake.

    I wouldn’t transfer speculatively though: you’ve got a month and a half to transfer and book trips, and if that doesn’t work out another bonus will show up soon enough.
  4. The Chase IHG Business card has a sign-up bonus of 165,000 points after spending $3,000 in the first three months. I know some of y’all like the recently increased Chase Marriott bonus offers, but I’d take this $99 annual fee card and bonus over those any day. Now we just need to lobby to bring back IHG PointBreaks.

Office supply stores reflecting on gift card sales this year.

  1. Do this now: Register for Q3 5x promos with the major banks.

    – Chase Freedom: 5x up to $1,500 in spend at gas stations, EV charging, and “live entertainment”. For manufactured spend, speed your way over to a gas station that’s open between at least seven and eleven
    – Discover IT: 5x up to $1,500 in spend at gas stations and with digital wallets. You can tackle this one like above, but digital wallets open other possibilities if you’re scared of being shot at your local neighborhood Sketchway Speedway
    – Citi Dividend: 5x up to $1,500 in spend at gas stations and home improvement stores. At this point, even if you’re worried about being shot, I’d just bring my Freedom, IT, and Dividend to the gas station at once, bullets be damned
    – US Bank Cash+: 5x up to $2,000 in spend at in two categories of your choice (I go with utilities and electronics stores, and there are typically games to play with your local utilities)

    Also, kudos to Citi for releasing their dividend registration and categories at the same time as the competition for the first time in <checks notes> ever.
  2. BlackHawk Network seems to have introduced another roadblock for manufactured spenders: Autodrain for amounts more than a couple dozen dollars is no longer working at major retailers. Unfortunately, the $480 aggregate per store per six minutes BHN rule is still ever present.
  3. H-E-B stores have a promotion for a $15 H-E-B gift card with the purchase of a $100 Home Depot gift card, which has a resale value around 90%. This one is limit one per H-E-B account, so scale with multiple accounts. (Thanks to GCG)
  4. Meijer stores have $10 off of $100 or more in Visa gift cards, limit one per MPerks account through Saturday. The good news? You can use the same email addresses to scale H-E-B and Meijer.

    Meijer stores sell both Pathward and Sunrise bank gift cards, and one of these things is not like the other (duh).

What could possibly go wrong at this upstanding community gas station that sells Visa gift cards and totally doesn’t have an insect infestation?