Category: Credit Cards

I’m not here to sell you credit cards and I don’t get anything when you are approved for a credit card that I recommended (except possibly an over-inflated sense of self worth), so I guess keep that in mind? Here are a couple:

  1. The American Express Personal Gold card with a heightened sign-up bonus that expires tomorrow for:

    – 90,000 Membership Rewards after $4,000 in spend within 6 months
    – 20% back up to $250 in restaurant spend (normally easy to MS, but currently a tad harder)

    This card has a $250 annual fee and offers 4x at grocery stores for up to $25,000 in spend yearly, along with some annoying Uber and dining credits too. There is a direct link for the application, but if you can use a referral link — most of those have the offer available and the referrer gets between 10,000 and 30,000 Membership Rewards for referring.

    I would have 20 of these cards purely for annual grocery spend if I could, the other benefits are just gravy. If you want to be cheeky by the way, ask AmEx for a retention offer a couple of months after opening the card and you’ll probably get it as a secondary sign-up bonus.

  2. The Marriott Bonvoy Boundless card with a heightened sign-up bonus of:

    – Five free night certificates for up to 50,000 points a night, expiring in 12 months

    Watch out with Marriott though. You’ll find that many properties creep above 50,000 points on weekends, you’ll probably end up paying for parking, you may end up with a resort fee, and you may end up #bonvoyed with a room over a 110 dB fan. This card is also subject to Chase’s 5/24 rule, so there’s that.

    This one has $95 annual fee, but with the added parking and resort fees you’ll probably be paying I’d just say that the annual fee is more like $350 after redemption and I’d make sure to cancel it exactly a year after opening.

At least the Fairfield Inn & Suites Lubbock, TX is always less than 50,000 points and offers this gorgeous view from the fourth floor.

American Express continues to dominate the news this week, and it continues to be great for us too. Forget Delta, AmEx is the one that #keepsclimbing

  1. I received a physical mailer for 20,000 Membership Rewards points for adding an authorized user card to an American Express Platinum and spending $2,000 on the new card in six months. The link is generic and widely targeted, so log-in to your American Express account then check here to see if you’re eligible.

    This offer’s POID is GGQ1:0002, which is significant because different POIDs are separate, unique offers. You’re unable to take advantage of the same POID multiple times typically.

  2. I’ve gotten reports from several readers that American Express is sending offers for new, no-lifetime language (NLL) Business Platinum cards via email. This offer is 150,000 Membership Rewards after spending $15,000 in the first three months. Check your inbox for email from AmEx mentioning “150,000 Membership Rewards” in the subject line to see if you’re eligible, and remember that the limit on American Express charge cards is 10 or 11 for most people, so if you’ve “only” got four of them, why not go for a fifth?

    According to DoC, some of these offers also have a bonus 10,000 points for adding an employee card during sign-up too.

  3. Qatar airways has a 40% transfer bonus for incoming bank rewards points through June 30, and that’s even more interesting because Qatar now uses Avios and Avois can be freely transferred between participating carriers. For US issued cards, your best (only?) bet is to transfer Citi ThankYou Points. The bonus could take up to 45 days after transfer, so don’t count on them right away.

    The best use of these for my patterns are to transfer to BA Avios for AA/AS domestic flights or Iberia Avios for International flights with lower fuel surcharges. (Thanks to rockyqintou)

  4. I wouldn’t bother talking about the American Express’s minor changes to their $10 monthly Gold dining credit partners, except that wine.com is now an option. That’s interesting because wine.com sells gift cards so you can liquidate the credit from home, though the smallest they sell is $25. With resale rates for that brand hovering around 83%, you’ll net $5.75 for your $10 credit each month, for each gold card, from home.
  5. Chase has two transfer bonuses for Ultimate Rewards running through July 31:

    – 30% to British Airways (don’t do this, do #3 instead)
    – 50% to Marriott (don’t do this, do Hyatt instead. Or, just stick a fork in your eye to save Marriott the trouble of doing it for you)

Have a nice weekend!

My wish for the weekend.

By most objective measures, 2021 and 2022 have been the best years of American Express for churners, culminating with offers for adding up to 99 employee cards with $19,800 in statement credits or 1,980,000 Membership Rewards for each business card you hold.

Since April though we’ve seen a gradual sunset in AmEx’s reign; some cards have lost these offers entirely and others have seen them cut to a level that just isn’t terribly interesting. There are still three cards with good offers though:

  • Hilton Business
  • Marriott Business
  • Lowe’s Business

Each has a $200 statement credit after $2,000 in spend when adding an employee card with a limit of five cards or $1,000 in statement credits per batch.

There’s another catch on these offers too: you can’t add 99 employee cards at the same time, instead you’re limited to five. But either due to a poorly thought out backend-logic system or some other oversight, the offers usually reappear for another batch of five. AmEx continues to award bonuses for new batches, so it’s still possible to get to 99 statement credits with some persistence.

To get these offers you’ve got to call American Express and ask “Are there any offers for adding employee cards to this account?” Because I guess you’re supposed to know that’s a thing and do it regularly, duh.

American Express’s business logic, as plumbing.

Rhetorical random thought: Why is a college quad called a quad? If you know don’t tell me, I’m currently living in ignorant bliss on the matter and wish to keep it that way.

  1. If you have an American Express EveryDay card, check your account dashboard for a targeted upgrade offer to the EveryDay Preferred card with a 40,000 Membership Rewards bonus. You’ll have an annual fee of $95 to pay in exchange for those 40,000 points.

    For a level two churner, I’d also ask for a retention offer from AmEx the day after upgrading the card since you’re going to have to keep it open for a year anyway to stay out of the penalty box.

  2. Check your inbox for targeted spend bonuses from Discover, offering an extra 2% on spend through July 31 for up to $2,000 in spend (of course I’d only knock this out stacked with Q2 and Q3 5x spend).
  3. Giant, Stop & Shop, and Martin’s stores have 10x points on Apple gift cards through tomorrow, up to $2,000 in spend per loyalty account. Resale rates are in the 92% range right now, so this is a nice way to gin up some bonused grocery spend at above break even. (Thanks to GC Galore)
  4. Kroger has a 4x fuel points sale running Friday through Monday on third party gift cards. Unfortunately for resellers there’s been effectively some form of 4x, 6x, or 12x running all month which has depressed rates, likely through the middle of June.
  5. Graduate Hotels (a boutique hotelier with unique properties scattered across the US and Europe) is running an award sale today starting at 12 PM Eastern for hotel rooms at $30 per night, plus taxes for stays through July 31. The sale runs for 30 hours, but my guess is that the truly great options will sell out long before that. (Thanks to FM)

For some reason Washington University didn’t contact me before naming this “the quad”. I guess it is more catchy than “the polygons” though.

First, a note: if you’re playing the Kroger gift card resale game, always make sure you clip any coupon that could be, even remotely, related to what you’re buying.

And with that out of the way, let’s dive into the week with a few above-average offers and a below-average offer to balance it out.

  1. Forums lit up over the weekend with news of the Capital On Tap business credit card increasing the sign-up bonus to $750 for $7,500 in spend.This is interesting because:

    – Capital On Tap isn’t performing a hard-pull on your credit
    – The card doesn’t report to credit bureaus
    – Credit lines are typically large
    – They support payments with debit cards from their payment portal

    There are a few downsides too: This is only available by a TPG affiliate link and reportedly it’s tough to get approved without a corporation, LLC, or other registered entity.

  2. Bank of America has been emailing targeted, uncapped bonus spend offers through December 31 for:

    – +2% bonus cash back on Customized Cash Visa
    – +2x miles on the Alaska Airlines Visa
    – +2x miles on the Travel Rewards Visa
    – +2x miles on the Amtrack Visa

    Check your email for any messages from Bank of America from the weekend, especially in your spam folders. I wasn’t targeted sadly, so I’m going to have to live vicariously through you on this one.

  3. Jim was the first to let me know that OfficeDepot / Office Max has a $15 instant discount on $300 or more in Metabank Visa gift cards through Saturday. To maximize:

    – Buy the “Everywhere” cards which have a lower fee and are typically easier to liquidate
    – Link your credit cards to Dosh
    – Try and run multiple transactions back to back

  4. Meijer MPerks has a $5 Meijer gift card with the purchase of $500 in Happy Gift cards through May 28, but you have to clip the coupon first. (Thanks to GC Galore)

    Normally I wouldn’t write about a $5 back deal but it gives an opening to talk about a Happy Gift Card that’s now available in both physical and digital form (EDIT: Thanks to yehuda for the corrected link): The St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital Happy card, which can be swapped to BestBuy. This is great from a velocity, resale, and anti-fraud perspective.

The outline for this post.

  1. Kroger and Harris Teeter are running another 4x fuel points bonus through Friday-Sunday on all third party gift cards, and through Tuesday with Happy gift cards. Unfortunately the fuel points resale market is rather weak right now after a series of tumultuous software updates at the fuel pumps and another two week long 4x sale that concluded a few days ago. (Thanks to GC Galore)
  2. Radisson Rewards has 30% off of “premium” hotel rooms in North America booked today in the Raddison mobile app for ios or android for stays through June 30. Premium hotel rooms are often just a few dollars more than a base room, so I think it’s still a deal even if you’re a base room person. UPDATE: Now live
  3. Do this now: Register for Wyndham’s current promotion, 7,500 bonus points after two stays through September 6.
  4. American Express is sending out physical mailers via USPS for two great sign-up bonuses:

    – 250,000 Membership Rewards for a new Business Platinum after $30,000 in spend in six months
    – 180,000 Membership Rewards for a new Business Gold after $20,000 in spend in six months

    If you get ahold of one of these, keep in mind that American Express doesn’t care who applies for the card as long as the applicant’s address matches the mailer’s address.

Now I just need AmEx to honor this, uhh, totally legit offer.

There’s a lot going on with new speculative products that we’ll discuss soon, but for now let’s talk about some active offers:

  1. The PayPal Mastercard is now generally available for new applications. The current sign-up bonus is $100 after spending $500, but this isn’t a card you get for the sign-up bonus. Instead you get it because:

    – It’s 3% cash-back everywhere you pay with PayPal or Venmo (some MS-friendly stores take both)
    – It’s a Synchrony card
    – It’s a Mastercard

    The card gets 2% cash-back everywhere else, which is fine I guess.

  2. You can currently earn 1,500 points transferrable to either AA or Hyatt by downloading the Bilt Rewards app for ios or android and linking your frequent flyer accounts. You’ll earn:

    – 100 points for linking each of your non-Hyatt loyalty partners, ten in total, though you may want to wait for increased earnings on other programs before linking immediately
    – 500 points for linking your Hyatt account before May 27

    Note that the minimum to transfer is 2,000 points. I’d love to get the Bilt card to moon my account🚀 , but I’m sure I’d be shutdown for manufactured spend before the card even arrived in my mailbox, setting a new world record. Also, blah blah blah getting below 5/24 blah blah blah. (Thanks to VFTW)

  3. OfficeMax/Office Depot has $15 back on $300 or more in Mastercard gift card purchases, bringing your net cost below face-value even without rewards or other shenanigans. To maximize the deal:

    – Link each of your Ink or other office supply bonused cards to a Dosh account
    – Try and get multiple transactions in a single trip

    These are Metabank gift cards, so make sure you’ve got a liquidation channel. They do exist nationwide but you’ve got to look.

Happy Wednesday friends!

The world record setting rewards balance plot.

Some of our favorite banks like Chase and AmEx allow you convert one credit card to another within the same card family (like converting a Delta Reserve to a Delta Gold) at any time. Other banks are a little more zany and will let you do just about anything as long as you talk to the right person, like Bank of America which will let you convert a Virgin Atlantic Mastercard to a Customized Cash Rewards Visa.

Let’s discuss some of the reasons a churner may want to do this:

Annual Fees

All of the banks mentioned above will prorate your annual fee when you convert a card to another card. You may want to do this if:

  • You forget to close a card within the annual fee refund grace period, and you don’t want the card anymore. So, you downgrade to a no-annual fee version for a prorated refund (and maybe then close the card after that posts)
  • You used all the yearly credits for a card, like the Sapphire Reserve $300 travel credit, so you downgrade as soon as your credits post for a pro-rated refund
  • You don’t want to reset the average age of the accounts on your credit report, but you don’t want to pay a particular annual fee any more either

Of course for next level gaming, you can downgrade an annual fee card with travel credits and simultaneously upgrade another no-annual fee to the card with travel credits and double-dip for the same net annual fee, but that may ultimately be a risky move.

Getting Upgrade Offers

American Express in particular has card upgrade bonuses all the time, sometimes as quickly as an hour after downgrading a card. For example, last year I downgraded a Business Platinum to a Business Gold, and then upgraded it to a Business Platinum for 90,000 Membership Rewards the next day.

Bypassing Card Limits

Some banks have card limits preventing you from holding more than one of a particular card, and maybe you’d really like to have two of them. Card conversion is often a workaround. For example, what if the Chase Freedom Flex’s application terms & conditions limit you to one card? Easy, convert another Ultimate Rewards earning card to a Freedom Flex and you’ll bypass the limit.

Caveats

American Express rules for downgrading cards are perhaps better understood than any other major banks’ internal rules, however the advice there is likely good for keeping your accounts in good standing at any bank:

  • Keep a card open for a minimum of 12 months after opening
  • Never downgrade a card to a lower annual fee within 12 months of opening or upgrading

Good luck!

Converting the Amazon Prime credit card to trash.