Category: Portals

  1. American Express has a few nice card-linked offers:

    – Thompson Hotels: $60 statement credit after $300 in spend by December 15
    – Park Hyatt Hotels: $150 statement credit after $750 in spend by December 15
    – Kimpton and Intercontinental Hotels: $75 statement credit after $300 in spend by December 31
    – Small and Luxury Hotels: $100 statement credit after $300 in spend by December 31

    The holidays tend to make these slightly easier to game than normal. (Thanks to berkstud14)
  2. Capital One Shopping has targeted increased cash-back bonuses at GiftCards.com. We’ve seen 4%, 6% and 9%, and I suspect there are other offers too. The website and mobile apps usually don’t have the same offer, so check both.

    Also, note that terms and conditions now specify that “orders over $2,000” are not eligible for cash back, and it’s currently unclear as to whether that number is inclusive of fees. (Thanks to Brian M and Joshua)

Happy Tuesday friends!

Want another Tuesday double? This, erm “life-hack” has your back.

  1. The Citi Shop Your Way Rewards card, a MEAB Unsung Hero, sent out targeted spending offers for Q4. Each of these offers is good once per month for October, November, and December:

    – $70 after $600 or more in gas, grocery, and restaurant spend
    – 10% back on between $600 and $700 or more in gas, grocery, and restaurant spend
    – 10% back on between $700 and $800 or more in gas, grocery, and restaurant spend
    – 15x ThankYou Points on $1,200 or more in gas, grocery, and restaurant spend
    – $200 after $1,200 or more in gas, grocery, and restaurant spend
    – $200 after $2,000 or mroe in gas, grocery, and restaurant spend

    For those who suck at math, the best of these offers is $600 over three months or 48,000 ThankYou Points over three months. This spend will stack with any other Shop Your Way offers linked to the card, because sometimes Citi’s IT isn’t completely broken and does something right. (Thanks to DC Domer, Ben, BB_Pcola, birt, FlashStash, and Adam)
  2. There are two deals conspiring to make Virgin Atlantic booking really cheap, and a Delta or ANA award slightly cheaper:

    – Chase Ultimate Rewards has 30% transfer bonus from to Virgin Atlantic through November 15
    – Virgin Atlantic has 25% off of award flights on their metal for travel through the end of the year booked by tomorrow

    Virgin Atlantic has high fuel surcharges on their own flights to London-Heathrow, so I think of these as cash with a mileage surcharge tickets (“pay regular premium economy ticket prices, use a few miles, and get business upper class”) as opposed to the traditional milage with a cash surcharge ticket.
  3. The United MileagePlus shopping portal has a 500 bonus miles promotion after $150 or more in spend through October 8. Yes, giftcards.com is on the United MileagePlus portal, why would you ask?
  4. Chase’s Pay Yourself Back categories have been extended through December 31. If you’re not sure why anyone would ever do this, then perhaps you have more runway to earn points than you’ve previously considered. Yes, transferring to some programs or booking travel through the Chase portal can net you a higher return, but also there are only 365 hotel nights a year and a few dozen or so business class flights that you can reasonably fit into the same time period.
  5. The Barclays AAdvantage Aviator Red card has a 75,000 AA miles sign-up bonus split into two parts:

    – 60,000 points for making a single purchase in 90 days
    – 15,000 additional points for adding and authorized user and making a single purchase in 90 days

    The $99 annual fee is not waived the first year. This card is also interesting because after you’ve put some decent spend on it, Barclays will typically let you product change to the AAdvantage Aviator Silver card which offers a credit for $25 per day in AA in-flight purchases and a companion pass that’s good for two companions.
  6. Meijer has $10 off of $150 or more in Mastercard gift cards purchased in-store through Saturday. As usual, scale with multiple MPerks accounts, and consider travel to Meijer land if you’ve got the liquidation bandwidth to scale this deal.

The manufactured spend points earning runway is long, but not infinite.

  1. Kroger is selling Marianos, QFC, and Carrs brandnames (and stores) to C&S, the parent company of Piggly Wiggly subject to regulatory approval, and they’re also selling rights to Albertsons branded stores in California, Arizona, Colorado, and Wyoming. This is a double edged sword, but all things being equal as a manufactured spender, I’d rather have:

    – A Kroger instead of Piggly Wiggly
    – A Piggly Wiggly instead of an Albertsons, at least in recent history

    Markets like California and Arizona with both Safeway stores and Albertsons stores will probably get the best of all worlds.
  2. Some airline shopping portals have a sweepstakes running for 25,000 – 100,000 bonus miles, and all that’s required is logging in and clicking a button to enter:

    – Alaska MileagePlan shopping
    – AA AAdvantage eShopping
    – United MileagePlus shopping

    Last round there were two separate winners in the MEAB community, and if someone’s going to win it might as well be one of you who probably won’t redeem 73,500 miles for a one-way to Lubbock a United Express First seat in a CRJ-700.
  3. First class tickets on China Eastern are now bookable with AirFrance / KLM FlyingBlue in addition to the normally available business class award tickets. To find them, you’ll need to choose La Premier class on the award search tool.
  4. The Bank of America Alaska Airlines personal card has a heightened sign-up bonus for 70,000 MileagePlan miles after $3,000 spend in 90 days. The annual fee is $95 and isn’t waived the first year. As with any Bank of America card, if you’re going to go for this offer probably grab some other cards at the same time.

    If you’re an value maximizer absolutist, you may want to wait a few weeks to see if an in-flight offer surfaces for 72,000 miles. I’d give that offer a 50% chance of surfacing; just keep in mind that my crystal ball broke in “The Great Christmas tree debacle of 2018”.
  5. The no annual-fee Chase Ink Unlimited and Ink Cash cards’ 90,000 Ultimate Rewards sign-up bonus is back:

    – Ink Unlimited
    – Ink Cash

    Referrals still pay 40,000 Ultimate Rewards to the referrer and have a sign-up bonus of 75,000 Ultimate Rewards, so if you’re running in two-player mode you’ll probably do better to refer P1 to P2. I’d also wait a week or two before doing so because it’s possible, perhaps even likely, that the referral bonus will also jump to 90,000 Ultimate Rewards (however, see prior crystal ball reference).

The Great Christmas tree debacle of 2018 shatters the near perfect MEAB crystal ball, or something.

Let’s keep it short and sweet for Labor Day.

  1. Office Depot / OfficeMax stores have $15 back on $300 or more in Visa gift card purchases through Saturday. As usual, link your cards to Dosh, check for Chase Offers at Office Depot and then try and scale this slightly differently than normal.

    These are Metabank Pathward gift cards so have a liquidation plan in place.
  2. American Express has a 25% Membership Rewards transfer bonus to AirFrance/KLM FlyingBlue running through September 25. I don’t currently have an Unusng Heroes series for mileage programs, but frankly this one at least deserves an article in the future. In the mean time, a few sweet spots:

    – Delta short haul Economy and First
    – Business class to and from Europe (assuming date flexibility)
    – Europe short haul Business and Economy

    KLM is also an underappreciated airline in Business class. Fortunately, in a move that will surprise only someone with Alzheimers, it turns out that it’s possible to book KLM flights with the AirFrance/KLM FlyingBlue program.
  3. American Express has an offer for $50 back after $200 in airfare at JetBlue. As usual, gamers can game.
  4. Do this now: Register for Discover IT’s 5x merchants for October through December for up to $1,500 in spend. Amazon.com and Target are the, err, targets this year.
  5. Dell is 15x at Rakuten for the Labor Day holiday which means that now is a great time to place several orders that will be cancelled later this week.

Have a nice holiday!

The Dell Verification team cheerfully works the Labor Day holiday.

  1. The Barclays Lufthansa Miles and More credit card sign-up bonus has increased for the second time in a month to 100,000 miles after $3,000 in spend in 90 days. The $89 annual fee is not waived for the first year.

    The main use for this card continues to be to earn Miles and More, err miles, for access to awards that you can’t normally get otherwise like Swiss First. (Thanks to DoC)
  2. British Airways is one of the merchants available on the TopCashBack shopping portal with different rates for short-haul and long-haul. Apparently this has been around sporadically in the past but I just learned of it and I’m intrigued at the gaming possibilities which may or may not exist. Special thanks to Mason for bringing it to my attention.
  3. Do this now (if you live in Washington or if your SkyMiles account lives in Washington): Register for Delta12 status which earns you miles based on the Seattle Seahawks NFL season performance and Main Cabin 1 boarding during the season too.

    It’s strange, but I’ve heard of SkyMiles accounts with addresses that don’t match the address of the owner, probably because they moved and forgot to update the account or something.

Have a nice float into the long weekend!

This guy floated to Washington for Delta12.

  1. The Chase Freedom Flex and Freedom Flex Unlimited cards have a new sign-up bonus:

    – $200 (20,000 Ultimate Rewards) after $500 in spend in three months
    – 5x on gas and grocery up to $12,000 in spend in 12 months

    The offers will stack. These cards are churnable if you’re under 5/24. (Thanks to DoC)
  2. Delta’s shopping portal has a rare bonus for 1,000 bonus SkyMiles with $400 or more in purchases through August 10 which works out to an additional 2.5x on your first $400 in spend through the portal.

    Sadly, Giftcards.com remains absent from airline portals.
  3. Southwest will email you a 50% off of a future flight promotional code if you book two one-ways or one round-trip flight by tomorrow night for travel through the end of September, and of travel on those flights too. A few notes about the promotional code:

    – It’s only good for paid fares
    – There are block outs for holiday travel between Thanksgiving-ish and New Years-ish
    – There are more block outs for travel around MLK day, Valentines Day, and randomly March 3

    Because I’m my own kind of special, I investigated what might cause March 3 to be included in the blackouts. The best I can find is it’s exactly one week before Daylight Savings Time which is peak travel for obvious reasons, so hooray I guess? (Thanks to FM)
  4. American Express has a few transfer bonuses for Membership Rewards through August 31. I’ve rated them on a scale of 1-5 because exactly no-one asked me to:

    – 15% transfer bonus to Avianca LifeMiles (3 stars)
    – 25% transfer bonus to Hilton Honors (2 stars)
    – 30% transfer bonus to Iberia Plus Avios (4 stars)
    – 30% transfer bonus to British Airways Avios (3.8 stars)

    You’ve got to login to see the transfer bonuses, or at least I did.
  5. Chase has a transfer bonus for Ultimate Rewards through September 30. I also rated this one on a scale of 1-5 because I couldn’t help myself:

    – 50% transfer bonus to Marriott Bonvoy (1 star)

    Remember, a Bonvoy point is probably worth 0.40-0.65 cents in general unless you’re trying to sell someone a credit card, especially when you factor that you’re going to be paying resort fees and parking for your free award stay. So, is (0.40 to 0.65) * 1.5 cents interesting for you for an Ultimate Rewards point?

Sure, the Marriott Igloo Valley looks like a bargain at 12,000 Bonvoy Points, but you still pay the $200 resort fee.

  1. Alaska and American’s shopping portals now have spending bonuses to match United and Southwest’s:

    – Alaska: 1,200 bonus miles for $600 or more in spend through August 14
    – AA: 2,000 bonus miles for $700 in or more in spend through August 13

    For AA Loyalty Point hunters, remember that portal bonuses don’t become Loyalty Points but regular spend does, often even when it shouldn’t.
  2. Alaska Airlines has a great promotion for flights between Kona, Hawaii and the continental US with promo code KONABOGO: Buy one, get one free tickets booked by this evening for travel between August 13 and October 31. There are day-of-week requirements but they’re not too onerous. Given Alaska’s route map, this should be extra exciting for best coasters west coasters.

    Word on the street is that the BOGO isn’t actually coding properly in the buyer’s favor, don’t be afraid to experiment.
  3. Alaska also has a 10% off flights to and from other Hawaiian cities using the same promo code, KONABOGO.
  4. American Express Offers has new Delta airfare statement credits:

    – $75 off of $250 or more
    – $150 off of $500 or more

    The absolute simplest way to game these is to book a non-basic economy flight, wait more than 24 hours, then cancel it. You’ll have a flight credit valid for a year, effectively locking the offer in for later. That concludes offer gaming 101. Now, study for 201 and 202.
  5. Everyone seems to be really excited that American Express Fine Hotels and Resorts bookings can now be changed. I guess it’s not unexciting, but personally I think that the true hack this could unlock won’t actually work. Go ahead AmEx, prove me wrong.
  6. In theory American Express has targeted more people at last year’s link for the Personal Gold card with 100,000 Membership Rewards after $4,000 in spend in three months; I haven’t been able to independently confirm this one though. (Thanks to DoC)

Happy Tuesday!

American Express is out there playing 1D chess to outwit our puny 2D chess playing, FHR booking brains.

  1. Walmart has been rolling out new self-checkout software terminals for a little over a year, and now there’s even a new-new self-checkout terminal being rolled out. Each terminal has different uses and what works at one version doesn’t necessarily work at another. Always be probing. (Thanks to Justin)
  2. Southwest has a tiered shopping portal bonus with 2,000 Rapid Rewards points on $500 or more in spend at the top tier. If you could do only one, yesterday’s United portal is almost certainly a better deal. But, why could you do only one?
  3. MGM is getting together with Marriott in a rebound relationship after the Hyatt breakup in an epic love story that’ll be chronicled in Taylor Swift’s new album “From Bad to Worse” (probably).

    All that remains to be seen is how Marriott #bonvoys the relationship. The possibilities are endless, but they’ll certainly fit the “From Bad to Worse” theme.
  4. Costco is doing a thing. These can be quite lucrative but you really better know exactly what you’re doing before you dive in, and don’t forget that you’re also subject to market price fluctuations.
  5. American Express Offers has $250 back on $1,250 or more in airfare with Qatar Airways. It is gameable.

Happy Wednesday!

A sneak peak of “From Bad to Worse” by Taylor Swift, as imagined by Stable Diffusion.