We’ve had fewer than six days without a 4x fuel points promotion this summer, and instead of depressing the fuel points resale market, new buyers are coming out of the woodwork with extra supply and rates are increasing. Incidentally, if your buyer isn’t assuming responsibility for shutdown accounts within a business day, find a new buyer.
United has 10% off of paid flights in the continental United States booked by July 24 using promo code TAKEOFF10 for travel from July 24 through September 26. This is a (widely) targeted promotion that will work one time if targeted for up to nine passengers on a single reservation, round-trip or one-way.
Do this now: Link your Bilt and Lyft accounts in the Rent Day tab in the Bilt mobile app. You’ll earn a $10 Lyft credit if you don’t hold a Bilt credit card and $20 if you do. (Thanks to DoC)
Usually you can’t use the $10 off coupons directly for another gift card purchase, but if you have a friendly cashier you may get away with it. (Thanks to GCG)
Kroger has taken a page from office supply stores and decided to run a gift card promotion more often than not running one, and that means that in the last two weeks and next two weeks we’ll have had exactly four days without a promotion. #slay
Grocery clerk Jimmy shows us what it means to slay, Kroger style.
Do this now: Register for Hyatt’s summer promotion, double points on properties outside of the Americas from July 1 through September 15. Bonus earning starts on the second stay.
Albertsons, Safeway, and Vons stores have $15 off of your next purchase when you buy a $75 gift card in multiple brands starting tomorrow and running through Tuesday of next week. The interesting brands for manufactured spend are Lowes, Macys, and Arby’s. Ok, ok, I’m lying about one of those, can you guess which?
Hopefully you’re recovering from any Friday afternoon RobinHood induced hangovers that may have found their way into your accounts (more to come later). To help, focus on the following:
Giftcards.com has another promotion code for 5% off the total purchase price of Visa e-gift cards: YAYSUMMER.
I’m still seeing 4% back on the Capital One Shopping mobile app and purchases are tracking each time for me. Limits are $2,000 per rolling 48 hours, and $600 per order, both per email address. Don’t log in for the promo code to apply.
The fuel points market isn’t as high as it was in the roaring 2021s, but it continues to adapt and recover nicely. Good fuel points brokers are assuming shutdown risk immediately or within 24 hours, so choose wisely my friends. (Thanks to GCG)
I don’t cover things that I think aren’t worth your time, which is why you won’t see anything about $2,500 sign-up bonus for a bank account that requires $200,000 in new funds to be locked up for 90 days and pays 0.15% in interest; it just doesn’t make sense to waste time reading about something like that when you can easily earn 4-6% on those funds with existing savings or money market accounts.
This philosophy means I almost never talk about Bilt, but I’m going to make an exception today because 2x everywhere for Hyatt points is definitely above the line: The first of every month is “rent day”, and you earn 2x on general spend on the Bilt Mastercard for up to $10,000 on rent day. Unfortunately today doesn’t coincide with the Kroger 4x promotion, but I guess you can’t win ’em all.
Walmart is 6x in-store at Rakuten, up from 3x last week. The terms and conditions haven’t otherwise changed but I think the likelihood of cancellation for heavy hitters is higher at 6x than 3x because Rakuten seems to investigate high balance accounts.
With the end of the month approaching, don’t forget that you’ve got through Wednesday to:
– Spend your AmEx Gold $10 dining credits – Spend your AmEx Business Platinum $10 wireless credits – Spend your Chase GoPuff $10 credits
In my opinion, Shake Shack gift cards, T-Mobile credits, and in-store pickups are the best way respectively to maximize each of these three credits with a minimum amount of time and breakage.
Staples has fee-free Visa gift cards in-store through Saturday, limit eight per transaction. As usual, try for back-to-back transactions if you’ve got the liquidation capacity to minimize your time spent in a dying, overpriced, one employee per 1,500 square foot, big-box office supply retailer.
These are Metabank Pathward gift cards so have a liquidation plan ready before you buy enough to stand up as a fifth leg for your desk.
There’s a 30% transfer bonus for Membership Rewards to Virgin Atlantic through June 14. This program has some great sweet spots, but double check availability before transferring anything in. I don’t have any particular inside knowledge but I think a devaluation of this program is near.
Rakuten has 3x at Walmart in-store and in theory it’s “unlimited use”, but you do need to re-add the offer to your account an hour after each purchase. Also in theory gift cards are excluded, but, uh, yeah.
– Platinum: 150,000 Membership Rewards and a $200 statement credit – Gold: 90,000 Membership Rewards and a $200 statement credit – Blue Cash Preferred: $400 cash back and a waived annual fee the first year
Referrers are currently seeing a low of 10,000 Membership Rewards and a high of 35,000 Membership Rewards for referring.
Happy Monday!
Soon to be unleashed at Walmarts across the country. (Thanks to Country_Points)
Public Service Announcement (PSA): There are multiple reports that American Express employee cards are no longer coming pre-activated in the mail, and when you try and use them you get email telling you that they need to be activated. It’s an annoying update, but it doesn’t change the calculus of employee card offers for me at all. (Thanks to Jimmy 🐐)
Public Service Announcement (PSA): If you want to book a Choice hotel for someone else, you can add notes to the reservation online which seems to appease front desk agents. I’d suggest something like “Additional guest NAME allowed to check-in for this reservation”. (Thanks to Jim for the tip)
While we’re talking about Choice, I’m going to mini-rant about their new credit cards issued by Wells Fargo that people keep talking about for some reason. I think they’re crap, specifically because the Citi Premier card:
– Transfers to the Choice program at 1 ThankYou Point to 2 Choice points – Bonuses at a higher rate (3x TYP or 6x Choice points) in nearly all the categories that the Choice cards bonus in – Earns a flexible currency – Can be paid over the phone with a debit card – Has a higher sign-up bonus – Is also a Mastercard
In completely, totally unrelated news, Walmart sells gift cards.
Bilt will have a 100% transfer bonus to AirFrance / KLM FlyingBlue on “rent day”, also known by the rest of the world as “May 1”. I know you didn’t ask, but in my opinion this is a screaming deal for business class flights to and from Europe. It’s also a screaming deal for economy flights, but the screaming is for a different reason. (“Row 39? I didn’t know business class went back that far!)
