Category: Quick Hits

1. American Express has a transfer bonus from Membership Rewards to all of its airline partners, something unheard of until this point. You’ve probably heard this reported elsewhere already, so let’s add to the conversation with a few particular sweet spots:

  • 40% bonus to Avios with Aer Lingus, British Airways, or Iberia
    • Use Iberia for great award space from the US to Europe and avoid fuel surcharges with BA with the same flight access. Look for Madrid trips for extra value.
  • 30% bonus to Virgin Atlantic, Hilton, Marriott
    • Use Virgin Atlantic for really low redemption round-trip tickets in Business or First to Japan and Eastern Asia
  • 25% bonus to AirFrance/KLM FlyingBlue, Aeromexico, Hawaiian
  • 20% bonus to Air Canada’s Aeroplan or Qantas
    • Use Aeroplan for short haul economy flights in the US
    • Use Aeroplan for business or first class flights from the Central or Eastern US to Europe
  • 15% bonus to LifeMiles
    • Use LifeMiles for loose definitions of what a region is
    • Use LifeMiles for economy bookings from the Central or Eastern US to Europe

2. United has a 30% bonus when transferring from hotel points to United MileagePlus miles. You have to register here first though.

  • Transfer Marriott Bonvoy points. With the transfer bonus, you’re looking at approximately 1.85 Bonvoy points to 1 MileagePlus mile. I’d say that’s about the best general use case of Bonvoy points I’ve seen in a long time. (This is a terrible idea with most other programs, especially Hyatt.)

Happy Thursday!

Bonus: Neptune’s sweet spot

1. Another week, another Point debit card offer: 15x at Nike between now and Monday September 6, limit 5000 points (or $333 in spend). I’ll buy a $330 gift card for resale at 93.5% and a net cost of 85%.

Point has been a great middle-man for transferring money from venture capitalist bank accounts into our wallets. I have to wonder when these offers will die, but it could be a while because VC money is plentiful right now — especially for FinTech companies.

As usual with Point, sign up for a new account using a referral link for the best bonus (currently $100 after spending $1,000). Make a friend’s day by using theirs, but if you don’t know anyone with a link you can reach out to me and I’ll share mine.

2. Marriott Bonvoy has its fall promotion out for stays between September 14 and December 12. Register here right now in case you end up at a Marriott property in the next several months. Also, my condolences if you do.

What’s the offer you ask? Answer: A slap in the face, but also 1,500 bonus points added to your Bonvoy account for each stay at a Marriott (or 4,500 if the property is all inclusive). Ok, ok i kid: a slap in the face is complimentary with every Marriott stay.

My welcome gift as a Bonvoy elite at my last Marriott Courtyard stay.

PayPal has a targeted deal running for 10% back from Target. As you saw yesterday, the Point rewards debit card has a 10x offer running at Target now too. An obvious question: Can these deals combine for 20% off? The answer is probably, though nothing is guaranteed until the data-points start rolling in. So, here’s how I’d play this:

  • Verify that you’ve got the PayPal Target deal (search for “Target” at this link)
  • Save the offer to your PayPal account
  • Add your Point debit card to your PayPal Wallet
  • Use cashbackmonitor.com to find a smaller, unknown portal (unfortunately it’s slim pickings right now)
  • Add one of the following to your cart:
    • A $500 gift card (Disney, Home Depot, and Apple gift cards are your best bet for resale)
    • Groceries and home goods that you’d buy anyway
    • Game consoles for resale if you can find them
  • Checkout with PayPal, using your Point debit card as payment

Ok, easy enough. We likely just got 20-21% off based on whether or not the portal tracks. (Hint: smaller portals still occasionally track on things like gift cards at many stores even when the big ones don’t).

I’ve kinda buried the lead here though: with these two deals stacking, you can get 20-21% off of Disney park tickets (via a Disney gift card). That’s honestly almost unheard of and if Disney is in your future in the next couple of years, I’d hit this one. If you open multiple PayPal accounts, a personal plus one for each of your “multiple businesses”, you can scale this deal even more; but after the first $500 it’ll turn into a 10-11% back offer because you’ll use up your Point spend capacity. Of course you will be able to get some credit card rewards in place of Point.

As always, if you don’t have the Point debit card and want to get it, make sure you use a referral link for a higher sign-up bonus. (The best that I know of is currently $100 after spending $1,000.) I’d rather you use a friend’s referral link, but if you don’t know anyone who has one feel free to reach out to me and I’ll share mine.

Targeting Target: Just one step away from this nonsense.

Apparently a bunch of marketing teams got together and colluded to make Wednesday, August 25 the official promotion day for travel hacking. Here are the results:

1. Simon has a promotion running for 40% off of gift cards with code FS40AUG21. Don’t buy with an American Express, but other cards are fair game. For the best bang for your buck, go with $1,000 Visa gift cards.

Tip: If you haven’t yet been approved for a volume account with Simon and you want to unlock the $1,000 Visa gift cards, I’d recommend putting “Manufactured Spend” on the application as the reason for applying. Yes, I’m serious, and yes, it works.

2. Register here for Hilton HHonors double points for non-AmEx Hilton credit card holders, or triple points if you do hold a HHonors credit card. The promotion runs through September 7 and December 31.

3. Alaska Airlines has a flash sale running today for travel between September 7 and December 15. Because the dates cover some holiday travel, I’d suggest taking a peek if you’re still waiting to book travel for the holiday season.

4. Register here for 1,000 bonus AA miles for every “qualifying” stay between September 3 and December 21, which as far as I can tell means every points earning eligible stay in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, or Asia (cash, or cash+points).

5. The Point debit card has a 10x boost for Target, up to $500 in spend. This amounts to $50 cash back. Can you guess my play? If you said buy a gift card for resale, you’ve won our grand prize!

If you want the Point card, use a referral because the sign up bonus is bigger that way.

A checklist with the options "Loser", "Winner", and "Other" Winner is selected.
Your quiz scorecard.

1. Register here for a $50 promo code off of any AA flight booking when booking with a Mastercard for travel before March 15, 2022. There’s a catch though, the code comes six to eight weeks after your first booking for a second booking. So, it’s really a buy-one, get-one for $50 off offer. I bet you can game it with a refundable fare, but at this point no one has been able to try.

2. Check here for a targeted offer for 135,000 points for upgrading from an American Express Gold or Green card to a Platinum card. Yes, this may even work with the NLL Business Gold card that you may have opened on Thursday. (Thanks to DDG)

3. An interesting promotion has come from Avis, which has happened in the past (checks notes) approximately zero times. Register at that link, then rent an intermediate car from Avis twice for at least two days and you’ll earn a free rental day. Also, don’t forget to register for Avis Preferred status if you have an American Express Platinum card. It’s an even stronger flex if your Platinum card was from item 2.

William Banks Jr doing the Tuesday Triple (jump).

1. The Citi ThankYou Points (TYP) 25% transfer bonus to Avianca LifeMiles has been extended through August 27. LifeMiles have a few sweetspots that involve strange definitions of regions, and other good deals like Central or Eastern US to Europe in economy. If I’m headed to Europe or Asia I’m going to do it in a lie flat bed like a diva though. So allow me to illustrate how I think about this bonus:

  • 60,000 TYP = 75,000 LifeMiles = One way business class between Europe and North America
  • 64,800 TYP = 81,000 LifeMiles = One way business class between Asia and North America

Those rates aren’t bad, especially given Avianca’s Star Alliance partner availability. Just avoid those old United Business class 2-2-2 configs.

2. Clip this coupon in all of your Meijer MPerks accounts for a $10 Meijer GiftCard with $50 in Happy Gift Cards. I’d buy a Happy Treats card and use it online or in-store at GameStop to buy a Steam gift card for resale. I wrote a quick Happy gift card guide a few weeks ago that may be helpful if they’re new to you. (Thanks to GC Galore)

3. Check your Kroger digital coupons for 300 fuel points when buying a Visa or Mastercard gift card. These coupons often work multiple times, just make sure you clip it before buying the first one. (Thanks to co_trout_slayer)

Pictured: United’s old 2-2-2 business class configuration.

A few of items to watch for this weekend:

1. Ready for another week of treadmill running with $200 Mastercard Gift Cards? Staples has your back with another fee free offer, limit five per transaction. I like it, but I don’t like it as much as the Office Depot/OfficeMax version which ends tomorrow because that one starts out as negative cost and gets even better with Dosh. The Staples one is “just” at-cost spend.

Related side note: Another card linked program, Ibotta, has worked with Staples online purchases in the past but seems to have died for anything useful (thanks to SideshowBob233).

2. The Citi Shop Your Way Mastercard has sent new targeted offers for the second half of August. I got one for $50 off of $750 in spend with the subject “Matthew, open now to unlock your special limited time offer! 🌟“, and there are reports of other offers for 15x on utility payments, which are honestly among the easiest categories of payments for manufacturing spend. Never heard of this card? That’s probably because as far as I know it doesn’t pay anyone a commission so you won’t find much written in the usual places.

Incidentally, the Citi Shop Your Way Mastercard is one of the next Miles Earn and Burn Unsung Hero cards thanks to its gameablity, monthly spending bonus offers that stack, and no-annual fee. This card is smoking hot.

Sam from Milenomics reminded me that the best sign-up bonus for this card is in-store at Sears and includes a free two-liter bottle of soda 🤣 in addition to the regular $40 bonus.

3. You might be pleasantly surprised to find that your Hyatt status was extended to Feb, 2023. Here’s to hoping it sticks for those of you that got it!

The smoke you’ll be dealing with today, probably a coming from the smoking hot Citi Shop Your Way Rewards card.

1. Check here for an American Express Business Platinum offer for 160,000 Membership Rewards points. You get 150,000 for spending $15,000 in three months, and another 10,000 for adding an employee card and spending $1,000 on that card. As of this writing, the offer is currently a “no-lifetime language (NLL)” card, meaning that having other Business Platinum cards in the past or present shouldn’t disqualify you from this offer. Tips: Employee cards come pre-activated for 60 days even without providing an SSN. Also, American Express is happy to give you employee cards as Your Name I, Your Name II, Your Name III, etc.

I’m still at my charge card limit with American Express so I can’t currently go for this, but I would if I could in a heartbeat.

2. Check here for an American Express Business Gold offer for 90,000 Membership Rewards points after spending $10,000 in three months. This one is also a NLL card.

I’d also go for this if I could just like the one above, especially because Business Gold cards often get a targeted upgrade offer to a Business Platinum for up to 85,000 additional Membership Rewards points.

3. Finally, there’s an offer for $30 back from Turo after spending $150 on many American Express cards. (Turo is like airbnb, but for cars.)

I’ve rented a Turo car before when regular car rental prices were sky-high and it turned out ok. I had to wait in the airport parking lot for 15 minutes for the owner to arrive, I got a different car than I booked (though materially similar), the guy renting to me was slightly sketchy, and the radio would play a strange female voice whenever a notification came in on my phone, but I saved $300 or so and in the end it was fine. Based on that singular experience I’d rather rent with a real, non-Fox rental car company but with the current carpocalpyse Turo may still be the best option.

My Turo rental car. Flames weren’t in the listing, but were provided to me at no additional charge.