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The end of the year is fast approaching. If you have a premium travel credit card that reimburses for travel expenses, make sure you’ve used them all. For Chase this is trivially easy because they work for travel, gas, and groceries.

For American Express, let’s just say you’ve got your work cut out for you, though it’s easier during COVID since most airlines will convert small purchases to travel bank funds. For reference, check the relevant Flyertalk thread for the airline you’ve selected:

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but United might be the easiest way to do this with direct funding of their TravelBank.

Woman playing whack-a-mole arcade cabinet game.
AmEx RAT team closing loopholes

OfficeDepot and OfficeMax (why are they different at all at this point? It’s the same company) are offering a few deals for holiday gifts manufactured spend:

  • Purchase $300 or more in MasterCard Gift Cards and get a $15 instant rebate between now and Saturday evening. The total cost will be $298.90 (1x$200 and 1x$100) for $300, or $398.90 for $400 (2x$200) worth of MasterCard gift cards.
  • Starting Sunday, purchase $300 or more in Visa Gift Cards and get another $15 rebate. This will last through the following Saturday evening. (Note: These numbers are correct today, but they may change the deal before Sunday. Double check.)

All of these deals are limited to one per transaction; friendly cashiers will let you do this multiple times spread across transactions. Of course, use a credit card like the Chase Ink Cash that bonuses at office supply stores to goose this deal. On the liquidation front, watch out for BHN issues purchasing money orders at Walmart.

What your Office Depot store will probably look like in the near future.

Only the first of these is new, but if you haven’t registered for the other two, you’re running out of time.

Yes, you can leverage these promos to get Globalist on the cheap* with Hyatt’s reduced elite thresholds for 2021. Incidentally, I’ve been a Diamond / Globalist because reasons for 7 years, and I would say that this is only worthwhile if you’d already be staying in Hyatts anyway for the next year or two, and definitely for more than 10-15 nights. Remember that Hyatt’s footprint is lackluster, and don’t let the bloggers talk you into status you don’t need. I certainly don’t need it and only get it because it’s ancillary to what I’m already doing. Always be your own elite.

Pictured: 1990s grade school student who grew up to be a Hyatt Globalist in 2020.

*punchline: Get the credit card and stay in a category 1 hotel for 10 nights on a stay starting in December and ending in January, then get the rebate for 25%, requiring a total 37,500 points for top tier status.

Register your Citi credit cards for 5% off of online spend, up to $25.00 per card through Monday, November 30. Yes, this works using a few online MS methods, be creative with it; if you’re not part of that game though, it’ll work on an Amazon gift card to reload your balance. Don’t forget your sock-drawer cards too, like my stupid AT&T Access [Less] card.

Southwest is offering a nationwide fare sale, and it doesn’t exclude Hawaii. Book by Thursday night, and use any schedule change hacks you may know of to goose the deal.

Virgin Atlantic is offering some excellent fares on round-trip business tickets originating in Europe (half off in many cases). This applies to both cash and award tickets, but don’t bother on the award tickets because the surcharges (YQ) are kinda ridic. If you’re US based like me, sandwich one of these fares in between two award tickets and turn it into two different trips.

A man and a seal passed out on the beach.
Recovering from a Southwest flight to Hawaii

If you’re into AA status, AA hasn’t shut you down yet, and you have any MasterCard that’s a World Elite MasterCard (like the Citi Double Cash), there’s a super-easy way to earn AA status:

  • Sign up for the MasterCard Travel service
  • Book two round-trip flights (at least one domestic) for Gold
  • Book two round-trip flights (international) for Platinum

The travel has to be completed by March 31, 2021 to qualify. What’s the rub? There’s always a rub. You have to book the flights through the MasterCard Travel concierge, I believe over the phone. There’s another rub: you’ll be flying American Airlines, for low level status.

As far as I know, this works for anyone with an AA account, but check to make sure you see the offer on the travel service home page first the details still match (and read the T&C to make sure they haven’t changed something).

Woman with revolver aimed at her head in front of a giant plate of red goo.
Playing russian roulette with AA for gooey red status.
Image credit: Ars Electronica

Until recently, you could bank monthly AmEx Uber Credits to your Uber Cash balance by using an accidental or purposeful cancel of a ride under certain conditions. That stopped working, which means you’ve currently got to use your Uber Credits as AmEx intended.

There’s a rub though, both Uber and Uber Eats are supposed to draw from your monthly expiring AmEx Uber Credit before they draw down your banked Uber Cash, but it isn’t working that way on Uber Eats. Instead, your banked cash is used and your credit stays put, ready to expire at the end of the month. If you’re one of the four people out there taking actual Uber rides it still works like it’s supposed to, but if you’re like everyone else, you’d probably rather use it on Uber Eats and you can’t with an Uber Cash balance.

Sam at Milenomics proposes a workaround: Spin up a second Uber account, de-link your AmEx Uber Credit cards from your primary account, and link them to the secondary account. That way, at least next month you’ll have those credits on an account without Uber Cash.

A trash panda (raccoon in a trash can).
Trash panda waiting on your non-free Uber Eats waste.

Ok, so about that Unicorn Amex that needed to use a Resy affiliate link? No need apparently. As of November 12 all new AmEx Platinum approvals get 10x on grocery and gas up to $15,000 spend. Visit American Express at this link and you could see the same offer. You may need to try private mode or a different browser if you don’t see the 100,000 MR points plus 10x grocery spend and gas stations offer, or copy and paste the link yourself, or jump up and down and yell “Ice, Ice, Baby!” when you click.

The Brave browser has been reported to work. If you don’t get a popup at the last step of the application, you should be eligible for a sign-up bonus even if you’ve already had the card.

Vanilla Ice, rapper
Vanilla Ice (maybe) has a Unicorn Platinum

American Express is currently offering a $25 statement credit on $250 in spend at BestBuy in-store or online. A little bird told me that you can sell a $250 BestBuy gift card at between 99% and 101%, netting you some spend and some cash back.

Also, check your inbox for a (boring) offer from Amex for a $2 statement credit for using contactless payments, up to 5 times.

Too bad it doesn’t compare to this offer: