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Yes! Just Picked up a New Alaska Visa for 40K Miles – How to Get the Offer

by Harlan 7 Comments

a screenshot of a visa application

The typical signup offer on the Bank of America Alaska Airlines Visa is 30,000 Alaska miles after meeting the minimum spending requirements (usually $1,000 in the first 90 days).

We’ve seen offers for $0 companion fares, a $100 statement credit (tantamount to a 10% discount on the minimum spending), and a few highly targeted offers.

This latest deal is for 40,000 Alaska miles and a $0 companion fare after spending $2,000 within the first 90 days of account opening. There are a few steps to get the offer to show – but it’s worth it for 10,000 extra Alaska miles.

alaska visa 40000

Best public deal there’s been for the Alaska Visa – 40K miles and a $0 companion ticket

I was just instantly approved with a $17,000 credit line and I’m LOL/24. It’s clear by now I’ll never open another Chase card – so I went for it. Alaska miles are among the most valuable out there – and you can use the $0 companion ticket to anywhere Alaska flies, including Hawaii!

Here’s how to get the offer.

Alaska Visa 40K offer with a little massaging

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Some Plastiq Mortgage Payments With Visa Cards Working Again!

by Harlan 8 Comments

a screenshot of a payment review

Update: Some readers let me know not all mortgage payments are working, but many are!

Here’s an example from my account:

a screenshot of a credit card

A mortgage payment you can still pay with Plastiq

As long as the “Submit Payment” button isn’t grayed out, you should be good to go! Let me know if it works for you!

More data points slash adventures with Plastiq.

So I just got a new Bank of America Alaska Airlines card – I get a new one every 45 days for a quick injection of 30,000 Alaska miles. Those are, of course, Visa cards, which Plastiq said would no longer work.

Well today, I paid the rent for one of my Airbnbs with this card on Plastiq.

plastiq visa payments

This Plastiq payment is clearly marked as rent

And it went through without a hitch:

a screenshot of a payment form

Boom

Considering the minimum spending on this card is only $1,000, I was able to knock most of it out with a single rent payment. Then I sent $50 to my utility company to trigger the sign-up bonus. Minimum spending done in under a minute. AWESOME!

This isn’t a fluke. My friend Angie used her Chase Fairmont card to pay her mortgage via Plastiq recently, too – that’s also a Visa card. And I’ve heard others have had success, too.

Plastiq Visa payments

While I think 3X with the Chase Sapphire Reserve is long gone, using Plastiq to meet minimum spending on Visa cards is extremely easy. Even with the 2.5% fee considered, having it done in seconds sure beats having to monitor it for a few months. Especially if you need to spend a few thousand.

I also just confirmed 3X still works with the Citi AT&T Access More card. And wrote about why you’d even consider using the new Blue Business Plus Amex for Plastiq payments, too.

But given that I can still get 3X, the gravy train is still on – at least for now.

And moreover, it seems you can use your Visa cards again. So if you have a Visa and want to make some Plastiq payments for rent, mortgage, or HOA, they should go through just fine. 🙂

Have you had recent success using a Visa card for a rent payment through Plastiq? 

Don’t Miss Out: Free Museums, One Month for 5X, Hilton Surpass 100K

by Harlan Leave A Comment

a collage of animals

Happy Wednesday!

Here are some deals still on the go – snag ’em while you can!

Through May 31st (today!)

June 3rd and 4th

Free museums

Free museums if you have a Bank of America debit or credit card. Only good for the cardholder and doesn’t include special exhibits. That said, there’s a participating museum in nearly every state, so check it out if you want some free culture this weekend.

limited time deals

Check out the Denver Zoo this weekend for F-R-E-E

Through June 30th

Get your 5X!

If you have Chase Freedom, get 5X Chase Ultimate Rewards points and drugstores and supermarkets on up to $1,500 in spend. Can activate retroactively and still get bonus points. Easy categories here.

The Boxed deal is back

a screenshot of a email

The Boxed deal might be in your Amex account

I wrote about how to save 50% on merchandise at Boxed with an Amex Offer. Instead of $15 back on $50+, it’s now $25 back on $65+. Still a dang good deal. Even better, you can tweet #AmexBoxed to add it to your synced card even if you weren’t targeted.

2X SPG points

Doctor of Credit has the details. You get 10,000 bonus SPG points for spending $10,000 on your Starwood business Amex through the end of June. So, 20,000 SPG points on $10,000 in spend = 2 SPG points per $1 spent. Great deal if you’re targeted – worth checking.

Bottom line

Get ’em while they’re around. Any other good ones to share? Let me know and I’ll add ’em!

Pick Up 30,000 Alaska Miles Every 45 Days

by Harlan 17 Comments

a screenshot of a computer

I recently picked up an personal Alaska Visa card, then tried to get another one soon after. It was automatically denied. Like, straight up the answer is no.

That’s unusual, so I thought it may have been because I didn’t lower the limits on my existing Alaska cards before applying. Not wanting to waste the hard pull on my credit (because multiple inquires on the same day are combined), I applied for the business version of the card and was instantly approved.

alaska miles every 45 days

Deeee-nied!

But I didn’t want to let it go. I called the next day to speak to a credit analyst (they are open 8am to 7pm and I usually apply for new cards late at night while tipsy) for reconsideration.

I offered to lower my limits on one of the other cards, as they are pretty high (like $20,000 each), but she said the denial had nothing to do with my credit score or account history. And moving credit lines wouldn’t help me, either.

I was denied because I already opened a personal Alaska card within the last 90 days – which was the first time I’d heard that. But apparently it’s been enforced sporadically for a while.

So I figured how to play by the “new” rules and still get my doses of Alaska miles: rotate between the personal and business versions of the card every 90 days.

Get 30,000 Alaska miles every 45 days

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App-O-Rama: 4 New Cards and ~200,000 Points

by Harlan 14 Comments

a white background with text

Also see: 

Oh man, looking back on my first AOR 3 years ago is such a stroll down memory lane.

Still the best high I've found

Still the best high I’ve found

I was still newish to points and miles, new to blogging, still finding my voice and figuring out my travel goals.

I mentioned them at the time:

My travel goals for this round of apps are Toronto, Montreal, Boston, Dublin, Seattle, Alaska, and eventually, Australia. I’d also LOVE to fit in Vienna/Prague sometime this summer.

I made it to all of those places with the exception of Prague (which I mentioned recently as a possibility with Hilton points, so it’s still on my radar):

It goes to show the power of setting a goal.

But I should take a little wisdom “Three Years Ago Harlan” because my recent round of applications were rather scattershot. After I get settled in Dallas, I’m gonna need to plan a lot of trips with all the points and miles I’ll earn from this newest AOR.

4 new cards!

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Why I Bought a Car With Credit Cards

by Harlan 14 Comments

a silver car parked on a concrete surface

Also see: 

I’m targeting late April/early May to be out of NYC and in Dallas full-time.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted a silver Subaru Forester. Buying a house and moving to Dallas meant I’d need to buy a car sooner or later.

The budget I had in mind was $6,000 for everything. Tax, title, registration, base price of the vehicle, everything.

I knew car prices tend to rise as it gets warmer, so when I found a great deal on the car I wanted in late February, I went ahead and snagged it.

My new cahhh

My new cahhh. I named him Clyde

Oh! And I wanted to pay for it in full. No financing.

Just an in-shape, reliable used car whose only expenses were maintenance, insurance, and gas. Boom.

Buying a car with credit cards

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Bank of America Sending 30K Offers for the Alaska Airlines Card Already

by Harlan 6 Comments

a blue envelope with white text and numbers

The same day Doctor of Credit broke the news Bank of America will increase the sign-up bonus on the Alaska Airlines Visa to 30,000 Alaska miles upon approval in May, I got that exact offer in the mail. But it’s already active.

asd

One of these is not the same… 

Actually, I got two offers. One for 25,000 miles. And another for 30,000 miles upon approval.

sad

Throw in a $100 statement credit and it’s a deal

I typed in the link to the offer (alaskavisanow.com lol) and typed in the promo code in the letter. Sure enough, it works for immediate sign-ups.

If there had also been a $100 statement credit, I would’ve pulled the trigger.

Get a better offer anyway

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List of AMEX Cards NOT Issued by American Express

by Harlan 13 Comments

UPDATE: One or more of these offers are no longer available. Click here to see the latest deals!

Spoiler alert. On this list, I find the FIA Fidelity AMEX to be the most valuable. I just love that card so much.

List of AMEX Cards NOT Issued by American Express

Thank you for being a friend – and for NOT being issued by American Express

And this post is gonna be focused on Serve.

Note: It is possible to send money between Serve and REDbird, or Serve and Bluebird.

So if you’re managing multiple cards, you can get a Serve card, load it up for $1,000 each month, and send it to Bluebird or REDbird to pay bills that normally don’t accept credit cards. Like student loans, utilities, mortgage payments, or anyone else.

List of AMEX Cards NOT Issued by American Express: 

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Is the Fidelity Amex the best cashback card in the universe?

by Harlan 22 Comments

<3

<3

Sorry for the hyperbole slash clickbait-y title. I thought I was being on trend.

But seriously, I love this card. I’m close to being obsessed with it:

We all love our points and miles. But I’ve been reading about straight cashback cards for a sec now, and the poor Fidelity Amex always gets swept under the rug.

Well no longer. This card is a gem. It has so much going for it. And it might just be the ace in the back pocket of cashback cards, which by default makes it the best cashback card in the universe.

Let me extoll the ways

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Bank of America/FIA WorldPoints Mall Ending in March 2015

by Harlan 12 Comments

From the “nobody cares but me” files… 

I’ve written a lot about the FIA Fidelity American Express in the past. In my opinion, it’s the best cash back card out there for a lot of reasons: no annual fee, eligible for Amex Sync offers, ease of redemption into interest-earning accounts, and until now, the incredible shopping portal that no one ever really talked about anyway.

I check this portal every time I purchase something online, and about every 4th or 5th time, they have the best payouts. I’ve never had any issue with my points posting, although they’ve been known to take their precious time about posting from a few merchants. I’ve earned hundreds of free dollars from the WorldPoints portal just by clicking their links in the past year or two.

As of March 2015, it will be ending.

Saw this on the FIA website

Saw this on the FIA website

Then I went to verify, and sure enough it’s reflected on the Bank of America website as well.

Screenshot 2015-02-02 19.00.27

From the BofA version of the WorldPoints Mall

They routinely paid out nicely for soap.com, which is where I order my dog’s food from (well, from wag.com but I always clicked through to soap.com and still got the portal points).

5 points per dollar for soap.com

5 points per dollar for soap.com

In addition, they often had higher payouts for hotels.com, staples.com, gap.com, The Body Shop, and even a couple of stores that other portals don’t have (soap.com, actually – although it’s on the Barclays RewardsBoost portal at 2 points per dollar).

If anyone wants to get in one more round of shopping in February to get some extra free money, now’s your last chance.

Bottom line

I hate to see Bank of America following in American Express’ footsteps – Amex closed their Membership Rewards portal a couple of years ago.

Chase recently rebranded their portal as “Shop Through Chase” which gives me hope that they’re not going to close it any time soon.

It’s not the end of the world or anything, but always bad to see less options and to see banks retracting programs like this. The economy is getting better (or rather, is already better) and Bank of America/FIA probably figure they can get the extra revenue from somewhere else.

Just hope it doesn’t signal more clawbacks in the near future, or prompt other copycats. I don’t think it will – BofA is one of the stingiest banks for points and miles credit cards, so this just comes off as yet another cut they’ve made. It affects me very peripherally with the FIA card, but still…

Does anyone else use this portal? Oh god, don’t say it’s just me. ::crickets::