Chase Sapphire Preferred First Friday

Lots of dining out news today.  

Just a reminder - tomorrow is the first Friday of the month.  And that means, you'll earn 3x points (actually 3.21 with the 7% dividend) for all of your dining spend on the Chase Sapphire Preferred card.

Whether it's coffee in the morning, lunch out, or date night, you'll still get your 3.21 points for each dollar spent. 

Because you can transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to a variety of partners, you can pretty easily redeem those pends for 2 cents each.  That means, you're effectively earning 6.42% back on your dining spend today which is pretty phenomenal.

If you have the Chase Freedom card and the CSP (or an Ink card) that's definitely the card to use given the opportunity to earn 10x back on your dining spend.  But if you only have a CSP, tomorrow is a great day to use it when you're out to eat.

10% Off at Restaurants & Lowe's During Q2

As I've written about before, The Chase Freedom card is a great tool to maximize Chase Ultimate Rewards.  In combination with the rotating 5x categories, you can essentially earn 10% off on those purchases assuming you value Chase Ultimate Rewards points at 2 cents a piece.

You must also have a card (either Chase Ink or Sapphire Preferred) in order to get the most value out of this strategy.  Without one of those cards, you're capped at 5% cash back on the rotating categories and you wouldn't be able to transfer the points to an Ultimate Rewards earning account.

In our house, Emily has the Freedom card and I have Sapphire and Ink.  So by spending on her card at restaurants and Lowe's this quarter, we'll earn 5x points which we'll combine into my Ultimate Rewards account.

This strategy is capped at 7,500 total points ($1,500 in spend) per quarter but it should be a no brainer to spend $500 a month dining in Q2 to earn those points!

Triple Dipping on Bangkok Hotel Reservation

On our way to Bali this summer, we have an overnight in Bangkok.  Our flight from Seoul lands at 10:30PM and our flight to Bali departs the next morning at 9:00AM.  We thought about heading into Bangkok for the night but decided it would be easier to overnight at the airport, get a good night sleep and enjoy a free massage in the Thai Airways Royal Orchard Spa in the morning.

There is a Novotel hotel connected (5 minute walk) to the Bangkok airport.  Over the weekend I checked rates for the property on the hotel's website and found that it was going for a prepaid AI rate of $138 USD.  I then used evReward to see if I could earn some points on my booking.

A quick overnight here before Bali

Hotels.com was offering 5x Ultimate Rewards points so I checked out the rate for the hotel and found it was exactly the same.  Excellent...time to triple dip:

• I booked the hotel (for $138) through the Ultimate Rewards mall earning 738 points  
• I paid with my Chase Sapphire Preferred card earning an additional 296 points including the 7% dividend
• Hotels.com also has a rewards program where you can earn a free night after booking 10 nights

I value the Ultimate Rewards points at $21 and the hotels.com credit at around $10.  Thus my total "rebate" is $31 on spend of $138 which is a 22% discount.  Well worth the extra ten minutes it took to check a couple of things out before booking the overnight.

First Friday - 3x Points on Dining with Chase Sapphire Preferred

Just a reminder - it is the first Friday of the month.  And that means, you'll earn 3x points (actually 3.21 with the 7% dividend) for all of your dining spend on the Chase Sapphire Preferred card.

Whether it's coffee in the morning, lunch out, or date night, you'll still get your 3.21 points for each dollar spent.

Because you can transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to a variety of partners, you can pretty easily redeem those pends for 2 cents each.  That means, you're effectively earning 6.42% back on your dining spend today which is pretty phenomenal.

Point Transfers: Chase Ultimate Rewards

I've written about how Chase Ultimate Rewards are one of my favorite point currencies.  If you are new to UR points, read these posts on how to earn them via the Chase Sapphire Preferred card and how to combine points between cardholders.

Once you have accumulated a stash of points, you're going to want to redeem them.  That is the point of this whole game/hobby anyway.  Here's a quick overview of how to redeem/transfer points to one of the UR travel partners:

1. Login to your Chase Ultimate Rewards Account
2. Mouse over the "Point Transfer" menu on the top navigation bar
3. Select the travel partner (in this case I've selected United) you want to transfer points to
4. Select the number of points/miles you'd like to transfer (in 1,000 point/mile increments)
5. Enter your United MileagePlus number twice
6. Enter your First and Last Name
7. Click "Continue" and then confirm the transfer

I've found that most transfer points (I've used United and Hyatt most often) transfer immediately so Ultimate Rewards points are awesome if you find availability and want to book something while it's still available.

Select the point transfer partner

Enter the transfer amount and your personal information

Combining Points: Chase Ultimate Rewards

Chase Ultimate Rewards are one of the most valuable points currencies because it's easy to earn a ton of them and they are incredibly flexible.  Chase offers the ability to transfer points (at 1:1 ratio) to ten different travel partners.  I typically transfer my Ultimate Rewards points to United, Hyatt, or British Airways (in that order) because they offer the best value and return.

Ultimate Rewards Transfer Partners

One great thing about the UR program is the ability to instantly transfer points between accounts.  This benefit really comes in handy if you are close to an award and need a few thousands points from a friend or relative.  Emily and I keep our stash of UR points in my account so about once per month, I login to her account and transfer them over to mine.

Here are the instructions for combining points between accounts in three easy steps:

1. Login to your Chase Ultimate Rewards account
2. Under the "Earn Faster" menu, select "Combine Ultimate Rewards Points"
3. Enter the Credit Card Number and Last Name of the point recipient

That's it.  This process takes a couple of minutes and because of the instantaneous nature of these transfers, can be extremely helpful when ready to book an award flight/hotel night.

My Chase Sapphire 7% Dividend Posted!

One of the great features of the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is the 7% annual dividend on all spend.  This includes bonuses, an extra 7% on category bonuses like dining and travel, and 7% on top of your Ultimate Rewards earnings.  The bonus typically posts on the second statement of the year in February.  I received mine this morning.

An extra 7% for 2013 CSP Spend

I actually spent around $22K last year on this card.  About half was everyday spend (travel and dining) but I also leveraged Amazon Payments to get extra points across the year.  In total, I earned 2,926 bonus points which is 7% of roughly 42,000 meaning I earned an "extra" 20,000 points from category bonuses and the Chase Ultimate Rewards Mall last year.  Not bad.

The 7% dividend is a great feature of this card and receiving the bonus in February is always a nice surprise.

Why I Love the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card

The most "abused" card I have in my wallet is the Chase Sapphire Preferred(R) card.  Beyond the awesome look (name on the front, numbers on the back) and feel (this card is heavy) the CSP has some outstanding benefits.  There are certainly more benefits but here are my top 10:

1. The current sign-up bonus is 45,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points after spending $3,000 in the first 3 months
2. 2x points on travel and dining
3. 3x points on dining on the first Friday of each month through the end of 2014
4. A 7% annual dividend on all points earned including the sign-up and category bonuses
5. $0 annual fee for the first year, $95 thereafter
6. The ability to transfer Ultimate Rewards points between accounts (super useful for couples/families to consolidate balances)
7. Access to the Ultimate Rewards Mall for additional earning opportunities
8. Awesome transfer partners including United, Marriott, Hyatt, British Airways, and Korean Air
9. Most points transfer instantly so you can locate your award and then transfer the points
10. No foreign transaction fees when traveling abroad (typically 3%).  You can also get the card with a chip (like mine below) so you can use it in Europe.  Many places won't accept the card without the chip.

My "abused" CSP

If you don't already have this card, you should get it right away (post on getting started) and put it in your wallet.  For most people, these are the most lucrative category bonuses.  Approximately 50% of my spend falls into the travel or dining category.  Travel is pretty broad and includes airfare, hotels, rental cars, parking, etc...I have this card linked to my Uber account as those charges count as travel.

Here's a quick example if you get the card today:

• Spend $2,000 per month, 50% on travel and dining
• You would earn 3,000 points per month in spend (36,000 total for the year)
• 45,000 bonus points in month three for hitting the new cardmember bonus
• The 7% dividend would pay out 5,670 points at the end of the year

In total, you would earn 86,670 Ultimate Rewards points.  This doesn't take into consideration the 3x "First Friday" or any additional points earned through the Ultimate Rewards Mall.  Those points could be transferred to a variety of different partners but let's use a real world example.  You could transfer the points to Hyatt and redeem for 4 nights at the Park Hyatt Istanbul where we stayed in November.  When we stayed, the hotel was selling for $380 USD per night.  The hotel is a Hyatt category 5 and requires 20,000 points per night or 80,000 total.

So you would be getting $1,520 in "value" from $12,000 in spend.  That is a 6.33% return!  Pretty solid redemption and a great way to get a luxury hotel stay for managing your everyday spend efficiently. 

Getting Started: Online Shopping Portals

This the third in a series (posts one and two) of posts on getting started earning, managing, and redeeming points and miles.  Everyone shops online and it’s one of the best ways to earn incremental points and miles.  Most airlines (United, American, Southwest, etc…) have shopping portals that enable you to earn points by clicking through their affiliate links.  Many Chase issued cards also have their own shopping portal through Chase Ultimate Rewards called the Chase Ultimate Rewards Mall.

Sample United Shopping Offers

It’s really simple…click through one of the links above, login using your AA/United/Southwest/Chase credentials, find a retailer, click through to their website and shop as you normally would online.  During an especially big promotion earlier this year, we spent a few hundred dollars at eBags when they were offering 35 miles for each dollar spent.  We earned over 10,000 miles in about ten minutes buying Christmas presents and a new suitcase for Emily.  

Holiday Shopping yielded a ton of AA miles

In some cases you can “double dip” to really maximize the points earned.  I’ve been able to go through a shopping portal to buy a gift card earning 4x points.  Then I used that gift card to pay for something I was going to buy anyway through the same portal earning another 4x points.  Everyone has a different “valuation” for how much their miles are worth.  I value most of my airline miles at $.02 each.  So earning an incremental 8 miles per dollar spent is like getting 16% off your purchase for a few minutes of work.