This is an update to my earlier post and includes the results of my attempt at a second and third Chase Ink card from back in December. I already had an active Chase Ink Bold but decided to apply for the Chase Ink Plus and a second Chase Ink Bold (for my other business for which I needed a completely separate account). I had never had an Ink Plus before so I was not worried about the bonus miles posting, but the additional Ink Bold was more concerning. I applied for my new Ink Bold card using my Employer Identification Number (EIN) instead of my SSN, which I previously used, and I was later approved after agreeing to reallocate credit from one of my other Chase cards (even though the Bold is a charge card and has no actual credit limit, Chase wanted me to reduce the credit on one of my other cards). I also had to explain my two separate businesses and why it was so important to keep expenses completely separate. Remember, the bonus is once per individual or business per card type. Also as you are most probably aware, the Chase Ink Bold and Chase Ink Plus are considered different products.

Well, the 50k bonus miles posted for both of my new Ink Cards, one was even slightly short of the spending requirements! Even after transferring points to United last month for a first class trip to Asia, I’m still at well over 200K Ultimate Rewards points!

Some Data Points

• Credit score – Just shy of 800. Make sure to check your scores before applying.  Get your free TransUnion score from CreditKarma and your free Experian score from Credit Sesame. Don’t forget that you are also entitield to a free credit report each year from the 3 major credit reporting bureaus. You can order your reports at http://www.annualcreditreport.com, which include any recent inquires but do not include credit scores.
• Total number of Chase cards prior – 6
• An Employer Identification Number (EIN) is easy to obtain online from the IRS. Check out this link. Note that you still need to enter your SSN at the bottom of the application so that Chase can check your credit history.
• If you aren’t automatically approved, call the Chase reconsideration line at  1-800-453-9719 for the INK cards and 1-888-245-0625 for personal cards.
• REMEMBER to move your UR points to an account you will be keeping before offering to cancel any of your cards!

Another interesting data point from this churn is that I only received two hard pulls from Chase, even though I applied for the Ink Bold, Ink Plus, and a second Sapphire Preferred.

Chase is currently offering a 50K sign up bonus for both the Ink Plus and the Ink Bold after $5,000 spend within 3 months. The Ink Plus is the credit card edition of the Ink Bold (which is a charge card). Remember, a credit card allows you to pay part of your bill each month while a charge card requires you to pay your balance in full. Why do I love these cards? Ultimate Rewards is one of my favorite currencies. I love the flexibility to transfer them at a 1:1 ratio to United, Hyatt, Marriott, and other partners. The cards are also great for charging my monthly cable/internet and cell phone bills for 5x points as well as 2x points at gas stations and hotels. Both cards also include no foreign exchange fees.

Ultimate Rewards Partners with a 1:1 transfer ratio:

Chase Ink Bold®  Business Card

• Earn 50,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 in the first 3 months from account opening
• No interest charges because it’s a pay in full charge card
• Earn up to 5X points per dollar on eligible business purchases, and points do not expire
• Transfer points at full value to participating travel programs.
• Direct access to a live service advisor anytime.
• Introductory Offer – First Year Free ($95 thereafter)

Chase Ink Plus®  Business Card 

• Reward yourself with 50,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 in the first 3 months from account opening
• With Ink Plus, you have the cash flow flexibility with the choice to pay over time or pay in full
• Earn 5X points per $1 on the first $50,000 spent annually at office supply stores, and on cellular phone, landline, internet, and cable TV services
• Earn 2X points per $1 on the first $50,000 spent annually at gas stations and for hotel accommodations when purchased directly with the hotel
• No foreign transaction fees
• Free employee cards
• 1:1 point transfer to participating travel programs with no transfer fees
• Get 20% off travel redemptions when booked through Ultimate Rewards.

It’s been quite easy to score Vanilla Reloads in the New York metropolitan area IF you were willing to head out to Long Island, New Jersey, or Connecticut. However, for those who refuse to leave Manhattan Island, it’s been difficult! There are very few CVS locations that still stock Vanilla Reloads and then a few weeks ago several of the stores that actually had them stopped accepting credit card payments. Well, I have some good news for NYC VR collectors, two locations are now fully stocked with 30-40 cards per location! I’m providing the details below, but please be accommodating to your fellow readers and limit your purchases to one or two per person.

CVS – East 34th street between 2nd and 3rd. About 40 cards remaining. Self-checkout and the checkout counter DO NOT work for credit cards. You must use the pharmacy checkout. $1000 max per transaction so make sure you remember to consider the $3.95 fee per card. Update – This location has about twenty cards remaining.  Update 2 – 3:30pm EST, no cards remaining here either. Impressive speed from the PMttP readers!

CVS – East 42nd street between 3rd and and Lex. About 30 cards remaining. Self-checkout and regular checkout work. ID required, $1000 max per transaction so make sure you remember to consider the $3.95 fee per card. Update – This location has no cards remaining. 

Live from the CVS on E. 34th…

Related – Witnessing A Vanilla Reload Delivery & Coupons w/ VR Cards!
Related – Vanilla Reload No Credit D-Day Averted
Related – Checkout Experiments in Vanilla Reloads Continued

Please email me availability updates so that I can post for other readers. Thanks!

This card just keeps giving and giving. Here’s another easy way to earn even more bonus miles in addition to the original sign-up bonus and the 15,000 non-use bonus. Reader Andrew in SLC emailed me back in March that he received an email offer in late February that offered 500 miles for switching to paperless statements - Sign up for Paperless Statements on your US Airways MasterCard by March 31, 2013 and get 500 Bonus Miles.

Now, according to Andrew, his wife Marni already had a previous US Airways card and her new card was automatically enrolled in paperless statements. He switched her back to paper statements the day he received the email in hopes that she too would receive the offer. Andrew reported that three weeks and two days after switching to paper, Marni received the offer as well…but for 1,000 miles!

Like Marni, I already had a previous US Airways MasterCard and it was enrolled for paperless statements which carried over to my new card received in December. I switched back to paper statements on March 11th and have been waiting for my paperless offer. It took much longer than Marni’s! Today, May 16th (just over 2 months after reverting to paper statements), I finally received the offer in the mail…though it’s only for 500 miles. Be Green Warning – For 1,000 US Airways miles, I certainly would have made the switch and sacrificed being green for two months. However, for only 500 miles, you might want to consider the environment. Up to you…

Additionally, Splittin’ Aces on Flyertalk has started a thread on Flyertalk regarding his 500 mile paperless offer and the other offers received as well.

So, without taking into account any of my spending, I’ve earned a whopping 55,500 points from one US Airways MasterCard (40K sign-up, 15K spending bonus, 500 paperless bonus). That’s a pretty incredible sign-up bonus! I plan to cancel the card at the end of this month and apply once more to try and earn the bonuses all over again (I was shockingly turned down in my last app-o-rama for already having the card).

Current sign-up offers (40K first year free is dead)
1) 35K after your first purchase, annual fee waived for the first year, 10K for card renewal. No landing page or promo details (thanks Chester F for the link).
2) 30K after your first purchase, annual fee of $89, up to an additional 10K when you transfer a balance within 90 days (1 mile per $). Full landing page and promo details.
3) Business Card - 25K after your first purchase, up to 10K for balance transfer within the first 30 days (1 mile per $), $79 annual fee. Note this link will also give you the option to select a business card with no annual fee and 5K miles for signing up.

Related - Building Up US Airways Miles for the AA Merger – Time to Take AAdvantage, Full List of Offers!

British Airways and Chase are offering a 10% discount to British Airways Visa Signature cardholders on every British Airways round-trip flight booked through ba.com/Chase10 when you use your British Airways Visa Signature card with promotion code: CARDOFFERU. Flights must be booked with outbound travel commencing from now through December 31, 2013 and travel must originate in the US.

• Discount is off the total cost of the fare (including taxes, fees, and carrier charges).
• Choose from any of British Airways 300+ destinations.
• Travel in any cabin — World Traveller, World Traveller Plus, Club World or First.
• Book up to eight friends and family members travelling on the same flight.

T&Cs
Valid only for new bookings made by US residents paying in USD with a valid British Airways Visa Signature card issued by Chase, for travel commencing from the US to London and beyond. Cardholder must travel to qualify for the 10% discount. To take part in this promotion, eligible participants must log in at www.ba.com/Chase10, make a roundtrip booking between December 11, 2012 and December 31, 2013, and enter the promotion code provided in this offer into the marked box on the Price Quote page of the booking process. Offer is non-transferable and cannot be combined with any other offer. Outbound travel must commence by December 31, 2013. 10% discount will appear on the final payment page. Discount is valid on the total roundtrip purchase price, including taxes, fees and carrier charges, on mainline flights operated by British Airways. Discount is not valid for flights on code share or franchise carriers. 10% discount on British Airways flights is valid for flight purchase only and does not apply to excess baggage fees, seat assignment fees, purchasing Avios for rewards or rewards fees. Roundtrip open jaw bookings are eligible for only one discount. Example of open jaw booking: outbound JFK to LON and return PAR to JFK. All rules of purchased fare apply, including advance purchase, minimum stay, weekend-add-ons, and cancellation/refund rules. Other travel related restrictions may apply. Valid only for new bookings made by US residents paying in USD with a valid British Airways Visa card issued by Chase, for travel commencing from the US to London and beyond. Cardholder must travel to qualify for the 10% discount. Discount applies for up to eight passengers booked on the same British Airways flight. Refunds from previously purchased fare types not permitted. In the event of program fraud or abuse, British Airways may withdraw this promotion.

Chase British Airways Visa Signature® Card

The 100,000 British Airways card offer may be over but the current 50k offerhas a much simpler spending requirement of only $1000 within three months. Why should you take advantage of this offer if you live in the US and you know of BA’s ridiculous fuel surcharges? I recently went to Barbados round-trip on American for only $47.50 in taxes and 12,500 Avios points each way (instead of 17,500 AA miles).  BA offers amazing redemption opportunities on short-haul flights and points can be used for cheap awards on American Airlines award redemptions within North America, the Caribbean, and Hawaii. There are even some good long-haul opportunities that avoid the outrageous taxes and fees that BA has become known for.  Check out this post for the short haul opportunitiesand this post with the long haul opportunities. Also, remember that BA allows household accounts where up to 7 members residing at the same address can combine and pool their points together. There is a $95 annual fee for the card that is not waived for the first year.

• You will get 50,000 bonus Avios after you make $1,000 in purchases within the first 3 months of account opening
• Plus pay no foreign transaction fees when you travel abroad
• You will also get 2.5 Avios for every $1 spent on British Airways purchases and 1.25 Avios for every $1 spent on all other purchases
• Every calendar year you make $30,000 in purchases on your British Airways Visa card, you’ll earn a Travel Together Ticket good for two years
• Chip with Signature Technology allows you to use your card for chip based purchases in Europe & beyond, while still giving you the ability to use your card as you do today at home

Unless you failed to visit BoardingArea entirely yesterday, you must be aware of the amazing limited time 75K AMEX Business Gold offer. At one point in the day, I think I counted 7 blogs promoting the offer. Why is the offer so great? It’s by far the most generous ever for this product type. The previous promotion was for 50,000 points after spending $5,000 on the card within three months. The normal offer prior to the 50K promotion had no sign-on bonus at all! I have received a 75K offer in the past (over a year ago) but it required $10,000 in spend, making this promotion extraordinary. The current offer is for 75K Membership Rewards points after spending $5,000 within three months with the annual fee waived for the first year. Now, this promotion was not advertised by AMEX and may be pulled at any point.

Anyway, the application instructions were pretty clear from most, in order to receive the offer you had to clear you browsing history or open an incognito tab/ private browser session. For me, when I first clicked the link, the landing page opened in my default browser (Chrome) and I did not receive the 75K offer, instead the normal 50K offer was presented. I cleared my history and cache, but still had no luck. Next, I moved on to Firefox. Once again, I cleared my history and cache but the offer I received was still for 50K. I finally copied the link into Safari and was able to get the offer to come up for 75K! Just one problem, the phone rang and I walked away…and the offer page expired. Upon reloading (even after clearing my history), only the 50K offer would come up. This time I sent the link to myself via iMessage and opened it using an incognito tab on my iPhone’s Google Chrome browser. Success! Two quick application pages to fill out and I was approved!

PS – Look at that ridiculous iPhone battery drain… 41% to 36% in 9 minutes with no other applications opened …visited the Apple Store earlier in the evening!

• Earn 75,000 Membership Rewards® points after you spend $5,000 in purchases on the Card in the first 3 months of Card membership
• 3X points on airfare purchased from airlines (up to $100,000/year)
• 2X points in the U.S. for advertising in select media, gasoline at U.S. stand-alone stations, and shipping, (up to $100,000/year)
• 1x points on all other purchases
• $0 introductory annual fee for the first year, then $175

Membership Rewards has a ton of airline partners including: Delta, AeroMexico, Air Canada, Alitalia, ANA, British Airways, Air France/KLM, Frontier, Hawaiian, Iberia, JetBlue, Singapore (exclusive access to Singapore Suite Class), Virgin Atlantic, and Virgin America. Under the current BA transfer promotion, these 75K points would transfer to 101,250 BA Avios.

This offer is not available if you’ve had an American Express business card that earned Membership Rewards points within the last 12 months. Personal cards are OK!

Update – Link is no longer working!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I had been patiently waiting and hoping to receive the much talked about 15k offer from Barclays and it finally arrived at the end of February. Several readers who signed up for the card a month or two after me, had been waiting for their offer as well, two of them (Eric and Bryant) emailed me yesterday to inform me that they received the offer yesterday for May 1- July 31st! What is the 15k offer? Lately, Barclays has been offering an additional 15K bonus for spending $750 every month for 3 months after a period of inactivity once you complete your first purchase (usually 2 months or so) on your new US Airways Premier World MasterCard. In my case, I applied for the card (for a second time) in early December and made my first purchase on December 17th. My bonus miles posted to my Dividend Miles account on January 2nd and I then tucked the card away. For those of you who have just received the card, this promotion is still very much alive and I’d recommend curbing your spending after your first purchase in order to potentially qualify for this promotion.

Check out this previous post for results of my experiments in US Airways MasterCard churning and tips on proposed timelines and best available offers.

1) 35k after your first purchase, annual fee waived for the first year, 10k for card renewal. No landing page or promo details (thanks Chester F for the link).
2) 30k after your first purchase, annual fee of $89, up to an additional 10k when you transfer a balance within 90 days (1 mile per $). Full landing page and promo details.
3) Business Card - 25k after your first purchase, up to 10k for balance transfer within the first 30 days (1 mile per $), $79 annual fee. Note this link will also give you the option to select a business card with no annual fee and 5k miles for signing up.

Offer is valid for select cardmembers and is not transferable. You will earn 15,000 bonus miles after you charge over $750 in net retail purchases (purchases that are not returned or rescinded) each month from May 1, 2013 through July 31, 2013. If you do not spend over $750 in any of the 3 months of the promotion, you will not be eligible for any bonus miles as part of this offer. To receive your bonus miles, your account must be open and in good standing. Purchases made during periods when your account is delinquent, your balance exceeds your credit line or your account is otherwise not in good standing as defined in your Credit Card Cardmember Agreement do not qualify for this offer. Your bonus miles will appear on your statement up to 6-8 weeks after the end of the promotion. Net retail purchases do not include such things as the purchase of money orders, traveler’s checks, foreign currency, lottery tickets, gambling chips, wire transfers, person-to-person money transfers or using the account to obtain a cash advance.

Wow, sometimes it’s pathetic how obsessed I get over this hobby, but then I think about the amazing experiences I’ve had all courtesy of my points and miles. That’s when I say, who cares about what others think! Yesterday, I had one of those obsessed moments when I happened to be at a CVS when a gift card delivery arrived. I watched as the red crate was opened and the workers unpacked the gift card packs one at a time. As they got near the bottom, three separate packs of beautiful Vanilla Reloads were uncovered…

Each pack had 10 cards enclosed…

…the three packs sat unopened while I documented the unpacking…hah

Some interesting facts to note at this suburban NY location. The gift card limit per day using a credit card was randomly $930, as such I purchased two cards (yes, only two!) at $465 each. More interestingly though, the Vanilla Reload purchase qualified me for a CVS coupon of $5 off a purchase of $30 or more that had already been sent to my ExtraCare card. Although coupons cannot be used on gift cards themselves, the gift card purchase qualified me for my $5 discount. My greeting card for $2.79 ended up being free, though if I had known ahead of time I would have spent at least $5 in addition to the VR cards. This is great news as I seem to get coupons like this almost every single weekend and now my VR purchases will qualify me for free CVS purchases!

FrequentMiler has a post today titled Better than free manufactured spend, which describes a few potential opportunities that can actually earn you a profit on your manufactured spend when utilizing PIN enabled debit gift cards. As mentioned last week, select Visa gift cards recently became pin enabled which allows them to be used as debit cards to load your Amex Bluebird card. Bluebird cards can be loaded via a debit card at any Walmart with a daily limit of $1000 and a monthly limit of $5000 and no additional fees (FrequentMiler discusses his experience here). You can also use a debit card to fund your Bluebird account online, though the limits are quite low and you’ll incur a fee (max of $100 per day or per transaction and $1000 per month and a fee of $2 per transaction). To earn money back on your manufactured spend, you’ll have to make use of one of the cash back portals.

If your time is important and you don’t necessarily want to jump through all those hoops (or wait for your cash back), consider Chase’s visa prepaid gift cards which are being offered fee free for a limited time. You’ll essentially be funding your Bluebird card for free!

The cards can only be purchased using a Chase credit (or debit) card, but they do allow pins to be assigned by calling Chase at 1.866.466.0079 once you receive the card.

I purchased my card last Thursday with my Sapphire Preferred card and received it in the mail on Wednesday, though the T&Cs state that delivery typically takes 5-7 days. I assigned a pin to my card that day without any problems. However, I’ve not yet had a chance to visit a Walmart to load my Bluebird card.

Luckily, The Points Traveler (who first broke the news), has posted a follow-up entry answering several pending questions including confirmation of a successful Bluebird reload with the card at Walmart, assurance that the transaction does NOT post as a cash advance, and confirmation of points earning when purchasing the cards. He also answers reader questions on how many cards you can buy and limits to watch out for.

I’ll be attempting to reload with the card this weekend, but I’m glad we have people like FrequentMiler and The Points Traveler experimenting for us! HT to Travel-Summary  who found the deal that FrequnetMiler blogged about.

Anyone else subscribe to Fandango’s FanMail newsletter? Hah, I didn’t think so! Well, I’m happy to report that there was some interesting news yesterday for Visa Signature holders, Buy One Get One Friday movie nights return this Friday and will last through August 2nd. Tickets must be purchased and used on a Friday and there is a limit of one purchase per card per 30 days (though I’m sure you have several Visa Signature cards). I’m sure you have at least one of the following cards which are Visa Signature: Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase British Airways, Chase Hyatt Card, Chase Marriott Rewards / Marriott Rewards Premier, Chase Southwest Plus, Bank of America Hawaiian Airlines, Citi AAdvantage Visa Signature, and Citi Hilton HHonors Reserve.

It’s been a busy month for Visa Signature promotions. Earlier this week I posted about a free 6 month CLEAR airport security membership for cardholders and hopefully you’ve also taken advantage of the free Hilton HHonors Gold status for Visa Signature members that MilesQuest details here.

Visa Signature is offering a free 6 month CLEAR Membership to speed-up your journey through Airport security.  Several of our favorite cards are Visa Signature cards including: Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase British Airways, Chase Hyatt Card, Chase Marriott Rewards / Marriott Rewards Premier, Chase Southwest Plus, Bank of America Hawaiian Airlines, Citi AAdvantage Visa Signature, and Citi Hilton HHonors Reserve.

CLEAR is used for expediting the normal security process at airport checkpoints. “Bring your CLEARcard and boarding pass to airport security and let the CLEARcube guide your way. At CLEAR, verify and you’re back on your way in minutes. Flying with kids has never been easier! Your CLEARcard covers your children under eighteen traveling with you for free.”

Currently, the only participating airports are:

Some important things to remember including to cancel your membership PRIOR to the 6 month trial ending in order to avoid any fees:

• Only U.S. citizens and permanent foreign residents aged 18 and over are eligible for CLEARmembership.
• Following your initial CLEARmembership period, your Visa Signature card will automatically be charged a promotional price of $60 off the then applicable annual rate for your 12-month CLEARmembership.
• To cancel automatic renewals of your CLEARmembership, you may call CLEAR’s customer service line at 855-VISA-CLR (847-2257).
• Your annual CLEAR membership fee is refundable; except that refunds will be pro-rated based on the time remaining on your membership and are subject to a $30 cancellation fee (unless you cancel prior to the expiration date of your free 6-month CLEARmembership).
• Your promotional price is applicable to your initial 12-month CLEARmembership and any future renewals so long as your qualifying Visa Signature card remains valid, on file at CLEAR and Visa continues to make the Visa Signature CLEAR offer available to Visa Signature cardholders. Otherwise, your CLEARmembership automatically renews each year at the then applicable rate. Visa reserves the right to modify or cancel this offer at any time and without notice. CLEAR will notify you at least 30 days before your card is charged.
• This offer is non-transferable and the free 6 month trial is available only on new memberships.
• Don’t forget, in person verification is required at one of the Enrollment Centers prior to using the CLEARlanes.

Now, remember that Global Entry grants you access to TSA Pre Check and costs only $100 for 5 years or is completely free if you are an AMEX Platinum or Centurion cardmember. If you are flying internationally from a TSA Pre Check terminal, you would receive expedited security screening both prior to your departure via TSA Pre Check and then upon the return via Global Entry.

Many readers have commented that they aren’t able to find Vanilla Reload cards or that their local merchants won’t accept credit card payments for VRs. DansDeals reports on an alternative, using purchased Visa gift cards (which over the weekend became pin enabled) to load your Bluebird card or to get cash back:

So the big news over the weekend is that you can now assign a pin number to gift cards, effectively turning them into debit cards. The automated call number for my gift cards easily allowed me to assign a pin number for my gift cards. I took a few thousand dollars worth of gift cards to WalMart today and loaded $1,000 onto mine and my wife’s Bluebird cards.  You are able to do this with any cashier. In the process I learned that you can use up to 4 cards per transaction, so that’s $400 of loads with 4 $100 cards or $800 of loads with 4 $200 cards.  This saves you time over doing a separate transaction for every card. You can load up to $1,000 per day and $5,000 per month. Get cash back from gift cards: I was also able to pickup a 98 cent bottle of Softsoap and select cash back to get cold hard cash from a gift card. However I was only able to get cash back in multiples of $20, so I’ll probably use Amazon Payments to wipe the remaining balance from the cards. I went to WalMart to be able to load Bluebird and to get cash back on a purchase.  I’m sure it will work at other stores as well so if you try to use a gift card with a pin to make a cash back debit purchase elsewhere please post the results in the comments. There are no fees to load the cards onto Bluebird in Walmart and there are no fees to get cash back. I did not have success though with the Mastercards from Office Max and Staples, I only had success with the Visa cards.  If you get the Visa gift cards from Office Max or Staples you should be good to go.  Other brands may work as well, I just haven’t tested them myself.

The full entry includes Dan’s value analysis for buying gift cards as well. Unfortunately, the comments section of the post does not yet have any examples of other Visa gift cards where a pin was successfully assigned (it seems to currently only work with the MetaBank Visa cards sold at Office Max), though one reader does comment on a rumor that Vanilla Visa card pins will be working soon too. There are also no other examples of stores where the cash back option has worked. Clearly, the best and easiest option is still Vanilla Reloads (if you are in an area where you can find them and pay with a credit card).