Best Reward / Cash Back Credit Cards

Finance
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Most often the scores provided me by my many FIs are dated. The dates vary, depending on the institution, over a very wide range. And too often the dates on the scores they offer me are quite a while back from the day I’m making the inquiry.

If Credit Karma is updating every seven days, that is decent service. Credit scores dated last month, or even two months ago, are of no value to me whatsoever. Why even bother.

Concession:

I probably need to add that I understand, for some folks, their credit score is (more or less or at least relatively) time invariant. And for those folks an old credit score might still have some relevance to their lives. That’s not me. But I acknowledge need for a current score does not apply to everyone.

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A credit score “dated” (whatever that means, the score is based on whatever date the credit report was pulled) today is also of no value to you. You arent making lending decisions, knowing your own score serves little purpose beyond satisfying your curiosity.

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I’m a very curious chap. My curiosity is one of several attributes that has supported my success through life. Knowing my score is important to me. If you have a different level of curiosity I respect your view. But I ask from you in return some consideration for my take on this, even though you do not share it. We are not all the same. .

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Hey, I’m all for curiosity. Curiosity is often what results in us stumbling into our lucrative shenanigans. Just don’t oversell it as being important or particularly valuable to know. At most it provides positive reinforcement for the choices you’ve already made.

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If we are talking about checking the FICO or Vantage score obsessively to watch it vary from 796 to 812 to 805 to 809, yeah, that’s fretting over something that doesn’t matter.

As someone who plays the credit card reward game, I do find it useful as a tool (beyond curiosity) to be able to see such details as hard pulls, whether or not a recent account has shown up, etc. to decide whether or not to proceed to applying for a card that data points show is sensitive to these metrics. A really bad day in the rewards card game is to apply and be denied for a card because I didn’t know that a new hard pull had shown up unexpectedly. It’s doubly bad because: 1) I didn’t get the card, and 2) I’ve added a hard pull for nothing.

I assume from previous posts that Shinobi watches credit utilization like a hawk. Maybe curiousity, maybe needed for his hobby … don’t know.

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326

I applied for a Chase Ink Preferred (for the 80,000 points) on Wednesday and nothing has shown up in my online account (I have a Chase Ink card from a long time ago that I still use regularly - same social security number but different business name). When I call to check the status of my application, the automated recording says it is under review and I will get a letter in 7 to 10 business days. How quick do folks usually hear back if they were approved for a chase business card? I was honest in my application and put my real business revenue of only $7,500/year, so my guess is that they might not think I’m worth it.

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Last year for a relative it took between 3-7 days on the ink preferred.

It’s been 3 years since I added one myself (Ink Plus), and I had a business/identity verification because I had recently moved and forgot to update address on one of my Chase cards, so I had to go in to a branch.

Revenue data point: My last one was $1K and Chase assigned a limit higher than any of my other Chase cards, almost $20k.

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Awesome, there’s still hope! Thanks for the data point.

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Appreciate the post. Yes, for me unconventional spending is more a hobby than anything else. That was a good way for you to put it.

And I’m fascinated by all aspects of my hobby. For example I recently, knowingly, intentionally and with forethought, committed a massive violation of Argyll’s rule. It was a “testing the system” sort of thing. The outcome?

My credit score hit its lowest level in recorded history. I suffered an over 100 point credit score haircut. Mind you, violation of Argyll’s rule does not involve late payments. It does not imply need to pay interest. I did “nothing wrong”, and obviously I paid the money I owed shortly after conducting the experiment, never paying a dime of interest.

My takeaway is that the idiots running the credit score game clearly had doubts about my ability to pay the money I owed . . . . unless I paid those debts essentially in advance!! WABOA

Anyway, when I paid the money my score recovered sharply. Bottom line lesson is they surely become nervous when your utilization jumps up significantly.

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I did CIP and CIC in the last few months. I think each took around 7 business days. Pretty sure I put my revenue lower than yours and was approved for both. Oddly (?), I also got a credit limit increase on the first card after a few months. (This was wonderful because I was still in the 0% purch APR window).

Happy hunting! I love chase UR points…

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331

With some new centurion lounges announced for next year… I want to verify I’m not missing anything about the Platinum, it still seems like a (relatively) expensive card.

$550 AF. But the only “credits” are $200 airline, up to $200 Uber (spread monthly) and maybe a “$100” Saks5thAvenue?
So the net annual fee I am calculating at around $230. (Valuing airline and Uber 15% and 25% discount and $0 for saks).

Seems still impossible for me to justify the steep AF for only the centurion lounges.

*Yes, I’m also valuing the low hotel statuses, GE, and priority pass at zero because negative AF cards already cover. I also would see very low value to the 5 ppd categories because I have >$10k accumulated in rewards accounts that I can use for various travel.

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The uber credits can be used on uber eats if you don’t use uber.

The airline credits can be used on ticket purchases. FT has more details about how to do that.

Another option is the business platinum card, which comes with 10 free gogo flight passes. Depending on your airline choice (and whether you would otherwise use wifi) these can be worth anywhere from $0 to ~$200. The business platinum fee is $450. There’s no uber credits though.

Both cards also allow you to use the delta sky clubs, so that’s nice if you fly delta.

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Cool, thanks for another data point. I’m kicking myself for waiting as long into Christmas spending seasons to get the card, but oh well. I shouldn’t have an issue hitting the minimum spend organically.

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Side note that creditkarma doesn’t pull data for the last 7 days, but pulls instantly. You need to wait 7 days since your last CK pull to refresh it. For example, if you pull on the 1st, you wont be able to refresh your score until the 8th. However if you pull on the 1st you will get an instant update if you pull again on the 10th (it doesn’t give you a score from the 3rd). CK is awesome for tracking what does/doesn’t hurt your score and by how much and when certain banks update after payment (pre-pay before statement cycle as Shinobi notes keeps your score premium). I use CK frequently to determine my perceived risk when I’m ready to apply for a couple cards or if I should wait for my score to rebound.

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336

if interested in credit pulls… and you have a few amex cards already… they will approve you w/o a credit check… I have a few OBCash cards and a blue cash everyday plus simply biz card… I applied for the new gold card and was immediately approved and credit check never shows up anywhere. This was on Oct 20. Card took 10 days to arrive. they allow you 5 cards.

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btw… the 250 fee is immediately charged… but plan to make it back with my 25k grocery “shopping” by 12/31. I am at 12k already. Plus the 4% unlimited on rest and fast food is a no brainer. Plus the seamless deal.

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Thanks, Corndogg. That is really good and helpful information. Much appreciated!

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Oh my goodness what a wonderful outcome! Logged into my Freedom Credit Union account this morning not really expecting much. They said it could take five or six days for the CC rewards to be credited. Nope:

There was almost $700 in rewards in my savings. They paid the FULL 5% reward as promised, right across the board. I could scarcely believe my eyes. :grinning:

Q: So Shin, was any of that unconventional spending? Because if that all was owing to conventional spending it’s really not a big deal.

It was mostly unconventional spending, though there were a good number of smaller conventional purchases. But the big items were unconventional.

Q: When you use the term “unconventional” . . . could you put a finer point on that?

Sure. One major “purchase” is exactly the same one that NFCU screwed me on, paying zero reward. Freedom paid me 5%! Another purchase was my silver coins, documented elsewhere on this forum on the “Hot Deals” board.

Q: So you are saying coin purchases are “unconventional spend”?

Look, I dunno, OK. I never bought silver before. So I just do not know. Unconventional spending, generally, is purchase of anything which can readily be converted to cash. Quasi cash is how some financial institutions refer to it. And different ones treat such spending in different ways, with some paying rewards regardless . . . and others not.

Q: Nearly seven hundred bucks is a decent reward. Did you need to exhaust your entire credit line to garner that much?

Absolutely not! It was my first time using the card. I had no way in advance to know how they would treat some of my spend. So I did not go “pedal to the metal”. I was cautious. But this month it will be different!:grinning:

Q: Anything else you can add for benefit of others who might have or want this card?

Not much. First of all, I just checked the Freedom CU website and their offer for this card, at 5%, remains open.

Only other thing is a small wrinkle, CERTAINLY not a problem, that I want to report:

I adhered to Argyll’s rule on this card. Means I paid off my balance a day or two before the statement closed. On every nickel I paid off I received the 5% reward very timely. However, there was a glitch, a small charge which they sort of messed up and did not apply to my card until the last moment.

Q: OK, so they applied a charge late. Was that conventional or unconventional spending?

It was a small conventional charge, couple hundred bucks. Because the charge came in so late it was not covered when I made my Argyll payoff, though I did manage to pay off that small charge on the very last day, November thirtieth.

Q: So what? Where are you going with this, Shin?

Again, not a big deal and certainly NOT a complaint. But I did not receive the 5% reward for that small charge . . . yet. I assume I will next month.

So all I’m saying is that they might not be paying the 5% reward until you pay off your card.

Q: You sure of that?

No, not sure. Only can report what happened with that small charge that I paid off really late. I will be adhering to Argyll’s rule on this card anyway, going forward. The late payment on the small charge was only just a glitch. But if you have the card and did not garner your rewards as timely as I did, it might (or might not) have something to do with the timing of your payments.

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You caught my attention, shinobi…

I have an acct with Freedom CU, but I don’t know how I missed this deal. So I just pulled up the promo offer for the 5% Cash back cc. But, I see it’s only good through 1/31/19. Yes, still 2 months left… Should I try?

So far I’ve been very happy with my Citi DC card.

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In your spot I would definitely try. I say that because you already are a Freedom CU member. You most likely would have your card well before Christmas.

Course it is not worth the trouble unless you can spend some money on the card this month (December) and next month. Statements close the last day of each month. That would give you the remainder of this month, plus all of January.

On the other hand, if most of your spending is already covered, or almost covered, by other cards at 5% reward, or close to that, it’s probably not worth the trouble to apply. There are 5% rewards deals all over the place, but they customarily are limited to certain spending categories, e.g., gasoline or groceries or . . . . whatever. The cool thing about the Freedom CU card is that the 5% reward is an across-the-board reward. Something like that is more valuable to some folks than to others, depending on what you are buying with the card.

ETA

One other consideration for you, as you decide, is prepayments. In January I will be prepaying my electric bill, my telephone bill, certain medical insurance bills, etc., for a while into the future. I also will be buying gift cards to pay for stuff well into 2019. Then, of course, will be my January tax payments. With a 5% reward I can make money on those. Anticipate overpaying my Federal income tax, collecting the 5% reward on the overpayment, then re-claiming it as a refund when I file my 2018 return.

I agree with you that with expiration of the 5% come end of January it is not a long time to use a new card. But if you become creative there is money to be made. I jumped on the deal early because I wanted time in November to experiment, to learn how things would play out especially on the unconventional spending side of things, before “betting the farm”. Would have to allow that it all worked out better than I had anticipated. :grinning: