Bilt seems to be helpful to people who travel.
I’m mostly interested in cash rewards.
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Citi Double Cash credit card is still the best. I consistently charge everything! Farming, traveling, everything, if they won’t take my card I walk away. Every couple months I usually get $300+ cash 
check in the mail.
Works for me! (has for years)
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I transferred a stock position of over $100K to Merrill Edge to qualify for platinum honor status at Bank of America. I have two credit cards at BOA. My everyday spend is the unlimited cash rewards which gives 2.625% rewards with no limit—as the name implies. I also have a customized cash reward card that gives 5.25% rebate for a category that I choose. I use that for online purchases.
I plan to pay my income tax with the unlimited cash rewards card. It is not coded as an online purchase so I don’t use the customized cash rewards card. For federal tax, I use pay1040.com that charges 1.875%, so I net 0.75% on my tax bill. As usual, California is a lot more expensive. They charge 2.3% to pay with a credit card so I only net 0.325%.
With treasury bills yielding above 5.3%, it pays to delay paying until the last possible time. I can earn about 0.44% per month interest before taxes. Credit card rebates are of course not taxable
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You may want to consider using payUSATax this year. They lowered their fee to 1.82% for credit cards: https://www.irs.gov/payments/pay-your-taxes-by-debit-or-credit-card
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Thanks. Every little bit helps.
On another topic, I have not covered the “pay with extension to file” gambit to avoid having to hassle with your tax program trying to force you to use their high fee payment method. Once you have finished your entries to the tax program and it tells you your tax due, pay that at a low fee website with extension to file. Enter that to the tax program, so that the balance due is zero. Then file your tax return.
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You don’t have to pay through the tax program even with tax due. Just tell the program that you’ll be paying by check.
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Northwest FCU NOW Rewards Visa is a 2% card, no annual fee and no foreign transaction fee.
$150 (15,000 points) for $2000 spending in the first 90 days.
With the bonus it works out to 9.5% rewards for the first $2000. If you spend $20K for the year, it works out to 2.75%.
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I paid my state tax with the Alliant 2.5% card. Unfortunately, the credit card fee was 2.45%. So not worth it there. Federal tax had a 1.82% charge, so that’s a little better. It was plus $2 on the state tax and plus $21 on federal tax.
It’s mostly for convenience and I don’t have to pay the bill right away. A couple days ago, I did a balance transfer of my tax payments to a 0% 12 months card so I can pay in installments.
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Interesting but if you read the article, this case has been going on for years, It could still be appealed. Also, the banks make so much money from high interest rates and fees that they still make a lot of money on customers.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/26/economy/visa-mastercard-swipe-fee-settlement/index.html
Visa and Mastercard agree to $30 billion settlement that will lower merchant fees
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The NYTimes weighs in on the settlement. They say it allows merchants to charge different fees depending on the credit card you use .That would royally tick me off, and I would tend to take my business elsewhere.
The Fallout From a Credit Card Shake-Up
A proposed settlement between Visa and Mastercard and merchants on swipe fees promises savings, but it may also alter the economics of premium credit cards.
the proposed class-action settlement could have wider consequences, including for the lucrative business of high-end credit cards — and for retailers.
What’s in the settlement: Visa and Mastercard said on Tuesday that they had agreed to reduce swipe fees, costs associated with the use of a credit card, for about five years. Lawyers for merchants who had brought the case estimate that this could save about $30 billion worth of fees.
Perhaps more important, merchants will be able to raise their prices based on the kind of card. For example, buying groceries with a higher-fee card — typically a premium card like the Chase Sapphire Reserve — could become more expensive than paying with a lower-end one.
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The card companies are making obscene profits which is how they manage the ridiculous bonuses and rewards. They’re robbing the merchants because it’s a system they can’t live without now.
I can’t blame the merchants for needing to ease these fees. The card companies would remain profitable if they cut their fees 90%. Ultimately, I’d rather see that (and concomitant lower prices by merchants) than the misleading rewards and bonuses that come out of the merchants’ pockets.
And how will the merchant determine which of hundreds of variations of cards you are using for that transaction, and which fee tier that card falls into? If the merchant is charging a fee to recoup the processing costs, they’re going to pick a fixed fee that covers all or most of the cost for all cards. And pocket the difference when you use a lower cost card.
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Computers are wondrous things. If the software does not already exist, I’m sure some enterprising fintech company will spring up to write it.
My question is where will this stop? Will the merchants be able to check whether you pay your credit card balance every month and charge you higher prices? 
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Primis Bank has several credit cards, most of which have 0% APR on purchases for 12 months. The 0% applies to balance transfers but there’s a 3% fee. The rewards are only 1%, but 0% APR on purchases for 12 months in a 5% savings rate environment could be worthwhile for some people.
I don’t have the card, as I recently acquired the Advancial 0% no-fee balance transfer card, and the Northwest FCU 2% card.
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Any thoughts on the Robinhood 3% cashback on everything credit card (with basically a $50 annual fee)?
As long as you charge $5k on it annually, that’d seem to me to beat the usual 2% Citi DoubleCash and other clones.
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I do the same for property tax but never used it for income taxes. Would have saved a few hundred last year when the taxes were uncommonly high for us!
It also requires the cash back to goi nto a company brokerage account before you can transfer it elsewhere.
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You need their brokerage account anyway to qualify, to pay for that “gold” status at $60/yr. Basically any annual fee for the high cash back rate. Worth it for high spending obv.
The Paypal Mastercard is issued by Synchrony. There is sometimes a signup bonus offered. All history & payments is through Paypal app/website and is tied to one Paypal account. It is good except when 5% quarterly with some other card. (Note - Synchrony is now starting to charge 1.99 paper statement fee on this and other cards.)
Also, the cashback is available right after transactions post - meaning you don’t have to wait to statement date. You can transfer the cash back to a bank account listed on your Paypal account.
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You never use your Credit Card to pay taxes? This year 2023, taxes were a rude awaken for me. Usually farming has helped with losses, but made to much this year. boo hoo! But I uses my CITI double cash card to pay both Fed & State taxes in February. Surprise today I ordered $848. cash check, back from my Citi cc.
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