After spending the week getting over having been a 1-point-per-dollar-sucker for far too long, I'm now determined to be rewarded much better. In fact, I want to be rewarded BIG for every dollar I spend. I tried to pay my health insurance with my new 2-point per dollar Venture card, but was told I can only pay by check. Damn! That's over 2,000 points per month that I can't get. I wonder if I can pay my mortgage by credit card, but I think that might be a risky thing to do ---- paying off mortgage debt with revolving debt just can't be a good idea. But I can pay my utilities, wireless and other bills with a credit card, and that should get me a bunch of points right there. I'm buying all our groceries during this 3-month period with my Chase Freedom card because it's giving me 5% cash back (the categories change every quarter. Right now it's groceries and movies, last month it was gas and Amazon).
Apparently I can earn even more with the Capital One card if I shop through their "Perk Central" website. So I went into the Perk Central to see what I can buy there that will earn me the most points per dollar. You can earn big bonuses on things you may not want (35 bonus miles per dollar for magazines.com, which would be so great if I wanted magazine subscriptions), but there are lots of things like Best Buy, Apple, iTunes and Target that give you 5 bonus miles per dollar, and various clothing and shoe retailers give you 9-12 bonus points per dollar. But here's something intriguing: Expedia, Orbitz and Priceline give you 2 extra points, Travelocity gives you 3 extra points and Hotels.com gives you 6 extra points. That means that if you book a night in a $200 hotel on hotels.com through this portal, you get 1200 points. Or is that 1200 points on top of the 400 points you'd get just by using the card? I'll have to call them again. I call them all the time now. I have a new question pretty much every day, and I now expect lots of service. I've become such a diva this week. They have live chat, which I now love for the purpose of transcription (see below).
Tamar: Hi Pamela. I just signed up for the Venture card and I'm looking at the Perk Central list of bonus miles, and wondering if the bonus points are ON TOP of the 2 miles you get for every dollar spent with the venture card, or instead of.
Pamela: That's a great question. I'm sorry for any confusion that you may have experienced. Yes, the bonus miles that you get on Perk Central are on top of the 2 miles that you get with your card normally.
Tamar: so if hotels.com, for example says they're giving 6 bonus points for every dollar, and I book a $200 hotel stay, I'm getting how many points? 8 per dollar? 1600 miles??
Pamela: Yes, as long as you go through our website to get to hotels.com to book the reservations.
Tamar: wow, great, thanks!
Pamela: I am happy to help! Is there anything else I can help you with today?
Look at that, they thank you for being a pest in this country. I love that.
And what, pray tell, am I going to DO with all these points? Tune in tomorrow, when I involve you in my exploration of the smartest ways to SPEND reward points!
I can just tell this is going to turn into a series.
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