A while ago I asserted that I was beginning to favor the Ink Bold over the Sapphire Preferred credit card. Yes, they’re both great cards, but the Ink Bold’s automatic 5 points per dollar for office supplies and other categories is hard to beat (and easy to take advantage of…). Now, it has come to my attention that the Ink Bold also has the best version of the Ultimate Rewards Mall!
Did you know that the Ultimate Rewards Mall gives different bonuses depending upon what card you use to log into the mall? FlyerTalker HikerT brought this to my attention a while ago and he has now created a great web page that shows the bonus rates for each merchant and card combination. You can find his web page here: www.lakebagger.com/ur/
Currently, the mall shows the following stores with different rates for different cards:
|
|
Ink Bold (New) |
Sapphire Preferred |
Freedom |
|
Dell Home |
5x |
3x |
3% |
|
Macys.com |
3x |
5x |
5% |
|
OfficeMax.com |
5x |
4x |
4% |
|
Sears.com |
5x |
4x |
5% |
Of the 4 stores with different rates, 3 have better rates for the Ink Bold than for the Sapphire Preferred! Even more convincing is that there are many stores that are only available for the new Ink Bold and not for any other card. That’s right: the following stores are not available in the Ultimate Rewards Mall for the Sapphire Preferred, Freedom, or even for the old Ink Bold (note: it is possible that the Ink Classic and/or Ink Cash do have these merchants. If you have either of these cards, please let us know).
Merchants Exclusive to the new Ink Bold
|
1-800-GOT-JUNK? |
3x |
|
1st Wishes |
8x |
|
Adorama |
2x |
|
Adorn.com |
7x |
|
Affliction Clothing |
3x |
|
AllPosters.com |
6x |
|
Apothica |
7x |
|
Art.com |
6x |
|
AutoZone |
4x |
|
BabyAge.com |
4x |
|
Baymont Inn & Suites |
2x |
|
BeachCamera.com |
2x |
|
Beauty Encounter |
4x |
|
BeautyBar.com |
5x |
|
Belk.com |
2x |
|
Bergners |
2x |
|
Big Fish Games |
5x |
|
Bob and Ron’s World Wide Stereo |
2x |
|
Bobby Jones |
6x |
|
Bon-Ton |
2x |
|
BookIt.com |
3x |
|
BookRenter.com |
4x |
|
Boston Store |
2x |
|
Bradford Exchange Checks |
15x |
|
buybuy Baby |
2x |
|
BuyOnlineNow |
4x |
|
Carbonite |
20x |
|
Carol’s Daughter |
4x |
|
Carsons |
2x |
|
Celebrate Express |
8x |
|
CengageBrain.com |
2x |
|
Christopher Blue |
6x |
|
CircuitCity.com |
3x |
|
Coffees of Hawaii |
5x |
|
Conde Nast |
30x |
|
Costume Express |
8x |
|
Country Door |
3x |
|
Create Your Own Successories |
8x |
|
Darphin |
5x |
|
David’s Bridal |
3x |
|
Department of Goods |
4x |
|
Dick Blick Art Materials |
5x |
|
Dockers.com |
2x |
|
dyson |
2x |
|
Ed Hardy |
5x |
|
eDressMe.com |
5x |
|
Elder-Beerman |
2x |
|
Ella Moss |
4x |
|
Elyse Walker |
3x |
|
Especially Yours |
6x |
|
Exclusively Misook |
2x |
|
Executive Essentials |
6x |
|
Fashion Playtes |
6x |
|
FedEx Office |
3x |
|
Frames Direct |
6x |
|
French Connection |
5x |
|
Gemvara |
4x |
|
Ginny’s |
3x |
|
GuitarCenter.com |
3x |
|
Harbor Freight Tools |
2x |
|
Harmon Face Values |
2x |
|
Herberger’s |
2x |
|
Hotel Club |
6x |
|
Hush Puppies |
5x |
|
Intrepid Travel |
3x |
|
Jessica London |
3x |
|
Julianna Rae |
8x |
|
KaTom Restaurant Supply |
3x |
|
Kerastase |
4x |
|
Kipling |
4x |
|
Lee Jeans |
5x |
|
LightingCatalog.com |
5x |
|
LittleMissMatched |
5x |
|
LuckyVitamin.com |
3x |
|
Madewell |
5x |
|
Melissa and Doug |
5x |
|
Merrell |
5x |
|
Metrostyle |
4x |
|
MindWare |
3x |
|
MISSION |
10x |
|
Mountain Hardwear |
5x |
|
OfficeDesigns.com |
2x |
|
Organize.com |
3x |
|
P.S. |
2x |
|
Paula Young |
1x |
|
pcRUSH.com |
3x |
|
Pure Collection |
5x |
|
Rawlings Gear |
5x |
|
Red Roof Inn |
2x |
|
Reiss |
3x |
|
RenewLife.com |
6x |
|
Soap.com |
3x |
|
Sonos |
5x |
|
Sorel |
4x |
|
Sunny Sports |
3x |
|
The Great Courses |
4x |
|
The Shade Store |
4x |
|
Tommy Hilfiger |
4x |
|
Tsubo |
5x |
|
UFC Store |
4x |
|
Vitamin World |
5x |
|
Wig.com |
6x |
|
Wind & Weather |
6x |
|
Wolferman’s Gourmet |
4x |
|
Woodwind & Brasswind |
3x |
|
Younkers |
2x |
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Ken: All Amex business cards automatically give cash back at Fedex via the Open Savings program: https://www.americanexpress.com/us/small-business/opensavings/opensavings.do#01
Actually this is NOT the case if you have a business account with Fedex, whereby they charge you via invoice (which any reasonably sized account has). If you are invoiced and then auto paid via Amex, you get ZERO cash back. It is a BS really, they quietly changed the rules recently in 2015. If you pay each time you ship (which most do not), then you get cash back.
Is there any business CC that bonuses spend shipping packages from Fedex.com or UPS.com?
Thanks. I will give that a try.
Linda: Each merchant has a merchant code for credit card processing — they self select what categories they fit into. Chase uses those codes to decide which merchants are office supplies. Kinko’s must not use an office supply code (which I agree is ridiculous). I don’t think you can get them to agree to change this, but if you call Chase a few times and/or private message them you are likely to get a nice rep to give you the points for your trouble.
I have spent over $2000 at Fedex Kinko’s using my Chase Ink Bold and Chase claims that does not qualify as office supplies thus 1 point per dollar and not 5. Is there any hope of convincing them…I don’t understand their rationale.
This may be a silly question, because I know typically you can’t buy a gift card with another gift card… but if I buy a Staples GC throug UR, would I be able to buy say, McDonald’s GC at Staples with said GC??
Matt: its not a silly question at all. I haven’t tried it, but I’ve heard that Staples will not allow you to buy gcs with their gcs.
@HikerT, Thanks for advice. I was not sure if I could get the points in Chase Freedom UR when using Sears gift card. I was able to do that with Chase SP.
Bluto, the quirk is probably something I wouldn’t encourage FrequentMiler (or any blogger with a clue) to widely publicize or it would probably kill the goose. That said, I’m comfortable posting the following link to my analysis and leaving it to the reader to draw their own conclusions. 😉
http://www.lakebagger.com/ur/2011SapphireBonus.pdf
Good question about gross vs. net. Unfortunately I didn’t have any outflows in 2011 so I don’t know. Maybe someone who transferred points out or to an airline could do a similar analysis. Also, it looks like my Freedom transfer didn’t post until 2012 so I may be wrong about whether it counts. It showed up as a “courtesy adjustment” in January 2012. My 2500 “courtesy adjustment” in 2011 was for stamps.com and it did count toward my bonus.
@SB good analysis of the Ink Bold vs the Ink Classic. I have been considering the same.
@HikerT regarding the quirk, have you considered transferring the points out of your pfd to your Ink Bold and back, then repeating? I don’t know if it is gross points transferred in, but it could be interesting.
Not sure why you would give up 1x at the UR Mall? Use the card that gives you the most points shopping thru the UR mall. That’s the whole point. 😉
Sorry for not stating my question more clearly, but you already answer it 🙂 Yes, follow your earlier advice, I can get points using Sears gift card when going through the UR mall with Chase SP card. With Sears, it is 4x with SA, but 5x with Freedom. However, I just recently got Freedom.. That was why I asked the earlier question. Um, maybe I just stick with the Chase SA… Thanks.
FWIW, if you have the Ink card a better option for Sears GCs may be to buy Lands End gift cards at Staples.com which would provide 9x (5x on Ink spend at Staples.com + 4x via UR Mall). If you only have Freedom you’d be better off buying GCs at Sears.com (1x on Freedom spend at Sears.com + 5x UR Mall)
Maya, if you click on the “Preparing for Miles” page at the top of this blog you can see the benefits by card with one quick glance. One thing I did not realize was Ink Bold and Classic come with 2 free lounge passes in addition to the 5X for office supply stores/cable/satellite/cellular/landline and 2X for gas and hotels.
May I ask if UR for Chase Freedom gives the points for buying with Sears gift card? Thanks.
Nguyen: I’m not sure I understand the question. Are you asking whether you would get points if you use a Sears gift card when going thru the Ultimate Rewards Mall? I know you will if logged in with a Sapphire Preferred account and so I’d be stunned if it doesn’t also work for the Freedom.
Does the Ink Plus come with the 2x points on gas as well (like the Bold does)?