How to maximize your Freedom 5X purchases

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Every 3 months, the Chase Freedom card offers 5X on spend within different categories of merchants.  This quarter (October through December), the 5X categories are hotels, airlines, Best Buy and Kohl’s. 

Here are some terrific ways to spend within those 5X categories:

Buy miles for .8 cents (Wyndham)

Loyalty Traveler summarizes the current bonus opportunities from Wyndham.  The gist is that its possible to book cheap hotel rooms (without showing up to check-in) and earn bonus points, then transfer the points to airline miles.  I really enjoyed this part of Loyalty Traveler’s post:

I found it interesting that Deals We Like linked to View from the Wing today who linked to Deals We Like  August post where she linked Travel by Points and Hack My Trip who linked Travel by Points who in his August post linked Loyalty Traveler for a blog post about the 16,000 points Wyndham Rewards promotion. It is like a genealogy chart of credits.

Maybe now I get get into his next genealogy chart?

Regarding the Freedom card:  Use it to pay for these stays. This way you’ll earn 5 points per dollar while buying miles (or hotel points) very cheaply!  Also, go through BigCrumbs to Wyndham to book your stay for a (possible) additional 2.1% cash back.

UPDATE: According to a post on FlyerTalk, Wyndham may not honor this deal after all.  For details, please see this post from View from the Wing.

Marriott & Southwest

Marriott has a terrific ongoing promotion in which you can earn 12 Southwest points per dollar when buying Marriott gift cards.  Go to www.marriottvacationcardoffer.com/southwest to purchase up to $1000 worth of Marriott gift cards.  If you use those Southwest points for “Wanna Get Away?” fares, then each point is worth 1.67 cents.  In other words, this is like a 20% rebate on Marriott gift cards.  Alternatively, you can trade in those points to get more Marriot gift cards (at a value of 1 cent per point).

Use your Freedom card to buy the Marriott gift cards and you’ll earn 5X on the purchase this quarter!  Thanks goes to Greek2Me who has confirmed that this purchase shows up on the Freedom statement as a hotel 5X purchase.

You can take this further by using your Marriott gift cards to qualify for Marriott’s Megabonus promotion.  Go to Marriott.com to sign up.  Different people are offered different promotions, but most people are offered a free category 1 to 4 night after every two Marriott stays.  You can take it even further by doing a Marriott Platinum Challenge at the same time!  See “Pursuing Platinum @ Marriott” for details.

Radisson Buy One Get One

Radisson has been running yet another great promotion (not as good as their incredible point-earning promotions, but still…) where one stay at any Radisson hotel will result in a voucher for a free night at any Radisson in the US, Canada, or Caribbean.  Unlike the Wyndham promotion, you do need to show up and check in.  Read “Hotel Promo Worthy of a Mattress Run: Radisson Buy One Night, Get One Night” for details.  Pay with your Freedom card for 5X!

Kohl’s 25X triple dip

While this has worked for me in the past, there is no guarantee that this will work every time, but it’s worth a shot.  Here’s how to get 25 points per dollar at Kohl’s:

  1. Go through the Ultimate Rewards Mall to Kohl’s.  Kohl’s currently offers 10 bonus points per dollar through the mall.  Buy Kohl’s gift cards for yourself.  Pay for the gift cards with your Freedom card.
  2. Go through the Ultimate Rewards Mall again to Kohl’s to buy merchandise.  Use the Kohl’s gift card to pay.

If points post for all of the above, you should get 25 points per dollar!  To save even more (potentially, a lot more), check out the tips in this old (but still relevant) post: “Fantastic points and savings at Kohl’s.”

UPDATE: A reader has reported that the double-dip did not work.  They got points for using a Kohl’s gift card, but not for buying one.  You can still get 15X simply by going through the UR mall to Kohl’s to buy items and pay with your Freedom card (10X from the Ultimate Rewards Mall + 5X from the Freedom card this quarter)

Best Buy / Kohl’s gift cards

Both Best Buy and Kohl’s sell gift cards to other merchants (in-store only).  Merchant gift cards come with no taxes or fees, so using your Freedom card to buy gift cards to restaurants, department stores, etc. is a great way to max out your $1500 quarterly 5X spend.  At Best Buy, you can get Amazon Kindle gift cards which can be used for all Amazon purchases (but not for the Amazon Payments service).  Best Buy also sells Visa gift cards, but they charge $5.95 for $200 cards.  This amounts to a 3% fee.  If you don’t think you can otherwise max out your Freedom 5X category, this can be worthwhile (since 5X is worth more than 3%), but I wouldn’t recommend it otherwise.  (Hat Tip to GrahamCC)

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Notes

In order to receive 5X for Freedom purchases, you do need to activate the 5X bonus before the end of the quarter. And, don’t forget that the 5X bonus is limited to $1500 of spend per quarter.

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