They all helped me get my Capital One Venture bonus! A few months ago, I bit more than I could chew in terms of minimum spending requirements. It was all due to Capital One’s 50,000 points offer that popped up out of the blue. This is one reason I recommend you have a certain threshold as far as sign-up bonuses are concerned.
Don’t just settle for a card because you don’t see anything else that may interest you, but wait for the right time.
Special offers pop up constantly, and if you max out your credit pulls, you may not get that one “star” bonus of the year.
Anyway, I had to come up with extra $3,000 in spending in order to get that bonus. We went to Disney, which took care of $1,000. If you’ve been there, no need to explain. However, I was still $2,000 short. I planned to buy some Amex gift cards through Bigcrumbs, but saw reports that Capital One may code them as cash advance, so I didn’t want to take a chance. Here are some things I did instead:
1) I decided to buy a $500 Visa gift card at a local Walmart. I’ve never done that before, but in the past was told that it wouldn’t be a problem to use a credit card. Not so. When I tried to use the card, the system wouldn’t let it go through. The employee kept trying, to no avail.
People in the line were starting to give me hostile looks, and I seriously feared for my safety. Nope, none of them were miles and points bloggers! Finally, the cashier called the manager, who said they only take cash or debit.
This is why I always encourage you to put a price on a hassle factor when it comes to the manufactured spending shenanigans. I asked my husband to go by the local CVS and get one there. He reluctantly agreed. Success!
2) I bought a $500 Amazon gift card for future use. We spend a lot there each month and the amount is deducted automatically.
3) I bought some gift cards to Walmart, McDonald’s, Starbucks and Dollar General from various online stores at a discount. First I went to Giftcardgranny and checked the prices. Then I clicked to several merchants through Topcashback to get additional percentage on each purchase.
The sign-up bonus on the Venture card was $500 towards travel-related expenses. I was working on the IHG Big Win and made sure to charge the hotel bills to that card. The bonus took care of them all, and we had several nice short vacations to enjoy as a family.You have 90 days from the date of your purchase to redeem the points towards the statement credit, so I did it as soon as the bonus posted.
I plan to cancel Capital One Venture before December to avoid the annual fee. As I mentioned before, at this time, I put all of our spending towards new sign-up bonuses and only keep the cards where the fee provides a perk upon renewal. The current offer for Venture card offers 20,000 points in sign-up bonus, good towards $200 off travel expenses. It does pay me commission, but I recommend you hold out for a better offer, like the one I mentioned.
If you liked my post, please subscribe to receive free blog updates through email and recommend me to your family and friends. You can also follow me on Twitter, join me on Facebook and find my e-book on Amazon
Author: Leana
Leana is the founder of Miles For Family. She enjoys beach vacations and visiting her family in Europe. Originally from Belarus, Leana resides in central Florida with her husband and two children.
Fishing4Deals, thanks for stopping by! Yes, it was a very nice bonus. I kind of wish I got a card in my name as well. In this hobby very often it’s “you snooze, you loose.” By the time I’ve finally decided to apply, the offer was dead.
That is a nice sign-up bonus for a card that has been around awhile.