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Note: Some of the offers mentioned below may have changed or are no longer be available. You can view current offers here.
Update 2/21/14: The minimum spending requirement is now $3,000 in the first 90 days to unlock the 40,000 bonus miles. Full offer details: Barclaycard Arrival Plus™ World Elite MasterCard®
Other credit card offers listed below that have expired were removed as well. Click here for the top current credit card sign up bonuses.
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Update: Two readers got the same offer, but with 5 bonus miles per dollar, taking the total to 7 miles per dollar! Wow! The post below still refers to 2 extra miles and 4 total miles per dollar, but some folks are being offered a total of 7 miles per dollar!
Next time you get an email for a great offer, forward it to me, so I can share it with everyone!
Barclaycard is offering targeted Barclay Arrival card holders 4x miles per dollar at gas stations; restaurants; and department, toy, and game stores from now until December 31, 2013. (Thanks to reader Drew B. for alerting me!)
If you received a targeted email with the subject “Earn bonus miles in three easy ways”, click the Activate Now button in the email.
This is the fourth very good miles promotion this week.
- US Airways Share Miles with 100% Bonus = 1.13 Cent Dividend Miles
- Citi Offering 3 AAdvantage Miles Per Dollar on Gas, Groceries, and More
- Barclay’s offering US Airways Offering Cardholders up to 50% Back on Redeemed Miles
What are the details on this Arrival Card 4x Promotion? Is it worth your while? How does it compare to the other promotions this week?
The Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard – Earn 2x on All Purchases is my favorite card for earning miles for economy class flights because the card earns two miles per dollar on all purchases, and the miles can be redeemed for travel on any flight, any time, on any airline.
After the standard 10% rebate on all flight redemptions, the net cost is 90 Arrival miles per dollar of airfare, so I value the miles at 1.11 cents each.
Since many economy award tickets are a poor value with traditional region-to-region based airline miles–like United, American, and Delta miles–Arrival miles are a great complement to tradition miles. Use the region-to-region miles for international first class, and the Arrival miles for domestic economy. (And earn miles and status on those Arrival-miles awards, since the airline thinks you are flying a cash ticket!)
As I said, the Arrival card already earns two miles per dollar on all purchases. This targeted offer is for an additional two miles per dollar (four total) on purchases from now through the end of 2013 at:
- gas stations
- restaurants
- department stores
- toy stores
- game stores
Gas stations and restaurants are categories where most people spend quite a bit, and the last three store categories are convenient for Christmas shopping.
These were Drew’s categories. If you were targeted, did you get the same or different categories? With last week’s targeted bonuses from Citi, different people got different categories.
The terms and conditions limit you to 2,500 bonus miles, which means $1,250 spending is the maximum that will be bonused by this promotion.
To participate, all you have to do is activate the promotion by clicking the button in the email you received.
How good of a promotion is this?
When determining which card to spend money on, consider the rebate percentage of that spending. What percentage of your spending are you “being rebated” by the value of the miles or points earned?
The most valuable rebates will invariably come from meeting the minimum spending requirement for a sign up bonus. For instance, right now you can earn 25,000 bonus Starpoints after spending $5,000 on the Starwood Preferred Guest® Credit Card from American Express. Plus that $5,000 spending on the card earns another 5,000 Starpoints.
Thirty thousand Starpoints are worth $750 to me, so the rebate percentage on the first $5,000 of spending on the card is 15%.
The next most valuable rebate percentages come from category bonuses. For instance, the 5 Ultimate Rewards per dollar earned on office supply purchases with the Chase Ink Bold and Plus are worth about 10 cents, so that category bonus is a 10% rebate to me.
This promotion creates a temporary category bonus. I value four Arrival miles at 4.44 cents, so Drew will get a rebate percentage of 4.44% by spending at gas stations, restaurants, department stores, toy stores, and games stores with his Arrival card during this promotion.
Should he use his Arrival card at those places?
At department stores from October 1 through December 31 this year, he could earn 5 Ultimate Rewards per dollar up to $1,500 in spending on a Chase Freedom, so I wouldn’t use an Arrival card there.
Through the end of the year, I was also targeted for 3x American Airlines miles per dollar at department stores, restaurants, gas stations, and grocery stores up to $1,250 in spending. I value that as a 5.31% rebate, so he should use his American Airlines card at restaurants and gas stations before his Arrival card if he got the same Citi American Airlines promotion.
If he’s opened any new cards that have minimum spending requirements which offer a higher rebate percentage than 4.44%, he should also meet those before taking advantage of this bonus.
But when he was done with those promotions and minimum spending requirements, he should use the Arrival card for its 4.44% rebate during this promotion.
If you didn’t get the promotion on your Citi American Airlines card, or you don’t have an American Airlines card or Freedom, this Arrival card promotion is even better for you.
Why is Barclaycard being so generous lately?
I don’t know, but I like it!
Barclaycard has run a 15k mile promotion for $750 of spending per month for three months on US Airways card for over a year. Then in July, it offered me 15k Lufthansa miles for spending $750 per month for three months on my Lufthansa card. And now this promotion on its Arrival card.
Clearly Barclaycard wants to get us in a habit of using its cards, and I certainly have been using mine to take advantage of these offers.
Recap
Barclaycard sent out a targeted email to Arrival World MasterCard cardholders offering 4 miles per dollar at gas stations; restaurants; and department, toy, or game stores from now until December 31, 2013 on up to $1,250 worth of spending.
This takes an already great card–my full review of the Arrival World MasterCard–and makes it that much better through the end of the year.
Full terms and conditions from the email:
Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard – Earn 2x on All Purchases with 40,000 miles after spending $1k in the first three months
My full review of the Arrival Plus
Just getting started in the world of points and miles? The Chase Sapphire Preferred is the best card for you to start with.
With a bonus of 60,000 points after $4,000 spend in the first 3 months, 5x points on travel booked through the Chase Travel Portal and 3x points on restaurants, streaming services, and online groceries (excluding Target, Walmart, and wholesale clubs), this card truly cannot be beat for getting started!
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I didn’t get any promotion at all. I got the Arrival on August 1st. Met the min spend and put it in the sock drawer. Meh.
Targeted for the same categories. The bonus on gas is useful for me in particular.
If all your spends are met, I’d argue that buying merchant gift cards at an office supply store with an INK is a MUCH better deal than using the arrival. Worst case you get 5% cash back on EVERYTHING (as statement credit), and best case you get the 10ish% back on transfers. You can do even better using the GCs to shop through the UR portal. Of course this a bit more hassle, but it is a better bang for your buck.
That’s definitely true, though not all merchants have gift cards at office supply stores.
My offer was for 5 bonus miles in the same category up to 2500 miles.
LUCKY!
I just got a targeted offer in those exact same categories on my Barclay’s US Air card. 5x bonus miles, up to 2500 bonus miles total, for spending in those categories.
So 7 total miles per dollar in those categories!? Wow, lucky you!
[…] Press ← Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard Offering 7 Miles Per Dollar on Gas, Restaurants, and Mor… […]
Isn’t Sears considered a department store, what about Kohl’s? Any way to buy a GC at these stores that can be turned back to cash?
Would this bonus offer count for in-store purchases at gas stations (such as Paypal reload cards at 7-11), or only at the pump? Also, would this bonus offer count for Visa gift cards or Moneypaks at Kmart?
At a gas station with a convenience store, I think the bonus would count because I don’t think Barclay’s could distinguish between the two locations (pump, store.) I can’t give a definitive answer though to either of your questions. It all depends on how the merchant codes itself to Barclay’s. The only thing you could do is make a small purchase and see how it codes and proceed from there.
Scott:
I noticed in the past 2 blog posts about targeted bonus category offers, you have recommended folks to meet minimum spend requirements for new card bonuses before taking advantage of the bonus category offers. I wasn’t targeted for any of the offers, but I tend to still try to maximize all of my miles/points accounts by using say my Chase Sapphire for 2X at restaurants or my AMEX Preferred Gold Rewards for 2X at grocery stores, and use the new cards for non-bonus category purchases where I am only going to earn 1X . While it will take longer to meet the minimum spend, I also have the ability to manufacture some spend. Is this a bad strategy or just preference? Ultimately, I will meet my minimum spend, and I will IMO end up with more total miles/points over time. I’d be interested in your comments. Thanks.
I’m sorry. I don’t completely understand the strategy you’ve detailed.
Sorry, I was trying to be brief, and evidently didn’t explain myself. Let’s say hypothetically that I was approved for the recent SPG AMEX offer of 30K points after spending $5,000. Additionally, hypothetically, let’s say I was targeted for the Barclays offer of 4X for gas stations, restaurants, etc. The way I understand your post, you would recommend that someone concentrate their spend on the SPG AMEX card first, rather than take advantage of the Barclays card bonus categories.
My strategy has been to do both. I would take advantage of the Barclays bonus categories while also attacking the minimum spend on the SPG AMEX card on spend categories that I only get 1x. Let’s say my goal is to meet the 5K SPG spend in 3 months, and that I average $400 spend per month in the Barclays bonus spend categories. After 3 months, with my strategy, I would have at least 35,000 SPG points (30K bonus + 5K for spend) + I would have 4,800 Barclays points (total $1200 spend in 3 months X 4 points per dollar). Advantage: More points overall in the 3 month time frame. Disadvantage: Takes longer to meet the minimum spend on the SPG card.
Hope that makes more sense. Thanks for your patience, and I appreciate your blog and advice.
Yes, if you can keep track of doing both easily that is better. Good strategy.
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