Affinity just sent an email announcing the new Hi5 categories for next quarter. Restaurants and gas already earn 2%, making this quarter's cashback 7% total for those two categories! Man, and I was totally looking forward to my DISCOVER's 5% restaurant quarter too. I may still have to show them a little love.
5% at hotels is also excellent and I may actually be able to use it at least once this summer!
Very timely of AFCU to pickup gas and dining after Disco/Freedom drop gas, completely changes my application outlook once again. The quaterly $3500 cap is very flexible with the multiple earning categories. Probably won't put any hotel/motel spend on it though.
@Anonymous wrote:I got this email as well but I'm curious if restaurants includes fast food and delivery also. It doesn't really make that clear.
From my experience, AFCU seems to be kinda flexible with what counts as categories so I wouldn't doubt they'd count. All you have to do is look at your rewards and see how they ring up. For example, Nespresso & Costco codes as grocery with them, whereas they don't code that way with any of my other cards. Also, my Comcast cable bill codes as streaming. I've been experimenting with different categories on this card to see if I can pick up extra discounts that I'd miss by putting it on another card. Especially when it's a Hi5 category. I ended up getting 7% off Costco Jan - March because it counted as grocery spend. Way better than my 2% with Citi.
Just got an email from Affinity revealing their three 5% categories for Q3:
• Hotels & Motels
• Gas
• Restaurants
For folks not familiar with Affinity, these 5% categories stack with the baseline rewards on their Cash Rewards and Pure Rewards cards, making them even more lucrative.
The Cash Rewards card in particular is a real cash back powerhouse. Here's the full list of Q3 rewards:
• 7% on restaurants (5% on up to $3,500 in spend on quarterly categories + 2% baseline rewards)
• 7% on gas (5% on up to $3,500 in spend on quarterly categories + 2% baseline rewards)
• 6% on hotels and motels (5% on up to $3,500 in spend on quarterly categories + 1% baseline rewards)
• 5% on Amazon (up to $3,500/month)
• 5% on bookstores
• 2% on groceries
• 2% on streaming services
• 2% on ride share
• 1% on everything else
On top of that, they have a $200 SUB when you spend $3,000 in 3 months PLUS another $200 if you spend $20,000 in 1 year.
Honestly, I'm baffled as to how they can possibly offer so many benefits, but I've had the card since January and it's been fantastic. Highly recommend it.
So if we take the 7% restaurant multiplier (Hi-5 5% + the 2% base), and combine that with the 5% Ampre restaurant promotions, we're talking 12% on dining for some cases?! There are several restaurants in my area that are part of the Ampre offers, so that would be sweet.
@PullingMeSoftly That's a good question! I keep forgetting about the Ampre offers and haven't tried any yet, so it would be interesting to see how that works. The other thing is that the Hi-5 rewards are all lumped together when they're rewarded after the quarter ends, so it's not easy to verify if everything is being counted. But the base 2% does go through right away so I assume the Ampre rewards do too. I'll have to play with that next.
@Anonymous I'd say as long as the charge codes as restaurant and you get your base 2x points, you can count on them to earn the extra 5% later on.