Maximizing points accumulation when meeting minimum spend

[wdkwang]

Hi All,

We're all familiar with signing up for premium cards that require anywhere from 3-5k minimum spend within 90 days to get the sign up bonus. There are plenty of sites that provide creative ways to meet said minimum spend; one of which is by opening up a checking account with a bank that has a high initial funding when applying online with amounts of $500 to $2000 to $15,000. Generally, the process goes like this:

1. Open credit card

2. Open checking account online with Bank ABC, and do an initial funding of, for example, $2000 with the new credit card

3. Pay off the credit card balance with the same checking account. Or, to be safer, transfer the money from Bank ABC to Bank XYZ, and pay off the credit card with Bank XYZ

Today, I was just thinking about what if a person was to take a new credit card and do an initial funding of $15,000 on a card with a $5000 minimum spend. That's $15,000 worth of points accumulated for virtually no money spent. I don't see any backlash on this but I come to this forum asking for fresh perspective that I may be missing. Thanks.

[Anonymous]

I feel like creditors would put an end to this pretty quick with AA and/or account closure.  If someone could get away with something like this, wouldn't they just continue to fund an account with a CC and continue paying it off with that account (or another account with a transfer involved)?  It sort of moves into the realm of manufactured spending IMO.

[SBR249]

This likely falls squarely within the definition of manufactured spending. I'm sure there are people that do this, however banks and CC issuers are increasingly going after these things. It's not that easy to find a bank that allows large sums of initial deposits via CC and will process it as a charge vs. cash advance. Many banks are also starting to check various databases for people who are constantly opening many bank accounts. CC issuers are also increasingly inserting language into their terms & conditions that specifically target MS techniques and/or to allow them to clawback SUBs generated through MS.

Whenever an easy MS technique is found, people tend to pile into it and then it will get shutdown. A good example from a few years ago was buying coins from the mint with free shipping. People would rack up CC rewards buying hundreds of thousands of coins from the mint, deposit them, then pay off their CCs. The mint cottoned on pretty quickly once the masses poured in and now it's not a thing. Rince and repeat. 

[simplynoir]

I'm sure the mess Citi created years ago where they allowed customers to fund checking/savings accounts with credit cards up to $100k with no fees closed a lot of doors with this MS method and served as a lesson for other banks.

[Anonymous]

DoctorofCredit maintains a list of banks that can be opened this way.  Generally the amounts are small (the receiving bank basically pays the standard merchant fee, and they don't want to do that for large amounts, when they have no guarantee that the money is going to stay in their bank for any length of time).

Plus like HPs, many banks report to Chexsystems, so opening too many bank accounts may prevent you opening more in the long run

[Anonymous]

1. The most initial funding I have seen is $1k, where are you seeing $15k? The majority are $250 or $500.

2. Not all CCs processes initial funding as a charge, some will process it as cash advance which comes with CA fee/interest and do not count towards SUB requirement or earn rewards.

[Kforce]

I would  "Prepay"  regular monthly bill's.

Front load your regular expenses.

Things like electricity,  propane, gym membership, trash service, cell phone, kids karate or dance.

*

I do this not for "SUB's" but with a quarterly 5% card that lets me change categories.

A category of "cell-phone and gym membership" pay each to hit CC cap.

(For me this covers full year of gym and cell).

Next category period change to "Utilities and ?", repeat.

I find it easy to max my "CC Cap" with prepay, planning and being able to pick categories.

No extra spending, just what I would normally need to pay.

*

Some in this forum would keep the money in high interest accounts, and never pay before due.

Between the discount price for 1 year of pre-payment of cell, gym, karate plus the 5% cash back.

This method is a "win-win" for me.

*

This should work or help with meeting a minimum spend, but will not help maximizing points.

[Anonymous]

PNC does allow 2k initial funding via credit card.  However I did not earn any points on my NFCU card doing this.  I don't know of anyone allowing more than 2k of funding via credit card.   And most cards don't even work.  Seems most banks and credit cards have gotten wise to this. 

[Anonymous]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

PNC does allow 2k initial funding via credit card.  However I did not earn any points on my NFCU card doing this.  I don't know of anyone allowing more than 2k of funding via credit card.   And most cards don't even work.  Seems most banks and credit cards have gotten wise to this. 

---

DOC lists Bankers Trust as $10K    But things keep changing....