Ah, the sound of points tallying up like a slot machine winner. You know you’re doing the points game right when you can earn 9X points on Q4 spending, all from a card with no annual fee.
Yep, Chase is accelerating Freedom and Freedom Flex Card earning for Q4 in hopes of getting a greater share of the most wonderful expensive time of the year, and if you use the offer to maximum potential, up to 9X points per dollar is up for grabs, in the category of your choice.
Chase Freedom 5X Categories + 4X Bonus
Chase is allowing people to “double dip” with their Freedom and Freedom Flex Cards this quarter.
If you spend in a Q4 bonus category, and do so via PayPal, you get to enjoy the 4X points boost two times, for a total of 9X points per dollar spent on the first $1,500 in purchases.
This quarter (until December 31st, 2021), Chase Freedom and Freedom Flex members can earn 5X points on; travel (including transit), dining, home improvement stores, select streaming services, select live entertainment, gas stations, drugstores, fitness clubs, grocery stores (not including Target and Walmart purchases).
That’s already awesome and more broad than usual (usually just a couple categories) but the PayPal bonus takes it over the top. PayPal is included in this, so you can earn an additional 4X points when you make purchases in these categories via PayPal.
Take…. Uber. Uber would certainly be included in the category of travel and transit, and if you pay for your Uber via PayPal, you’d earn 5X on the purchase, and 4X on top, for paying via PayPal! The same logic would apply for purchases made via PayPal with the other categories. You can get all the FAQ’s on the offer here.
An Easy 13,500 Points!
This is such an easy way to earn 13,500 points from just $1500 in spending.
If, by chance, you also have a Chase Sapphire Preferred or Reserve Card, these points could be moved to either of those cards, giving you the potential of $202.50 cash back, if you moved the points to Chase Sapphire Reserve, or $168.75 for Preferred, and used them for a Pay Yourself Back category, which now also includes Airbnb.
This 9X earning doesn’t exclude you from earning other points on the purchases, so it’s just an incredibly effective way to earn up to a $202 rebate, or 13,500 points back on a mere $1500 in spending. It’s safe to say $1500 in spending over the next 3 months isn’t too outrageous. You might as well be rewarded handsomely for it.
Important to note:
The quarterly bonus categories are Walmart, Paypal, and your top spending category of the rest of the list, not all of that list. You would only max out the 9x if you spend all $1500 via Paypal in one of the other categories. It can’t be a mix.
This double dip has a lot of people confused. Worth noting that both the double dip and the extra 4% in the categories you noted happens only in the ONE category where you spend the most. So if your top spending category is travel, you’ll get 9% on travel paid with PayPal using your Freedom card, and 5% on travel paid with the Freedom card alone. But purchases in all other categories noted will continue to earn 1% (Freedom only)/5% (PayPal/Freedom).
I think it’s pretty simple: make some big purchases with PayPal in the category of your choice, do it fast and you’ll earn a lot of points.
Are you sure this new bonus applies to the old Freedom card as well? Your link just shows the Flex. I’ve been trying to find anything about the Freedom and was hoping you had a Chase page confirming it. Thanks!