sfflyer415

Hello, I’m trying to think of creative ways to meet the high spending requirement for the Platinum bonus. I’m thinking of purchases from $1k-$10k.

Any potential suggestions?

So far I’ve thought about loan payments with gift of college gift cards, house improvement projects, prepaying utility bills, reasonably priced long haul business class flights, and even a used car. I have a wedding to plan for 1 year from now, but not sure if it’s wise pre paying wedding items this far in advance.

Appreciate any feedback.

notquiteaff

Do you actually need these purchases, i.e., would you make them without the spend requirement?

How about prepaying or overpaying taxes (estimated taxes)?

sdix

Agree on the pay taxes. If you overpay via CC you will get refund via Check or ACH

xooz

I prepay my supplemental medical insurance premiums. I actually pay for 12 months at a time. Usually I do this around the end/first of the year, but it can work anytime. No fees! I believe my kids will get a refund if I keel over....

nexusCFX

Just a word of caution that there have been DPs on Reddit and similar noting very slow refunds from the IRS if making a payment in excess of taxes owed, so if it's a large amount of money you can't afford to float to hit the min spend, this is not always a good option. It's much more optimal (not possible for 2024 now obviously) to make a very large Q4 estimated tax payment which you can just report while filing and is then not subject to this issue.

I have certain cards like the Chase Aeroplan with their due date set specifically so the closing date is ~Jan 14, so I can then make Q4 estimated tax payments to hit various spend thresholds like 15K spend for AC 25K status, and generally the refund from the IRS shows up before the payment on the card is due.

Schnit

If your CC statement closes today, you charge on 3/29, your payment is not due until 5/22. I imagine you get your refund before then

nexusCFX

Not if it gets delayed because the IRS doesn't process refunds for overpaying your 1040 taxes owed in the same manner as processing a refund for the refund amount on your tax return. That was the point of my post. If you overpay estimated taxes, you declare that on your tax return and the IRS knows about it and it's accounted in your expected refund amount. If you just overpay your taxes owed, you're just arbitrarily sending the IRS too much money and they have to eventually process that as a refund outside of the actual tax refund process.

Of course, these are not necessarily the norm. The IRS has to pay interest if they delay refunding you beyond 45 days so they don't intend to do so. I just bring it up so someone doesn't accidentally end up floating money they can't afford to. There are some DPs here about how the refunds can go a bit slow with this approach:
https://www.reddit.com/r/churning/co...a_credit_card/