I try to be diligent about making sure I activate my 5% cash back/5 Ultimate Rewards points bonus on the Chase Freedom card’s quarterly bonus categories.
I love the quarters that these bonus categories include restaurants, grocery stores and gas stations and I make sure I use the card to try to get as close to the $1500 limit as possible (an easy feat when it is restaurants and grocery stores-gas stations not so much).
Other quarters when it is Chase Pay, Paypal, etc. I don’t try as hard, except I actually decided to go for it for the last quarter of 2019 when Paypal was a category. I took advantage of Paypal as much as I could and actually even ended up making $1500 worth of Paypal (and department store) purchases during that last quarter. I eagerly anticipated my 5x points.
I didn’t check however, till it was too late. I hadn’t been getting the 5x in any of October, November or December and when I finally checked after the quarter was over, I saw that I had only earned 1x point on those purchases. I realized I never activated my 5% categories for the 4th quarter. UGH!
A call to Chase was unhelpful as they couldn’t do anything for me as it was my fault for failing to register. They wouldn’t even give me any goodwill points as they had previously when I failed to earn my 5x because my card had expired.
Word to the wise-Do as I say, not as I do. Don’t forget to activate your 5%/5x Freedom categories. You lose out on valuable points if you do!!!
