In the Chase app, there is showing a “birthday surprise category” on the Chase Freedom and Freedom Flex cards. In celebration of the 15th birthday of the Chase Freedom, the Freedom cards will earn 5%/5x on Insurance payments and on Tax Preparation Services during the month of March.
It’s not clear in the fine print whether these will be combined for the regular quarterly $1,500 limit or whether this will be separate. Also not clear whether that will have a separate activation page. I expect we’ll find out more as the promo timeframe gets closer.
Tax prep isn’t a huge spend category for most people, I’d guess. Insurance, on the other hand, can be a really nice category at 5x as someone can max out their insurance payments for the year (life, health, auto, home, etc). But again, it’s not clear what the limits will be on this of if it’ll combine with the other Freedom 5% $1,500 limit.
Hat tip to reader mangorunner
View Comments (42)
what type of insurance applies for the insurance and this only works if you have part of your $1.5K limit available? Is this like Auto insurance and homeowners insurance?
The MCCs for insurance aren't specific so any should work.
It's great but I'm expecting everything to be maxed out by Norwegian Cruise Lines.
This comment is sponsored by Norwegian Cruise Lines.
Are you one of those "influencers" I keep hearing about?
Does anyone else feel that @6 is really fortunate to only have at most $1500 in yearly expenses for the bolded categories below?
"as someone can max out their insurance payments for the year (life, health, auto, home, etc). "?
I can't max anything out either. It's not like I can move my auto insurance to March when it's due in January.
Life and health is through employer.
@guest_1970764,
My car insurance is also due in January so I have the same problem that you have. However, like @guest_1970701, I have other plans for the category. 😉
Exactly. And Home is bundled up in my mortgage payments.
Why are you worried about someone else’s expenses?
How am I worried? I am envious of him for having such low insurance expenses. Why are you worried about a comment that I made that wasn't about you?
I think you're reading it wrong. He doesn't say he's the one maxing it out. He's simply saying that someone can max out their insurance payments for the year.
@guest_1970759,
No, I read it exactly the way that you did. However, I would never make the statement that he did, knowing how much I pay for insurance in a year.
That is why I inferred (possibly incorrectly) that @6 pays $1500 or less per year in total insurance payments.
Regardless, your comment indirectly disagrees with how @guest_1970744 interpreted Chuck's comment.
Sorry, didn't see SC's comment. I was just referring to your comment about being envious that he'd pay that little. Though, honestly, the number didn't surprise me. My auto, home and umbrella are less than 1500/yr. though my premium dates don't line up with this offer.
@guest_1970759,
I just realized that you didn't mention health insurance. That was the main one that caught me by surprise that @6 is paying less than $1500 per year, including health. Agree?
He's on obamacare.
I don't know, some don't own a car or a house. But again, I think he was speaking in general terms in both person and policy options. FWIW, I don't pay for health, spouse's employer covers it.
That's interesting. That's exactly why I wrote the question to begin with.
@guest_1970731 acted like I was insulting @6 when I was actually envious of him. I was just curious what others thought about Chuck's comment.
I'm glad that you and @guest_1970743 chimed in, showing me that it is possible to pay that little in a year. 😀
Many of us have multiple Freedom cards. You have no way of inferring what his expenses are or how many cards he has. Also, I read his statement as saying that maxing out your insurance payments is the limit for how much potential 5x category expenses can be created… not that he or anyone else will have low enough expenses to max it out and still get 5x on all of it.
He wrote “as someone can max out their insurance payments for the year", NOT "as someone can max out their $1500 quarterly limit by paying for insurance".
I reduced my insurance to less than $1500. I get life/health through work. P2 and I are down to one car since we both work from home(this reduced our car insurance by 50%).
With grocery in the $1500 I expect I will use most, if not all, on grocery for VGC to make tax payments. Now if taxes were qualified and not tax prep, that would be really helpful but also really unlikely.
If those store bought gift cards are Vanilla or Incomm, it may be hard to use them online.
Which Visa GCs consistently work to pay taxes nowadays?
Insurance, next time they're sponsored by United Health
Nothing says happy birthday like taxes and insurance.
Luigi has entered the chat
Who is chase banks CEO? Just wondering
how to find it in app??
It's in the fine print on the page where you learn about the q1 category
If Sapphire continues Insurance then it will either 5x points on Freedom or 1x points and 25% redemption discount on CSR. Wile the redemption discount is certainly better, if travel is on the horizon, might be worth saving that up for the 50% travel but if not, I guess CSR would be the better option.
Essentially a 6.012% discount off insurance premium
I would do a dual scenario. For example, if the payment is for $1000, spend $952.38 on Freedom and $47.62 on CSR to use all the points earned from Freedom to offset the insurance costs.
In the same screenshot after the red circle it says the surprise category is included in the 1500 limit.
I'm not necessarily reading it the same way
I agree with frank. It says "up to $1500...including our surprise category".
@6,
I just looked at the screenshot. I agree with @guest_1970624. It's quite clear to me that the surprise category is part of the $1500 quarterly limit.
Am I the only one reading this as "[tax] insurance"?
The "&" is what's making me suspect that.