Discover has announced all of the rotating 5% cashback categories for 2019. The categories are as follows:
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Q1 (January–March): Grocery Stores
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Q2 (April–June): Gas Stations, Uber & Lyft
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Q3 (July–September): Restaurants
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Q4 (October–December): Amazon.com
Nidhin Mattappally, director of rewards strategy at Discover had this to say:
We release our full 5% Cashback Bonus Calendar as another way to make earning Cashback Bonus easier for our cardmembers and help them plan their spending throughout the year. The 2019 calendar is packed with popular categories that give our cardmembers a variety of places where they can take advantage of 5% Cashback Bonus on purchases.
I appreciate that Discover always gives us the full calendar well in advance, unlike Chase drip feed the information out over the full year. It’s nice to see Uber & Lyft added for Q2 as well.
How about people who do not buy on amazon? This is the second year with no other choice.
The site says that “Purchases of Uber and Lyft gift cards may not be eligible.” Still, I wonder if purchasing Uber credit through the app would count. Would be a huge discount (5% off for buying $100 in the app, 10% first year w/ discover). I might open a card to try it.
Would I make Amazon purchases with Discover again? Not sure if I should for any big items, namely electronics, given that extended warranty and purchase protection is gone.
Does Discover ever offer any kind of sign up bonus? Considering picking one up just for the 10% (after 1st year doubling) on Grocery and Amazon.
Just FYI 7-Eleven’s (at least around the Bay Area) code as gas for Discover
Watch as CHASE will now wait a bit and then announce at least one or two duplicate 5% Freedom categories to upend DISC. We’ve seen this movie before.
I really don’t understand the hate Discover gets. They have awesome customer service and the 5% categories are pretty decent. The Lyft and Uber are especially interesting to me. Obviously after the first year it loses value. But I will for sure be keeping my Discover after my first year expires in December. I maximize my 10 referrals a year and max out the 5% categories w/ MS.
I agree. Discover has raised my credit limit all the way from a measly $500 all the way to the current $4300 in a year and 3 months. Their customer service has been really good, and they seem to be one of the more MS friendly banks as well for me ;).
This may be the first year I don’t use any category. I understand some will find these useful, Q1 in particular, but the rest are already covered in bonus categories elsewhere.
Currently working on two amex BCP offers so there goes Q1.
As far as Q2 is concerned I have my Costco Visa at 4%. Not worth the effort for the additional 1%, plus it can’t be used for gas at Costco which is the cheapest around here.
Restaurants in Q3 may be ok for local places but overall I try to always use gift cards which exceed 5%. Plus we don’t eat out much in an effort to increase our saving rate.
Then there’s Q4 with Amazon, which is negated by the 5% Amazon card. That and the fact that if you look hard enough it’s easy to get more than 5% back on Amazon gift cards throughout the year.
I can see these categories being most useful for those that aren’t as heavily into discount optimizing as I am. I get it, not everyone has or wants to spend the energy to find alternatives. As for me, my Discover cards will be collecting dust until possibly 2020.
Anthonyjh21, thanks for the thoughtful reply. Out of curiosity what 2 BCP offers are you working on? Or are these just sign up bonuses?
Absolutely agree. For me as well only Q1, for the rest 9 months I put Discovery in my dresser.
Wow. I really think about dropping the Discover card in the future. 1st quarter is good. Second, I won’t really use. Third and fourth I get unlimited via Savor/Uber and Amazon cards.
What’s the benefit to dropping it?
The reason wholesale clubs isn’t in there is likely due to the fact that Costco only accepts Visa in Store. Due to this a majority of people who have Discover completely blow off that category. They either don’t know it’s accepted online or don’t want to put in the extra effort, so Discover took note.
Even though a lot of people on here may do that, we are sadly a minority.
Not sadly.