[Targeted] Chase IHG Rewards Club – 600 Points / $750 Monthly Spend April thru August (3,000 Max)

Chase has sent out a targeted bonus to some cardholders of the IHG Rewards Club Select credit card. So far, it looks like only cardholders of ~6 months or more have gotten the offer. (Note that the e-mail comes from Chase, not IHG.)

The Offer

No direct link.

  • From April 1, 2017 to August 31, 2017, earn 600 bonus IHG points each month when you spend at least $750 per month with your IHG Rewards Club Credit Card. The maximum is 3,000 bonus IHG points.

The Fine Print

  • You will qualify for and receive your bonus if you make purchases with your credit card that total an amount at or above the specified target amount ($750) during each month of the promotional period. note: this language is at odds with the offer text & other fine print because it makes it sound like you need to hit $750 each month. as far as I can tell, that is not the case; each month has a discrete 600 IHG points bonus.
  • Please allow 6 to 8 weeks after qualifying for bonus points to post to your account.
  • “Purchases” do not include balance transfers, cash advances, travelers checks, foreign currency, money orders, wire transfers or similar cash-like transactions, lottery tickets, casino gaming chips, race track wagers or similar betting transactions, any checks that access your account, interest, unauthorized or fraudulent charges, or fees of any kind, including an annual fee, if applicable.
  • Maximum bonus point accumulation during each month of the promotional period is 600 bonus points.
  • Credit card product changes during the promotional period will forfeit this bonus offer.
  • To qualify for this bonus offer, account must be open and not in default at the time of fulfillment.
  • This promotional offer is non-transferable and applies only to the account ending in the last 4 digits referenced in this offer.

Our Verdict

This is an astoundingly mediocre offer, as it only works out to an extra 0.8x IHG points (if you hit the $750 spending exactly). I have a hard time believing any cardholder not already putting about $750 per month on this card will be swayed by such a tiny bonus.

What IS interesting is that IHG seems to be making a real play to get their card to the front of people’s wallet (albeit badly, in this case). Recent targeted e-mails from IHG for their credit card have offered 60,000 points after spending $1,000 or 80,000 points after spending $2,000 in spend plus an additional 20,000 points for spending an additional $8,000 during the first year of cardmembership. IHG has also partnered with Fuel Rewards to offer a discount at Shell stations; although you don’t need to use their card to get the discount, I imagine it’s swayed some cardholders to do so given that gas is a 2x category on the IHG card.

It’ll be interesting to see if IHG rolls out more offers incentivizing use of their card over the next few months.

h/t u/paandemic on r/churning
    sirtheta
  • On March 28, 2017, 11:30

View Comments (23)

  • question, I keep getting 80,000 point emails from IHG with invitation code. Not a pre-approval but tempting. wont get as Im over 5/24. Anyone else getting this? has come to me 3 times so far

  • "This is an astoundingly mediocre offer" I like how you verbalized the thoughts in my head when I saw the email this morning. The rewards for spend on this card are so bad that I generally don't use it even for stays @ IHG properties, unless there's an extra bonus for using the card. IMO, 3x UR or TY pts > 5x IHG pts.

  • This offer does nothing for me. Pathetic. Couldn't even match 750 points for $750 in spend, lol. Just keep using a Chase FU for 1.5x UR or a Citi Doublecash card for non-bonus spend and you still come out ahead.

  • They should provide incentive to use their cards with their Accelerate Promotions. Granted the card already provides 5x on spend at IHG properties but I don't even use it at IHG properties. If they add something like "Earn an additional 1000 points per night when paying with your IHG rewards card" I might be tempted to use it.

  • This is more of an insult than an offer. If you max out the spend, the bonus comes out to about $12-$13 total. Then again, many cardholders see the number 3,000 and think ooooohh!!!. Not everyone calculates or estimated $/point like we do here.

  • concur with your sardonic lampooning of this offer Dr. Sirtheta. ( in spades!) Truly "astounding" how much a non-starter the promo is. We have this card several times over within the extended family; the annual free award night at IHG more than worth the annual fee. But rarely if ever do we actually use the card. (except for balance transfers) I rarely even use it any more for spending on IHG stays. (ironic, yes)

    Rather stunning how clueless IHG/chase seems to be here. (the promo spends at Wyndham, such as they are, are lightyears ahead of this) Hopefully the Manilla crowd at IHG will catch the loud laughing on this one across the travel-hacker sphere.

  • HHonors puts out decent promos once in a while. However, this is just a joke. Spend $3,750 for 3,000 points. That adds an extra 0.4 cents per dollar, almost bringing normal spend up to 1 cent per dollar.

    The only reason to ever use this is if for some reason you don't have enough points to pay for a hotel or you have no other means of paying for a stay at an IHG Hotel.

    If I can use half of my points with the Points Break, I may get over $800 in the sign-up bonus.

  • Hi, I tried to send Doc a heads up of this promo, but couldn't find a contact info. How do I reach you guys in the future for alerts?

    • Very much so. Even for the 2x bonus categories (gas, groceries, and restaurants -- where you can typically get higher cash back!), it works out to 2.8x * 0.7 cpp = 1.96%. (If we value IHG points at 0.7 cpp; personal valuations may differ.)

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