Point Collectors Anonymous

[cove]

Ok let me try this out on you.....
I head to the Woolies as it is the start of week 3 and that finishes the third and last $100 spend to pick up 15,000 Woolies points offer. I flash the rewards card and pay with a 5% off plastic Woolies gift card.
Heading home I pull into a Caltex Star Mart and go Woolies reward card, Myer One Card and then use a 10% off Caltex Star Card with the cheapest 98 fuel for the weekly low of the Perth price cycle.
Get home and Mrscove is unimpressed with so much washing machine goop and the cupboard is now chockers. I make another promise to not do any more.....
Moving along I start loading $100,000 each into credit cards to pay the fiscal fiend later this month.
I knew you would understand............

 

[get me outta here]

cove, well done on the haul, but I think you are supposed to put the bonii haul in the back of the garage until req'd.

Ok let me try this out on you.....
I head to the Woolies as it is the start of week 3 and that finishes the third and last $100 spend to pick up 15,000 Woolies points offer. I flash the rewards card and pay with a 5% off plastic Woolies gift card.
Heading home I pull into a Caltex Star Mart and go Woolies reward card, Myer One Card and then use a 10% off Caltex Star Card with the cheapest 98 fuel for the weekly low of the Perth price cycle.
Get home and Mrscove is unimpressed with so much washing machine goop and the cupboard is now chockers. I make another promise to not do any more.....
Moving along I start loading $100,000 each into credit cards to pay the fiscal fiend later this month.
I knew you would understand............

 

[cove]

Tomorrow my office wants to buy some Coles Myer gift cards so that will go on Amex Platinum Edge. Just keeps going despite our Monday public holiday.

 

[maccaisking]

so I currently feel I'm going a little crazy trying to max things out till the AMEX April deval date...uhoh.
affecting my normal day to day work

anybody else?

Me!
Im thinking of things i can prepay in advance. Especiallly 3ppd purchaes

Me too! Trying to factor in the cash flow and how much we spend p.a in certain places so as I can "prepay"...

I was thinking yesterday that a ‘what can you prepay before deval day?’ thread was needed, so I’ll put my list out there. I’m currently living in China but move back to Aus on 3rd April so will have 10 days to knock these off. I already have:

$5k WW and $5k Coles GCs
$5k Only 1s

and plan to prepay approx 12 months of electricity, water, gas, internet and council rates. I’m going to see my daughter’s old child care on the first day back to prepay the remainder of the year’s fees upfront, and claim rebates from the government, assuming this is still possible - it was before the changes on 1 July last year.
My wife’s work covers private health for 3 months after we return which is worth more points for paying our own insurance so no prepay there.

There must be more things. What am I missing which can easily be prepaid?

 

[potm]

I love points too but I wouldn’t be prepaying expenses for 12 months in advance. 1 point extra per dollar isn’t worth the cost of funds.

I sadly do not have the doubling of points offer so am more worried about trying to scrape some points together post deval rather than scrambling to earn points before. It might be a feast to famine scenario as I use up all my points in the next few years before they expire.

 

[daft009]

I sadly do not have the doubling of points offer so am more worried about trying to scrape some points together post deval rather than scrambling to earn points before. It might be a feast to famine scenario as I use up all my points in the next few years before they expire.

Hmm, you raise a valid point...

 

[11sjw]

Tomorrow my office wants to buy some Coles Myer gift cards so that will go on Amex Platinum Edge. Just keeps going despite our Monday public holiday.

Great to see you're still smashing it out @cove !

 

[Chicken]

Tomorrow my office wants to buy some Coles Myer gift cards so that will go on Amex Platinum Edge.

Wouldn't you rather get 6% off Myer gift cards, than paying full price using Edge?

 

[cove]

Myer.....are they still in business?

 

[cove]

I do bother with 10% off with David Jones.
When my SIL gets gift cards in the mail from Myer she knows to use them quickly.
The Coles ones should be ok for much longer.

 

[Chicken]

Myer.....are they still in business?

Yes, and at 6% off, I would rather pay 6% off with a Visa MC than paying using Edge for 3 x AmEx points but without 6% off.

 

[mrsterryn]

On the purchase of a new car we tried to buy husband's car last year and they would only permit $3000.
If my husband gets his way and I get a new car we shall definitely try again
Our balances tend to go between 1000,000 up to about 600,000 but we so spend on reward flights or upgrades very regularly

 

[Bindibuys]

Paid out the balloon on husbands car last month on C/C (the monthly payments were also via C/C) Simply paid $1000.00 every day until complete, then moved the debt to a 0% balance transfer.
Now in the market for a new car.

 

[SOPOOR]

Some things ive done recently

Prepaid 1 yrs of wish gift (unfortunately isnt very high now due to personal circumstances
Paid $1000 credit into lumo
Bought some stuff for other peiple using my statement creidts

 

[carls888]

and plan to prepay approx 12 months of electricity, water, gas, internet and council rates.

How do you pay rates and electricity with Amex? Mine only offer Visa/MC and I cannot work out how to do it with RP as they only offer a Bpay alternative...

 

[Saltywings]

Wow, 12 months in advance. That's a bit much, considering you can get a

• guaranteed, tax-effective rates of return by keeping that money parked in an offset account (assuming you have a mortgage),
• near-guaranteed rate of return in an index fund
• near-guaranteed rate of return in a high-yield ETF that can pump out tax-effective dividends

I'll happily drink the 'I told you so' cider if the market goes into GFC mode this year.

OTOH, all the land tax is coming up and some previous adjustments to the ATO are payable so there goes another $500k. Might as well milk what needs to be milked *shrugs*

 

[maccaisking]

How do you pay rates and electricity with Amex? Mine only offer Visa/MC and I cannot work out how to do it with RP as they only offer a Bpay alternative...

Paying these online with Only1 cards which were purchased during the recent promos. Needless to say there will be a juicy statement credit offer with alternate companies when I’m done..!

Wow, 12 months in advance. That's a bit much, considering you can get a

• guaranteed, tax-effective rates of return by keeping that money parked in an offset account (assuming you have a mortgage),
• near-guaranteed rate of return in an index fund
• near-guaranteed rate of return in a high-yield ETF that can pump out tax-effective dividends

I'll happily drink the 'I told you so' cider if the market goes into GFC mode this year.

OTOH, all the land tax is coming up and some previous adjustments to the ATO are payable so there goes another $500k. Might as well milk what needs to be milked *shrugs*

I considered other ways money can be used. Most of our money is in an offset account as you suggest, saving around 3.7%. If I were to put it into the markets (which I don’t understand well enough to use myself beyond basic buying/selling) the return may be higher, but for me the best value is in earning points.

When self funding our travel we are only Y flyers so any luxury comes through this method. I hope to cover a couple of years holidays (1-2 OS trips) with what I can stock up on and then find a new sca, uh method.

 

[SOPOOR]

if everyone has any other ideas on ways o r things to prepay stuff, Im all ears!

 

[Coops1]

Heh daft009, got the link from your AFF interview, haven’t even read one post in here yet, but I love it already.

UPDATE T+43mins: Great thread.
- I’m a hoarder and partial spender. Should be “a good point is a spent point”
- it’s hard to balance status earn and reward flights, as an example all flights on VA this last year were reward, so moving back to silver, not worried as biz class reward gives the same benefits.
- everything goes on relevant credit card for max points earn
- won’t ever pay a surcharge, unless a basic visa/mc less than .75%
- no biz, just salary, so hard to make points thru day to day spend
- churn and earn offers are no brainers, although will chase any point/bonus that is either free or part of my normal spend pattern.
- To give you an idea of the hoarding (in SQ, VA, QF, EY) have 500k Flybuys (across accounts), 95% from bonus and starting to cash small portions in for $
- looking forward to using them in next 1-2 yrs, especially on SQ.

Thanks for the thread.

 

[daft009]

So the earning has reduced as I'm only using the Amex when there is no surcharge.

Has made life little simpler as now only 1 Amex to worry about. Doing quite a bit of EFT rather than pay high surcharges.

Still working my way through my wish cards for groceries and fuel bought pre deval