Practical Pointers: Make sure you don’t miss that credit card welcome bonus

There are many reasons to sign up for a travel credit card, whether it be the points you earn through your ordinary spending or the other benefits you’ll enjoy through your membership. Of course, one of the biggest advantages you can usually earn within the first few months of opening a card is the welcome bonus.

Many travel cards will give you a large number of bonus points for signing up, as long as you spend a certain amount of money in a certain amount of time.

Depending on the card and the offer, the points you earn through the one-time bonus may be more than the points you’ll earn in a year through your spending alone. It’s often enough for multiple free flights or multiple free nights at a hotel (depending, of course, on the flight and property).

Because it’s essentially ‘free’ points, the bonus can be a big factor in your decision to apply for a card, take the credit inquiry and incur the annual fee.

At the same time, it’s important to remember that the welcome offer — and the chance to accrue, often, tens of thousands of bonus points — typically goes away after a given period of time, so it’s imperative to meet that spending requirement.

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Adjust your spending habits

When evaluating whether a particular credit card is right for you, look at whether the spending requirement is a realistic benchmark to meet in the allotted time.

Once you’re approved for a card, you’ll want to sit down and formulate a plan to ensure you meet that benchmark.

Here are some general things you can do to prepare for the first few months as a new cardholder so you can ensure you qualify for the bonus.

Now may be the time for large expenses

If you’re already planning on large upcoming expenses, whether for flights, a home appliance or a new laptop you’ve been thinking about, the first few months with a new card may be a good time to make the purchase. Of course, you want to make sure you can afford to incur these expenses during that time period. However, if it’s money you’re planning on spending in the near future, making the purchase at a time when it can help you meet a spending requirement can go a long way.

Unplanned expenses can ironically help too, as much as you hate to have them.

An unfortunate example is that while I was working toward a spending requirement after adding The Platinum Card® from American Express to my wallet, my dog fell ill (he’s fine now!). I was out of town, so my wife took him to the vet — and alerted me that the bill had come to $700. After cringing and asking for details about how he was doing, I told my wife, “Be sure to charge the visit to the Amex Platinum!”

As much as I hated having a sick pup, big expenses — planned and unplanned — can take away some of the anxiety around meeting the benchmark.

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Focus your attention on that card

You’ll most likely want to funnel your spending onto the new card, even if it’s not the ideal card for the type of spending you’re doing.

For instance, say you already have a card that earns 3 points per dollar on dining and you just opened one that only earns 1 point per dollar at restaurants. Just during this period, you may want to put the bill on the 1-point-per-dollar card, even though you technically wouldn’t be maximizing your spending.

At the end of the day, meeting the benchmark for the welcome bonus is more important.

Now, if you’ve planned your expenses carefully enough to know that you’ll meet the requirement easily, you can be more strategic; as a general rule of thumb, though, it’s a good idea to focus on the card with a welcome bonus you’re pursuing.

Don’t buy things you don’t need

As time goes on, if you find you’re just not getting close enough to the benchmark, there are better options out there than buying an expensive product you otherwise wouldn’t purchase.

After all, the whole goal here is to save money.

This is where you can get creative and think outside the box a bit. See if your employer will let you pay for something and then reimburse you, or ask to pay bills for a family member or friend.

As long as you’re reimbursed in a timely manner, paying for others’ expenses with your card can be a great way to ensure you meet your goals.

There are many other tricks you can employ to ensure you meet this requirement.

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Be cautious when cutting it close

As you try to meet your spending requirement, it’s important to be cautious when counting on expenses to process too close to your deadline.

Whether the cost of an item you bought online doesn’t end up hitting your card until it ships (as opposed to when you clicked “purchase”) or you get a refund for a shirt you returned four days before the deadline, little things can end up putting you back under the benchmark and prove costly if you don’t get the welcome bonus as a result.

Without racking up expenses you can’t handle, the further in advance you can reach the benchmark (and the more you can clear the benchmark by), the safer you’ll be.

Bottom line

While selecting the right credit card for your spending and travel habits can be crucial to your points-earning potential through bonus spending categories, it’s hard to replicate the value you get in points, essentially for free, out of that welcome bonus.

For that reason, doing everything you can to qualify for that bonus (without spending money you don’t have or large sums of money you wouldn’t have otherwise spent) is a goal worth planning for and ensuring you meet.

Read more:

Beginners guide to points, miles and credit cards
Choosing the right credit card for you
The best rewards credit cards for each bonus category

Featured image by The Points Guy.