January 22 Update: Receive a $25 Amazon gift card when you redeem HSBC Rewards points, you can have up to 4 personal Amex credit cards & the U.S. looking to implement a quarantine requirement

Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your daily dose (or near daily dose) of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more. This update is brought to you by the HSBC +Rewards Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 30,000 bonus points, no annual fee in the first year and a low 11.9% interest rate! 

 
UPDATE! Thanks to DC for forwarding the full T&Cs of this offer and - you have to redeem 150,000 points in one fell swoop to get the gift card....

There is a new (well, new as of January 15) HSBC offer available to their cardholders. You may recall from last month we brought you details on how HSBC now has exclusive offers akin to Amex Offers and RBC Offers. The offers for Door Dash and Spotify are still available but now they have also added one for an Amazon gift card. When you redeem a minimum amount of points for an eligible reward by January 31 HSBC will send you a $25 Amazon.ca Gift Card. They don't state what the minimum amount is however. I would guess that if you redeem 25,000 points for $75 statement credit (their cash back option) you would earn the $25 gift card. The terms state this is only available for the first 600 people so you may want to get in on it sooner than later if it appeals to you. Learn more here. 

Summary of global hotel systemwide bonus points promotions – January Edition

 

Here is your monthly update of all the global hotel bonus points promotions that are available. One of the easiest ways to rack up lots of hotel points is to take advantage of these systemwide bonuses that come from many of the big chain programs and also from the lesser known programs. In fact, right now it should be rare for you NOT to earn a bonus. Unless you are staying at a boutique hotel or perhaps an independent hotel most other hotels out there have a bonus. So take advantage of it! These systemwide bonuses simply require you to register beforehand and they do not affect hotel pricing as long as you book a point eligible rate which are most rates out there. Of course booking through a third party site like Expedia or Rocketmiles does not count as most chains only award points on bookings that are made directly with them.  Here are all the current promotions that are available to everyone this month:

The postponed Scotiabank Rewards devaluation for some non-travel redemptions will now take place on April 1

 

In January of 2020 Scotiabank revealed they were going to change the points requirements for some of their non-travel redemption options. You can read our original post about the changes here. However it didn't take long for Scotia to reverse course because of the Coronavirus pandemic causing a shift in how Canadians were using their points. Only about a week after most of the country went into lockdown they announced that they were postponing the redemption option changes due to the uncertain times ahead. As travel was curtailed and financial woes hit I'm sure cardholders were happy to redeem Points for Credit without the planned devaluation. Fast forward to now and I hate to be the bearer of bad news but it appears Scotia will now go ahead with their changes as of April 1st. 

January 21 Update: Double Accor ALL Rewards points for stays in Canada, the U.S., Mexico and Panama, Rewards Canada Podcast now on YouTube & Budget extends Fastbreak status?!?

 Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your daily dose (or near daily dose) of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more. This update is brought to you by the HSBC +Rewards Mastercard which is currently offering a welcome bonus of up to 30,000 bonus points, no annual fee in the first year and a low 11.9% interest rate! 

On January 11th we provided details on the next iteration of Fairmont's Stay Close offer where you can get your second night free on stays at select Fairmont Hotels and in that post we also gave details on how you could earn Triple ALL Rewards points on those stays if you booked by Janaury 15. Now we can tell if you missed the triple points you can stil get a bonus as ALL Accor Live Limitless launched a new bonus today offering Double ALL Rewards Points on all stays that are booked by March 31 for completion by June 30. Sure Double Points doesn't match the Triple we had before but it's better than no bonus at all! What you need to do is simply register for the offer here first and then book your Fairmont Stay Close stay here. If you already have a stay booked simply register and you'll be all set.

The Platinum Card from American Express will lose its Shangri-La Golden Circle Jade Elite Status benefit on March 31

 
Earlier in the month the U.K. based points and miles blog Head for Points announced the U.K. version of the Platinum Card from American Express was losing its Shangri-La Hotels Golden Circle Jade elite status benefit. Rewards Canada immediately reached out to American Express Canada who confirmed this is the case for Canadian cardholders as well. At Amex Canada's request we didn't release the details until now as Platinum Cardmembers will be receiving details on their next statement about the departure of this benefit. Based on the U.K. and Canada losing this benefit I am under the impression this is a change seen by American Express globally.

New 40,000 point welcome bonus and no fee in the first year for the HSBC World Elite Mastercard

 
Earlier this week HSBC's revealed a new offer for their HSBC World Elite Mastercard that is better than the standard welcome offer we've seen since late December but by no means does it come close to the 100K offer they ran for the last four months of 2020. The new offer provides up to 40,000 bonus HSBC Rewards Points along with having the first year $149 annual fee waived on the primary card.  The bonus is awarded as follows:

Alaska Airlines is offering up to a 60% bonus when buying Mileage Plan miles

 

Some of the best frequent flyer miles out there are Alaska Airlines' Mileage Plan miles so when they are offered with a bonus when buying them people take notice. For the longest time the biggest bonus on buying Mileage Plan miles was 50% but in the latter half of 2020 we saw that boosted to 60% and even 70% for select members. Well we're happy to tell you that that  the Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan buy miles bonus is back and once again we see it up at the 60% level! 

Receive a 30% bonus when you buy World of Hyatt points

Hyatt has brought back their 30% bonus on buying points.  This version was last seen in October/November of last year and it allows you to buy World of Hyatt points for only 1.85 cents (US) each.  There is potential value in buying these points for select Hyatt stays around the globe as you can easily get more value than that per point on the right redemptions. Ideally since the transaction with points.com who facilitates the sale is conducted in US$ you'll want to use a credit card that has No Foreign Transaction fees to get the best value possible out of the points.

January 19 Update: New welcome offers for the TD Aeroplan Visa Platinum & Business cards, bonus Aeroplan points for opening TD accounts & an Amex Offer for Mr. Lube

Here's your Rewards Canada Daily update! Your daily dose (or near daily dose) of loyalty program, credit card and travel news, bonuses, deals and more.

Yesterday we let you know about the new welcome offer on the TD Aeroplan Visa Infinite Card but didn't go into the two other TD Aeroplan welcome offer changes. Here are the new welcome bonuses for the two of the other Aeroplan co-brand cards from TD:

American Express brings back a $200 statement credit offer for Sobeys, Metro, Save-On-Foods and Uber Eats purchases (Platinum Card only)

 

When the Coronavirus pandemic hit last year American Express shifted a good chunk of their resources from acquiring new customers to supporting existing customers. We saw many amazing offers to help out their cardmember base from double points, boosted cash back redemption value and more. One offer that resonated extremely well with many Canadians was a $250 statement credit for grocery shopping. Amex offered their Platinum cardmembers that credit for spending up to $250 at participating grocery retailers in Canada. That's right they gave $250 for spending $250. An amazing offer that we are happy to say has returned once again! This time they are offering up to a $200 credit when you spend up to $200 with  Sobeys, Metro, Save-On-Foods and Uber Eats. (Thanks to Paul on Twitter for letting us know about it!)