Bankwest Qantas World MC 90k bonus, $6k spend in 3 months, $135 first year annual fee, exp 31 August 2019

[me-h]

I cancelled my ANZ black yesterday (got the bonus points 2 months ago but was waiting to finish an OS trip I'd booked stuff using the card for to enable the travel insurance). That was the 3rd card I've cancelled this calendar year. I tend to keep no more than 3 active cards at a time, and then cancel one before signing up to a new one. I give it a month between dropping to 2 cards and taking out a new 3rd one. Will sign up for NAB next month. Never been refused a card yet, I prob churn 3-5 cards a year.

On BW, I hit the 6k min spend this month, got 3rd statement today (first statement came with the card and was for zero, 2nd statement a month ago). No sign of the bonus points yet. Hoping they'll post next month after I've paid the statement that took me over the 6k total min spend.

 

[nickfromeastryde]

yOU DO 2 cards a YEAR??? Won't that hurt your credit rating? can't they see that you've had cards and cancelled them? I figured if you had too many cards they'd work out you were QFF points shopping.

I do 4 to 6 a year but still really can't follow how if affects my scores. Did ANZ and Qantas Premier around Christmas time and my score went down, have just had approved Citibank and Bank West and score has skyrocketed back into Excellent range on both Credit Savvy and Get Credit Score.

Doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason but as others have said, I don't think the Banks use it as their main assessment tool. Ability to repay seems to be far more important which I guess it probably should be

 

[JennyMG]

RE 'GOVERNMENT CHARGES' exclusion on Bankwest Mastercard.
Did a couple of tests.

Northern Beaches council rates did not count toward points.
Rego did not count toward points.
All other payments did, but nothing that could be construed as Govt. charges.

Makes me wonder, would a greenslip be considered govt. charges? part of the rego, but not.It's a biggie! Shame I didn't have the WMC then to test it.
What about hiring a council room for a party.
What about paying for a DA.
Seems kinda silly when water and electricity is fine.

 

[33kft]

It really just comes down to how much that entity paid in transaction fees (ie did they pay lower government rates or higher private enterprise rates). I agree on the surface it seems silly but when you think about it, these are semi-govt institutions that would benefit from pushing payments thru at the lower rate (meaning less cream on top for your bank to pay your incentives) whilst Water and Electricity are often (but not always) retail service providers rather than wholesale infrastructure companies and as such don't benefit from semi-government transaction fees.

 

[33kft]

Also, I 100% suspect all of those you listed would result in no points, and you've certainly got a good feel of where the line in the sand tends to be for these types of transactions.

 

[NoName]

Why not just buy a Westfield gift card or something to pay these bills with? A small fee to buy the card and you still get the full points.

 

[33kft]

Why not just buy a Westfield gift card or something to pay these bills with? A small fee to buy the card and you still get the full points.

If you're going to do that, make it WISH gift cards at a 5% discount (or the Coles equivalent). But to be honest I've never bought an entire min spend worth of WISH cards, because the best honed skill is paying the fees that you'd pay anyway, but making sure they are eligible for both min spend and points earn. Some might not bother but that's my approach and it doesn't put me into $6k of debt to coles woolworths in the short to medium term.

I'll normally put through around $1k-$2k of WISH cards at any time however, since I'll spend that in 2 months. Any more than that wouldn't be optimizing my min spend.

 

[NoName]

Yes that too as a better option. Just buy them as you need them, no need to buy $6k worth. If you have $1000 in rates to pay then buy $1000 worth of gift cards.

 

[JennyMG]

Why not just buy a Westfield gift card or something to pay these bills with? A small fee to buy the card and you still get the full points.

What a novel idea!!!

 

[Kangol]

RE 'GOVERNMENT CHARGES' exclusion on Bankwest Mastercard.
Did a couple of tests.

...

Seems kinda silly when water and electricity is fine.

Did you pay a water bill and get the points?

 

[JennyMG]

Yep, didn't you? ....

 

[JennyMG]

If you're going to do that, make it WISH gift cards at a 5% discount (or the Coles equivalent).
;............
I'll normally put through around $1k-$2k of WISH cards at any time however, since I'll spend that in 2 months. Any more than that wouldn't be optimizing my min spend.

1. How do you pay a bill with a WISH card?
2. does it have to be a certain kind? (5% discount or coles equivalent???)

 

[33kft]

1. How do you pay a bill with a WISH card?

You can't, but you can buy groceries with it. The advantage being that you can purchase an amount to cover your normal spend (say $2K) upfront on the card to help meet minimum spend criteria within a certain time, yet you could take additional time to use the gift cards - you could buy several months worth of groceries in advance, basically. As an added bonus, for the Woolworths gift cards at least, you can get a 5% discount on the card by purchasing it through cashrewards, shopback or a bunch of other channels - so you're getting 5% off your grocery bill.

 

[JennyMG]

Well, what if

You can't, but ......

What if you bought a bunch of those 'visa card' type gift cards.I suppose they could be used to pay for stuff, such as rego, rates, etc. That way those 'govt. charges' would still be eligible purchases and to towards the points count and earn regular points too.!
Ok, it might seem a bit extreme, and a bit of effort, but I wish Id thought of that a week ago when I paid the rego and the rates and it won't go toward my bonus points tally.

 

[get me outta here]

The Entertainment Book sells Wish cards up to $500 value for 5% off . And JB Hifi, Priceline pharmac_, Country Road, movies, supercheap auto, etc

 

[NoName]

You can't, but you can buy groceries with it.

This is why I mentioned Westfield Gift cards. They can be used anywhere like a prepaid visa. I’m fine with wearing a $2.50 fee for putting $500 on one.

 

[33kft]

What if you bought a bunch of those 'visa card' type gift cards.

You could potentially* use these cards to pay bills that wouldn't otherwise qualify.

The * is because I know that at the very least ATO and AusPost have blocked using only1 visas and their cohorts.

Also the fee for Only1 visa is $5.95 per card. They only come in $50 or $100 variants so that's a ton of money to spend to meet min spend - $59.50 per $1k.

 

[Kangol]

Yep, didn't you? ....

Haven't tried yet!

 

[tdimdad]

This is why I mentioned Westfield Gift cards. They can be used anywhere like a prepaid visa.

Including outside Westfield shopping centres?

 

[pangwen]

Just got approved (a little over 2 weeks between application and approval). Unfortunately, it was a bit too late for me to use the "no overseas transaction fee" feature - I hadn't realised the long wait time involved with this card, and only applied for the card about a week before an overseas trip. They called me on the 3rd last day of my trip (incurring roaming charges on my behalf) to confirm some details, and I got the approval notice on the last day of my trip.