Happy (Belated) Independence Day!
This is the July 5, 2026 edition of the LazyPoints Weekly newsletter. It goes out by email every Sunday at 8:00 a.m. Pacific–unless I oversleep–and is archived here on the blog. Want it straight to your inbox each week? Sign up here.
It’s a long weekend—we’re taking a break, and I hope you are, too!
It's also the start of a new month, quarter, and second half of the year. That means a lot of credit card benefits have just reset. Some are best saved until you actually need them. Others I try to use immediately so I don't forget about them. For example, I just used my Amex Resy credit to buy a gift card at our favorite restaurant.
I’ve been testing some methods to keep track of all these credits, including Thrifty Traveler’s card tracker, Cardstack, and Kudos. I’ve already written about MaxRewards. But for the time being, I’ve just been using a Google Sheet. It lets me organize around when the credits will expire and separate the “I need this to justify the card” credits from the “this will be useful once in a blue moon” credits.
Also, if you have a card with quarterly bonus categories like the Discover It or Chase Freedom Flex, be sure to check out the Q3 categories and activate them.
That's it for this quick holiday edition. Enjoy the long weekend—we'll be back with a full newsletter next week.
This week on the blog 📝
I wrote about Pointhound, a service that delivers points deals to your inbox. I wasn’t a fan of their paid service, but if you’re new to points (and maybe even if you’re not), I think their free emails are a great way to get a sense of your options to redeem your points, tailored to your home airport.
We also had a new Alaska Global Getaway with some great deals (Tokyo for 55k round-trip 👀). The booking period has already ended, but I added it to our running list. Keep an eye out for these on the first Wednesday of the month.
Quick Points of the Week ⚡
More value 📈
Rove adds Frontier as a transfer partner. If you’ve been using travel/shopping portal Rove, you can now transfer those points to low-cost carrier Frontier, where redemptions start as low as 5,000 points. Maybe a decent option for cheap domestic travel. (Award Wallet)
Deals 🏷️
Credit on Apple Pay with Amex Offers (targeted). I didn’t get this one, but cash back just for paying with your phone is worth scanning your Amex Offers for. (Miles to Memories)
Save on Gas with Amazon (today only). Prime members can save 50¢ per gallon at BP, Amoco, and certain other locations. (TPG)
Notable Transfer Bonuses ⬆️
Amex → Virgin Atlantic, 30% bonus. Virgin points aren’t my favorite because of their often-high fees and difficulty in finding (non-London) award flights on their website, but the points never expire and have some uses.
Capital One → Eva Air, 30% bonus. This only brings the value to slightly less than 1:1, and dealing with EVA’s booking system is probably only worth it if you’re specifically searching for business class to Asia, especially Taiwan.
Amex → Hilton, 20% bonus. I’m not interested.
Recommended 👍
“Pay Yourself Back” with Chase points. I struggle to use Chase points in a way I find truly valuable. If you want a relatively simple way to get value, check out Frequent Miler’s guide to Chase’s option for extra value when redeeming for statement credits.
Manage European airport chaos. The EU’s rollout of a new entry/exit system hasn’t exactly been smooth. I dodged this on my last Europe trip, but I’m on alert for my autumn trip. If you have European travels planned, you might want to check out this guide from Zach Griff.
Sign up bonus of the week 🎯
Links marked with an * are affiliate or referral links, meaning we may earn if you apply via our link.
Rakuten is currently offering up to $90 cash back when using the shopping portal’s link to sign up for a Chase Freedom Unlimited. That’s on top of the $200 welcome bonus on that no-fee card. With 5% cash back when booking travel via Chase, 3% on dining and drug stores, and 1.5% on all other purchases—and the ability to convert those earnings to transferable Ultimate Rewards if you have another, qualifying Chase card—it’s a solid no-fee card. That brings the total value close to the card's best-ever public offer of $300. But I'd still rather save an application for a stronger, get-me-to-Europe type bonus.
Other great sign-up bonuses this week
50,000 points+ $300 Bilt Cash + Bilt Gold status on the Bilt Palladium (our take: 🔥🔥🔥)
100k points on the Chase Sapphire Preferred* (our take: 🔥🔥🔥)
90k miles on the Delta Gold (our take: 🔥🔥)
80k miles on the Citi AA Platinum Select (our take: 🔥🔥)
175k points on the Hilton Aspire (our take: 🔥🔥)
100k points on the JetBlue Premier (our take: 🔥)
125k pts + 1 night on the Marriott Boundless (our take: 🔥)
100-125k miles on premium Delta Cards (our take: 🔥)
100k points and $100 on the Hilton Honors (our take: 🔥)
60k points on the Choice Privileges Mastercard (our take: 🔥)
150k points on the Morgan Stanley and Schwab Platinums (our take)
Up to 100/175k on the Amex Gold/Platinum (our take)