The Secret Points Shopping Portal With More Stores Than the Ultimate Rewards Portal!
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Update: One or more card offers in this post are no longer available. Check our Hot Deals for the latest offers.One of the best ways to get miles and points on your regular spending is to use online shopping portals.
I’ve written about using Evreward to find the best shopping portal deals. But did you know Barclaycard has a shopping portal too, and it’s NOT listed on Evreward?
How Does It Work?
Link: Barclaycard RewardsBoost Portal
To earn extra miles and points by shopping through the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal, you must be a Barclaycard cardholder. But not all Barclaycard cards qualify.
For example, if you have the Barclaycard Arrival Plus World Elite Mastercard or Barclaycard US Airways cards, you can access the shopping portal.
But cards like the Barclaycard Choice Privileges or Barclaycard Hawaiian Airlines don’t allow cardholders access.
Note: If you have only the Barclaycard US Airways card, you’ll be sent to the Dividend Miles Shopping Portal, which has different payouts than the standard Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal.How to Earn Extra Miles and Points
Step 1: Does Your Barclaycard Qualify?
If your card qualifies, you’ll see the “Earn More Miles With RewardsBoost” icon when you log into your Barclaycard account.
Click the “Shop Now” button to be taken to the portal.
Step 2: Search for Categories, Merchants, or Products
Once you’ve logged into the RewardsBoost portal, you’ll be able to choose from hundreds of online stores, airlines, hotels, and car rental companies.
You’ll earn extra points or miles per $1 you spend, depending on the merchant. Or occasionally, they’ll offer a lump sum of miles and points for a purchase, or another bonus like free shipping.
You can also search by product, and it will list the merchants that carry it, along with payouts. Click “Shop Now” to start shopping at the merchant’s website.
Step 3: Go Shopping!
Once you click through to a merchant, it won’t look much different from the store’s regular website. Add items to your cart or make reservations as you normally would.
Once you’ve paid for your purchase, the regular points should show up on your Barclaycard statement immediately.
The bonus points from shopping through the mall may take some time (up to 8 weeks but hopefully less!) to post to your account.
Is It Worth It?
The look and feel of the site is similar to that of the Chase Ultimate Rewards shopping portal. I did some comparisons to see which portal had better deals.
One of the 1st things I noticed about the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal is that there seem to be many more merchants listed, compared to other sites like Chase Ultimate Rewards.
For example, in the category “Apparel – Women“, I counted ~65 merchants on the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal. Barclaycard RewardsBoost had more than double that!
And the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal has many more merchants listed for travel than the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal. For example, when you search for “Travel – Hotels and Accomodations” on the Chase portal, you get 4 options: Hotels.com, Expedia, Hotwire, and Gilt City.
But the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal lists 38 merchants in the same category, including Marriott, IHG, Choice Hotels, and Westin. Plus, Orbitz, Travelocity, and Priceline are also included.
I found similar results when I searched for flights and car rentals. The Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal has many more choices!
Where Will You Earn More Miles and Points?
Because the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal does NOT appear on Evreward, you’ll have to log-in to search for a specific merchant and see if the bonus points are better or worse than other shopping portals.
I looked at some of the featured merchants on both the Barclaycard and Chase portals to see which paid out more bonus points.
| Barclaycard RewardsBoost Portal | Chase Ultimate Rewards Shopping Portal | |
|---|---|---|
Walmart| 2 miles per $1 | 1 point per $1 | |
| Staples | 2 miles per $1 | 4 points per $1 |
| Home Depot | 2 miles per $1 | 3 points per $1 |
| Best Buy | 2 miles per $1 | 1 point per $1 |
| Sephora | 5 miles per $1 | 5 points per $1 |
| Macy's | 3 miles per $1 | 5 points per $1 |
| iTunes | 4 miles per $1 | 3 points per $1 |
| FTD | 10 miles per $1 | 10 points per $1 |
| Hotwire | 1 mile per $1 | 1 point per $1 |
| Groupon | 4 miles per $1 | 3 points per $1 |
Sometimes the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal paid more than the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal, and sometimes the opposite was true.
So you have to compare! But I think it’s worth it, because the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal has many more merchants (travel, especially).
Note: Barclaycard Arrival miles and Chase Ultimate Rewards points are NOT created equal!If the payouts for a merchant are similar between the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal and the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal, you’ll have a decision to make. That’s assuming you have credit cards that qualify for both shopping portals.
The Barclaycard Arrival Plus card earns miles which can be redeemed for 2.2% cash back now 2.1% back for travel. So for example, a $1,000 flight on Expedia booked through the RewardsBoost portal earns you an extra 1 point per $1 you spend, or $11 (once you take into account the 10% bonus now 5% bonus for travel redemptions).
However, if you have the Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase Freedom, or Chase Ink card, you can shop through the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal. You’d earn the same extra 1 point per $1, or 1,000 points.
And those 1,000 points could be transferred to travel partners like United Airlines, Southwest, or Hyatt, and be worth considerably more than the $11 cash back you’d get from Barclaycard.
Remember, to transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to partner airlines and hotels, you must have the Chase Sapphire Preferred, Chase Ink Plus, or Chase Ink Bold card.
But given there are many merchants and travel companies on the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal that aren’t on other portals at all, many times you shouldn’t even have to make a decision!
Are There Drawbacks?
The FAQ for the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal says it can take up to 8 weeks for bonus miles to post to your account. And folks on FlyerTalk have complained that sometimes miles go missing or take months to post.
Barclaycard also makes it clear that you can only use coupon or promotion codes found on the Barclaycard RewardsBoost mall. I don’t have personal experience with trying coupon codes from elsewhere, but if you’ve done it and the miles have posted, please let me know in the comments!
Bottom Line
Log into your Barclaycard account to see if your Barclaycard credit card qualifies you for bonus miles through their Barclaycard RewardsBoost shopping portal. It’s not listed on Evreward so you’ll have to compare payouts manually.
When payouts are competitive, decide whether you prefer Barclaycard points or another currency such as Chase Ultimate Rewards points.
What do you think of the Barclaycard RewardsBoost portal?
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