Increased Bonus Offer for the Amex Blue Cash Preferred With 2 New Bonus Categories Added

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INSIDER SECRET: You can only earn the introductory bonus for a specific Amex card once per lifetime, but if you’re not eligible for an offer, Amex will let you know (with a pop-up message) before they check your credit.

The Blue Cash Preferred® Card from American Express has an increased welcome bonus of $250 (as a statement credit) after spending $1,000 on purchases in the first 3 months of account opening.

Along with the bigger bonus, the Blue Cash Preferred is also getting an update. There are two new bonus categories that have been added and one that has been removed.

Increased Amex Blue Cash Preferred Intro Bonus

Apply Here: Blue Cash Preferred® Card from American Express

In addition to the Amex Blue Cash Preferred card’s $250 statement credit (after meeting the minimum spending requirement), it has the following perks:

• 6% cash back at US supermarkets (up to $6,000 in purchases per calendar year, then 1% cash back)
• 6% cash back on US 20+ streaming services (Hulu, Netflix, Amazon Prime, HBO, Apple Music, Pandora, etc.)
• 3% cash back at US gas stations & transit (including parking, tolls, ride share)
• 1% cash back on everything else
• Terms Apply

At US supermarkets, you can earn 6% cash back on up to $6,000 in spending each year; then 1%. At the maximum, that would mean $360 in cash-back rewards ($6,000 X 6%). And the new 6% back for streaming services is a unique and useful category since most of us are paying for these already.

The card does have a $95 annual fee (see rates & fees), but it’s easy to earn enough cash back to offset it. For example, you’d only need to spend ~$132 a month at US supermarkets and streaming services to earn $95 in cash back for the year (~$132 X 12 months X 6%). That’s not hard to do at all.

Plus, you’ll earn 3% cash back at US gas stations and transit which includes Uber, Lyft, and parking. In both of these categories, and the streaming services category, you can earn an unlimited amount of cash back!

With this update to the card, Amex has removed the bonus category of 3% cash back at department stores. But if you’re an existing card holder you can still take advantage of that perk until July 31, 2019.

What do you think of the changes to the card? Are the bigger bonus and new cash back categories enticing enough for you to add this one to your wallet?

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