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Recently, we had published about a previously unwritten welcome offer on the Bilt Rewards card that had become available in the Bilt Rewards app (See: Bilt card first impressions). This offer was available publicly at the time when we initially published it on our best offers page, but Bilt has since reverted to a targeted offer with no guarantee that cardholders will receive it. Moving forward, some cardholders will receive the targeted email to earn 5x for the first 5 days after receiving and activating their Bilt Rewards card. Again, the offer was publicly-available when we initially listed it on our card page, but that changed. When we received reports from a couple of readers who did not receive the offer, we reached out to Bilt for more information.
The good news is that Bilt has agreed to honor the offer for those who signed up for the card before August 29, 2023. If you applied for the card before August 29th and did not receive the offer for 5x for the first 5 days, you should reach out to Bilt customer service and we are told that the offer will be honored.
It is obviously disappointing that this offer is not available publicly. While many readers have reported getting this offer, not everyone will moving forward, so you can not count on this bonus when applying for the card. Some people clearly haven’t been receiving the offer and we have no way of knowing the odds of receiving it if you are approved for the card.
As to whether or not it makes sense to get the card moving forward, I think that remains a matter of personal situation the same as before we reported on the welcome offer. Most people probably didn’t have the means to max out the offer, and we agreed that it wasn’t a very good offer but that something was better than nothing if you were interested in the card (particularly for those who did have the expenses to make good use of 5x for 5 days). I think the Bilt card makes sense for those who pay rent and aren’t currently earning rewards on it (I know a number of people who are or were in that situation prior to getting the Bilt card) and earning double rewards on Rent Day (the first of the month) can make this a nice way to generate some extra points that can be transferred to programs like Hyatt and American Airlines. There are plenty of people for whom this card won’t make sense (particularly those who primarily generate rewards from new card welcome bonuses — clearly Bilt has decided that they aren’t interested in attracting that market segment), but I think that for those who aren’t earning points on rent and/or can make good use of the Rent Day doubling, this could still make sense, particularly if Bilt continues with some of their generous Rent Day features.
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[…] 開卡獎勵（非公開）：開卡後五天內消費5倍點數回饋（上限為50,000點）原則上官網其實是沒有提到開卡獎勵的，但根據網友分享的隱藏版官網說明，以及我們自身的經驗，在開卡後會收到一封Email，內容就是說在開卡五天內的所有消費都會有5倍點數，上限50,000點，但房租除外，然後需達到刷卡五次的條件才會有喔～如果近期有計畫中的高額消費，可以趁開卡時賺點數。這個開卡獎勵並不保證每個人都會收到，但看了很多網友幾乎都說有，甚至有人說沒收到可以主動發信去問，官方也願意提供，他們不公開可能是想讓用戶有驚喜的感覺，如果突然取消了可能也比較沒有爭議。 […]
I signed up and was approved for the card a couple days ago. Does the notification that an applicant is targeted for the welcome offer come upon application approval or after receiving the physical card?
Bilt did not honor this offer to me It has been over 2 weeks since I made the purchase, FM posted this article and I contacted Bilt with this article. A Bilt representative contacted me and said they are “unable to retroactively apply the points to the account.”
Send me an Instagram DM – @kerrpoints
I applied in June, never received the offer, and was told that I couldn’t get it.
I’m one of those who applied for the card based on your discussion of the 5x earnings and before Aug. 29. I got my card today along with the 5x offer. I appreciate how you and Bilt handled this. There was a misunderstanding, you explained it, and they agreed to honor what you had told your readers. In a world of no-notice devaluations and the like, that’s refreshing.
I applied for the Bilt card on Monday (8/28), the day before this was posted…I received the card today (9/1), activated it, but didn’t receive the 5x offer right away. I asked about it via customer support on the Bilt app, including noting that FM said applications before 8/29 would get the offer, and within about 5 minutes I received an email telling me I was getting 5x for 5 days. I immediately paid my property taxes and basically consider this to be a reasonable SUB, especially for a fee free card. Thanks to the FM team (again) for seemingly making this possible. Fingers crossed I actually get 10x since today is Rent Day!
Any other card/issuer, this line would say something completely different.
“As to whether or not it makes sense to get the card moving forward, I think that remains a matter of personal situation”
But its Bilt so we do our darndest to make sure ol’ Dick isn’t butthurt. Notice how Dick Kerr used to roam these comments at the beginning with welcoming comments and “I’ll address that for you” but now he is nowhere to be seen. Probably counting how many VC dollars they have left before they go bust. At this point, its just a matter of time- like Dick’s runway time guesses, I am going for 6 months max.
Like others say, dodgy company that we’ve been calling out from the beginning and FM are still protecting at all costs.
What’s dodgy about Bilt?
Where do we start? They’ve paid for trips for all the bloggers (their friends) to Moskito Island and Miami. They get ZERO negative coverage as a result. Even in this article- phrases like it’s unfortunate that this happened, vs how they would treat them if they were any big bank.
They have deceptive practices- as exampled above
They have had TONS of issues with erroneous charges
They have the occasional great “deal” on points transfers, only to generate more and more press- and then many have complained of issues on transfer day which surprise surprise (go back to #1 reason above) the shillers don’t cover.
A dodgy company keeps doing dodgy things. What a surprise. There’s a reason the comments section of every Bilt post contains warnings about doing business with this company.
Sounds sloppy on Bilt’s end. They have a sign up promotion that they may/may not honor and there’s really no way to know if you qualify until you qualify. Same with ending said mystery promotion abruptly. Communicating things like this and giving definitive timeframes for ending them is something a responsible company would do. Given the runaround people work with verifying identity is in the same vein.
Good to clearly see Bilt for what it really is; not quite ready for primetime and watching it stumble on a public stage again and again should be telling for the future. While the hype is exciting, believe what they actually deliver.
It does, indeed, sound like a major instance of miscommunication on Bilt’s part. Once bitten, twice shy, and I imagine that FM will be much slower to report on private communications from Bilt in the future.
DP: I got the card on the 24th and I was targeted for 5x for 5 days.
I’m curious about what criteria they use to target cardholders. Does anyone have speculation on that?
Probably zip code. They probably that you will spend a lot and continue to use the card. Also, love the name. Love everything about IAD as an international flyer except the people movers.
What’s Kerr saying about this mess? Guy reminds me of a used car salesman..
He’s too busy inviting half the points & miles blogosphere to private parties to know or care about this…
I got a ’94 Izuzu Trooper for you if you’re looking. Changed the oil once in the 2000s.
Let it go and move on with life.
I picked up the card and got lucky to get the 5x offer. I have two in college so it made sense to get the card for their rents as well as to pay tuition for fall for both of them. If we didn’t have ongoing rents to pay I’d buy have bothered getting the card. The plan going forward is pay rent and 3 other rent day transactions and little else on the card, maybe I’ll tack some dining onto it too.
Pretty sure I’ve read that you can only make one rent or rent-type payment a month.
How will they track that if I’m using the bank+routing via Venmo? I get it if it’s one of the bilt property partners but this is just another Venmo payment
[…] bonus is now official. (We still don’t see it showing on the official landing pages.) Update from FM: it’s targeted and not official and isn’t being sent to […]
I applied 2 weeks ago and was approved with the 5x offer. However, the app said I would get 5x for the first 5 days. It also said I could use a virtual card number to start spending immediately. So I did, and put my big spend on it. Unfortunately, that spend didn’t count. Only until I go the physical card in the mail and then activated it. Then I started earning 5x points. Does that sound legit and I shouldn’t fight it? Thanks.
I mean, it never hurts to try…sounds like it could even be a legitimate glitch.