I was really happy when I received an email from Google Offers recently. They wrote to inform me that they were refunding a deal that I never used to my credit card.
The deal was for Lucky Rice in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel New York, I picked up 3 premium tickets to this exclusive affair for $99 each, and we all thoroughly enjoyed the event. Google explicitly stated that if I had actually used the offer then not to worry, it was their treat!
The refund from Google was a real surprise, and came at a strange time since the card it went to was my AA Citi Visa that just sits in my wallet, at the same time as the refund I received a targeted offer for 3x points on the card, for which I registered with one click.
The card was carrying a credit balance of $297 and I want to use it to earn those valuable AAdvantage miles, however each bank has a different policy on whether it would reverse the previously earned 297 miles or just not allow earning when in a credit balance.
Rather than remember each banks policy I just call up the card company and have them send me a cheque for the balance, in the case of Citi they actually offered to wire the funds directly to my linked Checking account, which saves a lot of time and effort.
I highly recommend requesting credit balances be returned to cash, and they do eventually do this automatically, but it can often take several billing cycles, by which time you have lost out on the use of that money, it’s like you are giving the card company a free loan of your money and terrible practice. Furthermore potentially forgoing earning points on that card until the balance is spent down.
Leave a Reply