Good afternoon everyone.  We only have 11 days left in 2016, so what better time than now to calculate how our Q4 spending is going on the Discover It and Chase Freedom.  I wrote a similar post last quarter: Final Month Review: Calculate Progress Toward Chase Freedom Q3 Restaurant Spend.  Let’s start with the Discover It and finish with the Chase Freedom.  Log into your Discover It online account and click Search Transactions under Activity & Payments.

The Q4 2016 categories for Discover It include Amazon, department stores, and Sam’s Club.  Since I only use my Discover It on Amazon, I typed Amazon into the search box, set the dates for October 1 through today, and click the Search button.

I have 10 transactions from Amazon between October 1 and today, totalling $416.66.  If you made purchases at Sam’s Club, change the search to Sam’s Club.  If you made purchases at department stores, leave the search box empty and select department stores in the categories drop down menu.  Add up all 3 search result numbers to calculate your total Q4 spending.  If you are short of $1,500, decide if you want to max it out.  Since it is really easy to get 5% cash back at Amazon year round, I will not max out the remaining spend on my Discover It.

---

Up next, we have the Chase Freedom.  Log into your Chase online account and click on the Go to Blueprint link under your Chase Freedom account.

Click See Spending inside the Track It box.

The Track it page divided all your purchases into various categories.  Since we only care about Q4 categories (drugstores, department stores & wholesale clubs), click one of those categories.

You will see all purchases that post in those categories for the last several months.  Since we only care about Q4, look at all purchases from October to December.  As you can see, my Chase Freedom hasn’t gotten much use this quarter.  Add up the monthly totals from October to December in these 3 categories to see where you stand.  If you are under $1,500, decide if it is worth spending at those categories to max them out.

Discover It Q1 2017 categories: gas stations, ground transportation (Uber & Lyft) and wholesale clubs.

Chase Freedom Q1 2017 categories: gas stations and local commuter transportation (Uber & Lyft).

Wow, these credit cards both have the same categories!  I don’t own a car, so gas stations doesn’t interest me, but I do take Uber and Lyft occasionally, so I will make sure to set my Discover It Chase Freedom Credit Card for Uber and Lyft in January.  I prefer 5x Chase Ultimate Reward Points to 5% cash back from Discover any day.  If you have any questions, please leave a comment below.  Have a great day everyone!