Tag Archives: American Express Serve Card

Requesting an Increased Cash Advance Limit from Chase for Online Serve Reloads

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Requesting an Increased Cash Advance Limit from Chase for Online Serve Reloads

I’m sure most of you are sick of hearing about Serve and their “cash advance fees” on Chase cards, but I promise this will be the last post about this issue.  Last Thursday/Friday, Serve or Chase started processing online Serve reloads slightly differently than before (link).  As it turned out, no cash advance fees ever posted, but the online Serve reload would decrease your cash advance available balance (link).

If you tried to use a Chase credit card with a cash advance limit smaller than your online load amount or a Chase Ink Bold business Charge Card, your online Serve reload would fail and you would get this error message.

Serve Reload Payment Declined

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False Alarm! Online Serve Reloads are Posting as Purchases (Not Cash Advances)

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False Alarm!  Online Serve Reloads are Posting as Purchases (Not Cash Advances)

(Hat tip to RRGG for keeping me informed along the way)

It’s been an exciting last 24 hours, but I am happy to share some good news.  According to FlyerTalk (link) and comments on my last post (link), online Serve reloads are not posting as purchases (and earning miles/points/cash back as before).

Serve Reloads Posting as Credit Not Cash Advances

For some reason, online Serve reloads are affecting cash advance balances across many banks, especially Chase.  Even though the cash advance balance changes, no actual cash advance fees are posting.   Continue reading

*Some* Chase Credit Cards Charging Cash Advance Fees for Online Serve Reloads

Update: 7AM PST – Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Freedom reloads are showing up as cash advances online.
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*Some* Chase Credit Cards Charging Cash Advance Fees for Online Serve Reloads

There have been reports on FlyerTalk (link) and some Tweets that Serve is now charging cash advance fees for *some* online Serve reloads.  Most of the cash advance reports state that Chase is charging cash advance fees for online reloads.

RRGG on the FlyerTalk thread (link) has some good info:

It seems like you should include a little more information if you’re going to start a new thread. You didn’t mention the type of card for example. NOT EVERYONE is getting a cash advance from Chase, as mentioned in the Serve thread.

There are reports of no cash advance today on:
UA Explorer Visa
UA Explorer MC
Sapphire Preferred
Southwest Visa
Also Barclay, Citi cards (Prestige), Fidelity AMEX

There are reports of a cash advance today on:
UA Club
UA Explorer
Ink Bold Visa
Sapphire Preferred
Also a Capital One card

As you can see it’s not even consistent.

Finally, in the past sometimes Chase has posted these as cash advance at first. After a few days they get changed to a regular charge. If anyone actually got a cash advance fee, you might want to share that.

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Random News: Ebay and PayPal Split, Hilton Free Night Certificate, RebAgents, Emirates Miles, $160 AirTran Credit, and Nickelodeon AMEX Offer

Ebay Baby

Random News: Ebay and PayPal Split, Hilton Free Night Certificate, RebAgents, Emirates Miles, $160 AirTran Credit, and Nickelodeon AMEX Offer

Before I dive into the random news, today is the last day of September.  Make sure you max out your Amazon Payments, Bluebird reloads, Server Reloads, etc. before the limits reset tonight at midnight.  With that said, here are some random news topics…

I just received the following email from Ebay.  Sometime in 2015, PayPal will become a separate company (probably going IPO as well).  I’m not sure how this will affect anything, but I think it is worth sharing.

Ebay PayPal Split Announced

 

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the Citi Hilton HHonors Free Night Certificates (link) and received a helpful email response regarding how Citi calculates your $10,000 annual spend to qualify for the free night certificate:

The screenshot you posted says you only get credit for charges after your annual fee date. I assumed that was the day I activated the card so I spent $10,750 on the card in my first year with some cushion to be safe. I never received the annual certificate and when I asked, Citi said I only spent $9,800. I checked my statements and that number excluded the $950 I spent in the few days between when I activated the card (around 7/25) and the date the first annual fee was charged (8/2). Citi is investigating for me and it seems like this is a technicality that will ultimately be resolved in my favor, however, if I had known I either would have not spent anything until I saw the annual fee hit or would have spent the extra $200 to hit the bonus before moving on to a different card.

Hopefully this warning can help avoid potential time spent on the phone with Citi for you and others that may be cutting it tight on the $10K spend.

 

A friend of mine writes for the blog RebAgents (rebate + agents) and sent me the following link: Why finding a Real Estate Agent or Realtor should be the last step in your home search checklist (link).  If you are in the market for buying or selling your house, check out the link to learn more about how to reduce your real estate agent’s commission and buy/sell your house faster.

 

A reader of mine has Emirates miles and wants to know what to do with them.  Any advice?

I have like 14500 skywards emirates miles what will be best way to redeem it ?? I tried to do some research on it , I cannot find anything.

Also I have 5 different accounts with emirates ( my relatives ) all has 8k miles

 

I have $166.45 in AirTran credit that will expire on October 30, does anyone have any experience converting this credit to Southwest Airlines credit?  Any way to extend the expiration date?

$160 AirTran Credit

 

Last but not least, I checked my AMEX accounts and this AMEX Offer caught my attention.  If you have kids (or are a kid yourself), you probably watched Nickelodeon at one point.  I spent a large chunk of my childhood watching these shows and it would have been awesome to go check out Nickelodeon Suites Resorts when I was younger.  I am too old now, but maybe you can take your kids and give them the best vacation ever!

Nickelodeon Suites Resorts AMEX Offer

If you have any questions, please leave a comment below.  Have a great day everyone!

How to Create and Manage a Serve Sub Account (Not Useful for MS)

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How to Create and Manage a Serve Sub Account (Not Useful for MS)

Serve allows you to add authorized users to your account (called sub accounts) where you can fund the sub account and monitor their transactions.  Before you start creating sub accounts, please read the FAQ page (link); here is a good summary of what you can and cannot do with a Serve sub account:

Serve Sub Account Allowed Activities

As you can see from the picture above, you cannot manufacture spend with Serve sub accounts since you cannot add funds or use bill pay from a Serve sub account.  If you want to learn more about sub accounts, please click here.