WELCOME OFFER ON THE CHASE INK BUSINESS PREFERRED® CREDIT CARD
The Chase Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card is Chase’s most popular business credit card. Though its annual fee is only $95, its welcome offer recently is 90,000 Ultimate Rewards points after spending $8,000 in the first three months of opening your account.
Don’t write off this business credit card if you don’t have a registered LLC! What most people don’t know is that they’re eligible to apply if they earn any sort income from “side hustles” – whether it’s setting up a lemonade stand on weekends, dog-walking, baby-sitting, selling second-hand furniture on Facebook Marketplace or clothes on Depop, driving on Uber, renting out their basement, freelance writing, etc. If that’s the case, they qualify for business credit cards as Sole Proprietors and they can apply using their SSN instead of an EIN!
We’ll provide more in-depth instructions below.
ABOUT THE CARD
Beyond earning 90,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points as part of the welcome offer, you earn the following points on your spending:
- 3x points per $1 on the first $150,000 spent in combined purchases on travel, shipping purchases, internet, cable, and phone services, advertising purchases made with social media sites and search engines each account anniversary year
- 1x point on all other purchases, no limit on the amount you can spend
The card additionally offers no foreign transaction fees, primary car rental collision waiver, travel insurance, purchase protection, extended warranty protection, and more! You can find the full details of these benefits here.
WHY GET THE CARD
To start with, you don’t want to miss the 90K welcome offer! Whether you own a LLC or not, the 3x earnings on several categories of spending make this card a good addition to almost any wallet. Additionally, having a card like The Chase Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card allows you to turn any cashback you’ve earned from Chase’s cashback cards (such as the Chase Ink Business Cash® Credit Card, Chase Ink Business Unlimited® Credit Card, Chase Freedom Flex®, or Chase Freedom Unlimited®) into points – such that 5% cashback turns into 5x points per dollar spent, 3% cashback turns into 3x points per dollar spent, etc.
After you’ve had the card for more than one year, if find that it’s not worth the $95 annual fee – don’t worry. You can keep your credit line open and downgrade it to a no-fee product – such as the Ink Business Cash (which earns 5x points on select spending categories) or the Ink Business Unlimited (which earns 1.5x points on all purchases). If you also have a Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card or Chase Sapphire Reserve® in your wallet to keep earning Ultimate Rewards points, you’ll still be able to turn the cashback from those Ink cards into points!
ELIGIBILITY
As any of Chase’s cards, you need to be under 5/24 to apply.
If you don’t know Chase’s 5/24 Rule is, it basically means that to qualify for a Chase credit card (whether personal or business), you need to have opened less than five new cards in the last 24 months. All personal credit cards on your credit report within the last 24 months count towards your 5/24 status, even obscure ones like store cards.
Unfortunately, “new accounts” also include cards that you’ve been added to as an authorized user. So if your P2 added you as an authorized user on their Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card last summer to get an additional Priority Pass membership or TSA PreCheck credit, it’ll still count towards your 5/24 status.
Fortunately, business credit cards do not count towards your 5/24 status! Business credit cards from TD Bank, Discover, and UBS Bank are notable exceptions and do count your 5/24 status. So do select business credit cards from Capital One (though importantly, the Venture X and Capital One Spark Cash Plus don’t count towards 5/24).
Importantly, you are still eligible to apply for the Ink Business Preferred even if you already have another Ink product, such as the Ink Business Cash or the Ink Business Unlimited. You can have all three in your wallet at the same time! As long as you’re under 5/24, you’re also eligible to apply even if you’re recently already had the card and downgraded or closed it.
HOW TO APPLY
Filling out an application for a business credit card looks a little bit different compared to a personal credit card, but we’ve got you covered. If you’ve never applied for one before and you don’t yet have a registered LLC but still qualify through another stream of income, this is how you should fill out your application:
- Legal name of business: your legal name
- Business name on card: your legal name
- Business mailing address: your mailing ddress
- Business type: sole proprietor
- Tax identification number: your social security number, though you could easily create an EIN through the IRS if you wanted to – the process is quick and free
- Business category: pick the one that best describes what you do
- Number of employees: 1
- Annual business revenue: your projected annual revenue – it’s 100% okay if this is zero! Not everyone makes a profit immediately.
- Years in business: number of years you’ve worked like this – it doesn’t matter if you haven’t been making a profit
- Gross annual income: total income of your household – does not have to be just from this income stream!
If your application doesn’t get immediately approved, it’s likely that it was sent in for further review. In this case, you should expect a call from Chase within a few business days – they make ask you some of these questions again (so make sure you keep a copy of your application on file!) or they may ask for further clarification on what you do. Either way, especially if you already have an existing relationship with Chase, don’t hesitate to tell them how excited you are to get this card for its points-earning opportunities and wide variety of benefits!
Remember that once you have the card, you also don’t have to put only your business expenses on it. It may help for personal accounting purposes to make tax season easier, but the banks really don’t care whether you charged your personal travel or shopping to your business card.
CHASE TRANSFER PARTNERS
Chase transfers to 11 airlines and 3 hotels.
| Transfer Partner | Ratio | Alliance |
| Aer Lingus AerClub | 1:1 | None, but has partners |
| Air Canada Aeroplan | 1:1 | Star Alliance |
| Air France/KLM FlyingBlue | 1:1 | SkyTeam |
| British Airways Executive Club | 1:1 | Oneworld |
| Emirates Skywards | 1:1 | None, but has partners |
| Iberia Plus | 1:1 | Oneworld |
| JetBlue TrueBlue | 1:1 | None, but has partners |
| Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer | 1:1 | Star Alliance |
| Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards | 1:1 | None |
| United Airlines MileagePlus | 1:1 | Star Alliance |
| Virgin Atlantic Flying Club | 1:1 | SkyTeam |
| Transfer Partner | Ratio |
| IHG Rewards | 1:1 |
| Marriott Bonvoy | 1:1 |
| World of Hyatt | 1:1 |
HOW TO TRANSFER YOUR CHASE ULTIMATE REWARDS POINTS TO AIRLINE AND HOTEL PROGRAMS
If you’ve never transferred your points to an airline or hotel loyalty program before: don’t worry, it becomes much easier after the first time you do it. Before you start, though: never transfer your points before finding an award flight/stay! Keep your points with Chase until you find one.
Once you’ve found an award flight or award hotel stay using points, log into your Chase online banking account. Look to the right and navigate to “Ultimate Rewards Points”:
Keep scrolling down until you get to “Discover more ways to use your points.”
Click on “Explore partneres” under “Transfer points to partners”:
You’ll see a list of airline and hotel partners who Chase allows you to transfer your Ultimate Rewards points to. Navigate to the one you want to transfer to, click on it, and select “Transfer points.” You’ll be prompted to link your accounts, so enter your hotel/airline loyalty program account number and your name, and you’re all set – you’re able to select the amount of points you want to transfer!
IF YOU’RE WONDERING HOW TO USE YOUR POINTS…
Although you’ll see the 90,000 Ultimate Rewards welcome offer advertised as worth at least $900 cash back or $1,125 toward travel when redeemed through Chase Travel℠, we don’t recommend you to use these points in the portal. So forget the cashback and gift card options, and don’t book flights or hotel stays in the travel portal!
Why? Because 90,000 can stretch much further than $1,125.
Here are three examples:
- Look at this $10,801 Iberia business class flight from Boston to Madrid. You can book it for only 34,000 Iberia Plus Avios!
2. This $7,911 Air France business class flight from Boston to Paris costs only 50,000 Air France/KLM FlyingBlue miles!
3. This $11,357 Emirates first class flight from New York to Milan costs 102,000 Emirates Skywards miles! And yes – JFK to MXP operates on an A380, so you also get an on-board bar on the upper deck of the plane, as well as an on-board shower. You only just a couple more points after meeting the 90K welcome offer to book this flight!
Click here to learn more about the Chase Ink Business Preferred® Credit Card!
Note: Opinions expressed here are ours alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.
