A number of people have noticed (1, 2, 3) that using Paypal for an airline purchase does not trigger the 5% rewards with Chase Freedom. Most Paypal charges show on the statement as “PAYPAL *JANESBOUTIQUE”, but airlines apparently worked out a special coding so that it just shows up as the airline charge directly.
This issue has been reported with Delta, Southwest (ymmv), United, British, and is probably true for all airline purchases. (Update 5/22/18: seems like America does work for 5x. )
We added a note to our original quarterly 5% post a few days ago, but thought it worth a separate heads-ups post here. If you already made the purchase, try SMing Chase and asking for a manual adjustment as that’s worked in the past.
On the positive side, this should mean that for the purposes of ordinary travel category bonuses, paying with Paypal is less likely to mess up the proper travel coding.
It’s 2022, is this 2018 post and its comments still hold true?
Mine showed up on the card as Delta, not paypal
Paid for my car insurance (progressive) through paypal, not trigger 5% either
southwest works fine, it will show additional information as paypal on the freedom statement. I also saw similar dp post here.
Hmm, interesting, let me update the post as YMMV.
I bought ~$800 worth of flight tickets (jetblue and united) at the beginning of april and also noticed this. I have reached out to Chase and they called me back and told me there is nothing they can do and I will have to talk to Paypal about it. I asked about the manual adjustment but the guy on the phone said he cannot do that as it is against their policy. As a long time chase customer I’m really disappointed.
I wonder if one of the local TV consumer reporters would consider looking into this? What they’re doing is clearly not right.
dp: Bought air tix on Air China USA website, paid via PayPal using my CSR. Received 3x points. If I remembered right, only “Air China” was shown on the merchant name – without “PayPal *” in front of it.
Do this site’s admins/owner have any contacts with Chase who they could report this problem to? I’m wondering if there might be some way to have this fixed. Obviously individuals calling CS are not going to get it resolved.
We can try, but I highly doubt they will fix it.
4 transactions posted on 4/10, noted as “AMERICAN AIR00…” (no paypal, even though they are paid w/paypal). Each earned 5x bonus points and are noted as bonus earn.
My AA Paypal purchase posted 5x as well.
It does not hurt to buy a ticket via agencies like Priceline and use Paypal there?
I’d guess things like that will work.
Can I use the Chase Shopping Portal to get additional bonus points from retailers, and check out with PayPal using the freedom card? Anyone know if the bonus points will still get applied from the portal?
Yes, that should work fine.
AA purchased did not trigger 5x even though it has “PAYPAL COM” in the transaction details. was able to SM and get the manual points adjusted. it was only a $193 OW ticket.